My spacious place

Hello, God.

This is how it was.

I was trapped in a deep, deep hole. A mine-shaft. It went down and down and down and I was flat against the wall on a ledge only wide enough for my feet. Unstable and terrified of falling off. It was so deep that I couldn't see the bottom and I was so far down that I couldn't see the top. There was only darkness. Afraid to move, trembling and unable to get my breath, I was so scared and I was crying out to you.

You heard me. Suddenly you were there next to me. You had your arm around me and I cried harder and harder. You asked me if I wanted you to help me climb out but I was paralysed with fear and there was no way that I could step off the ledge to try to climb. You offered to carry me out on your back and  I nodded tearfully. You helped me climb on, and although I was scared I didn't feel as if I'd fall. In no time we were out into the sunlight and we collapsed onto the grass at the top of the mineshaft. 

We were on a cliff top. The grass was soft and green. Behind us were cornfields behind a wooden fence, and fifty yards in front of us the cliff edge and below us a wide sandy beach and the sea. The sky was vast and blue, the sun shining, a few white clouds dotted about and the odd seagull swooping.  A huge wonderful landscape, wide and sweeping.  

We sat by the mouth of the mineshaft. I took deep breaths. I felt safer but I didn't want to move in case I fell in. You saw my unease and so you filled in the hole. Just like that. Immediately grass began to grow over the new earth. You asked me if I wanted to stand on top but I said no. I didn't trust the new ground. It might give way and swallow me. I might find myself back on that ledge in the darkness. 

You got to your feet and you walked onto the new grass. You turned to me and stood with your arms wide as if to say, 'Look!' A gentle breeze was blowing and it blew your hair and your clothes. You looked strong and sure. You stamped a couple of times to demonstrate how firm the ground was, and then you began to dance. Faster; you danced a comical little jig with a big grin on your face. You made me laugh. You invited me to dance with you but I shook my head. I was happy to sit on the soft grass leaning back on my elbow and watch you, dancing in the sun. You asked me why not and I looked away, 'I'm too clumsy to dance.'

You stepped over to me and held out your hands. I hesitated. You took my hands in yours and pulled me to my feet. You drew me gently towards you and we danced. With my cheek on your shoulder, we danced. Slowly swaying on the miraculous new ground with the sea beyond and the sun above, we danced. 

After a while we sat down again and you told me I was precious. You had a present for me. From nowhere you produced a big bunch of beautiful flowers. Red and orange and yellow blooms, vivid and jewel-like, with lush green foliage, you handed them to me with a smile. 

Incredulous, I looked at you questioningly, 'What is this?' 

You said, 'The Holy Spirit. A gift. For you.'

Later you were looking for someone. She was hiding in the cornfield, crouched deep behind the long stalks waving in the wind on the other side of the fence from the grass where we were sitting. You knew where she was straight away and you went over and leaned your arms on the fence, looking down at her. She was crying. She had tried to hide from you because she was Unworthy. Your face was kind; gentle and patient. You asked her if she wanted a cuddle and she nodded yes through her tears.

Effortlessly you leaned over the fence and picked her up under her arms and lifted her out of the cornfield into your arms. She was just a child. She clung to you and cried and cried. You wrapped your arms around her, laid your cheek against her head and rocked her gently from side to side. After a while you pulled away so that you could see her face and you asked if there was anyone else with her. She pointed behind her and there, still in the field was a toddler, scarcely old enough to stand alone, wailing piteously with both arms outstretched to be carried. She was Lonely. 

You cuddled them both. You were kneeling on one knee and they were clinging to you and crying. You smoothed their hair and whispered kindness to them.

When they were calmer you began to look for someone else. You didn't have to look for long, even though she'd tried to get away from you. Standing in the far corner of the cornfield under a huge oak tree was another child, older, maybe seven or eight. She stood with her arms folded and scowled with a sulky expression as you approached. You held out a hand but she didn't want to come with you. She was Control, and she wanted to stay that way. You talked softly with her and eventually, reluctantly, she followed you. As you turned to leave you looked up into the wide limbs of the tree and saw another little girl sitting on a branch. Her name was Grief. She stared at you silently with big, tear-filled eyes. You opened your arms and she slipped easily off the branch into them.  She put her arms around your neck. 

You walked down the path at the side of the cornfield away from the oak tree and towards the cliff path and the grass again. You were carrying the youngest child and leading the other three. You were gentle and loving and so kind. I watched from the edge of the grass, leaning on the fence, my back to the cornfield and the sun warm on my face. 

You walked to the edge of the cliff and you knelt down and spoke to them. Three of the little girls responded to you immediately and lifted their arms to be picked up but the older girl turned round and looked at me. She didn't want to go. The others did. One by one you picked them up in your arms and threw them high into the air; Grief, Lonely, Unworthy. Each one became a beautiful white bird that fluttered high above before catching a thermal and rising higher and higher into the blue sky. Last of all you turned to the older child, Control. She looked up at you, then pleadingly at me, and when I didn't respond, she turned and met your gaze and slowly lifted her arms. You threw her upwards and she too, soared away. 

You turned back to me. We stood, you and I, looking at each other. Me, leaning against the cornfield fence, the wood warm on the small of my back, you at the edge of the cliff, silhouetted by the sun, the sea stretching behind you to the horizon. You were smiling, with your head on one side. You lifted your arms until they were stretched wide.

This is our place. A place where I can breathe deeply, where the air is pure and sweet. A place where I can find you and you seem always to be waiting for me when I go there. I feel light and happy and free. 

It is my spacious place. 

'When hard pressed, I cried to the Lord;

He brought me into a spacious place.'

Psalm 118:5

'He brought me out into a spacious place;

He rescued me because he delighted in me.'

Psalm 18:19

Rock of ages

'Hello again, Lord.

This morning I was feeling sad. Cross and sad. Hard done to. Unappreciated. You know the sort of thing. It was all people stuff. Hurt feelings and so on. It might all have been trivial but it was painful and I was sad. It felt very bad at the time.

I lay on my bed and had a little cry. I tried to read some of my devotional book but I wasn't really paying attention and had to keep starting the paragraph again. I was just feeling worse and worse. I decided to go off by myself for a little while.

I thought I'd find somewhere out in the countryside on my own and sit down and see if I could find you. As I drove off I wasn't sure where I was going and I had tears streaming down my face. I couldn't go anywhere in civilisation. I turned the worship music off because I didn't want to hear anything upbeat. 

Got where I was going. Parked the car. Bought a drink from the ice-cream van because I didn't have any change for the car park machine. Wondered if it was worth it as I only had half an hour. Placed ticket in window of car, locked up, trudged along path to find a place away from the myriad of hikers. 

Tear-stained and sniffly. Red-eyed and red-nosed, clutching a handkerchief. Everyone else there seemed to be kitted out with hiking boots and gaiters, rucksacks and walking poles. Those little transparent pockets with maps in. All organised and purposeful. 

Rock of ages, cleft for me

My favourite place. I left the path and began to meander among the rocks on the Edge. I kept stopping and looking about me for the right spot. I asked you to find me a place. It didn't take long. 

It was a hollow. A little rocky, grassy niche between a few mammoth boulders strewn there for centuries. I could sit on a smooth rock with my back against another and a few feet away more enormous stones sheltered me from the breeze and from anyone else. 

I could have been the only person in the world. 

I felt as if I was protected. Tucked away. Hidden. Surrounded on three sides. Enveloped. And not by rocks but by you. 

Safe. 

You know what came to mind?

This: 

'Rock of ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in thee.'

I hid myself in you.  It wasn't for very long, because I had to get back, but for a short space of time this morning I left my little world and sat with you in yours. Apart from some hikers miles away in the valley there was no-one in sight but I was not alone. You were all around me. All around me, just as you always are, but I was aware of your presence in a wonderful way. You were with me. You showed things to me. You were tapping my shoulder and pointing and saying, 'Look. Use your imagination.'

I could hear the birds. Countless voices, different calls.  I must find out about birdsong so that I know whose voice is whose. Sweet twittering and chirruping and the low call of the wood-pigeon. Swifts swooped and danced in the air. A kestrel hovered. A couple of bees buzzed in front of me. The wind whispered in long grass. A bird flew past level with the rocky edge and I could hear its whistling wing-beats. Another came to land close to me but was surprised to find me there and took off in a flutter of feathers. A dog barked and I heard its owner's whistle.  

So beautiful but so easy to miss.

The rock I was leaning against had horizontal striations which might tell a geologist something about its history. Not me; it just said to me that it had been around an awful long time. Millstone Grit. Different shades of sandstones in layer upon layer. 

Roses of lichen in a palette of grey and white flowered across the surface and soft green moss on the sides in the damp and shade. Rabbit pellets by my feet, heather in white, brown, cream and the palest of pink. A tiny spider made its way across the rock face. 

Down in the valley where the road curled round and back on itself the odd car went past. The irregular shaped fields, marked out with Derbyshire dry stone walls, were home sheep or cows, or horses, or crops. I was high enough looking down that huge oak and beech trees seemed small, dwarfed by the landscape of ridge and rocks. In the distance a forest of birch. 

Occasionally there was a small break in the clouds and sunshine played on the greenness for a moment or two until it disappeared again. 

Immediately to my right was a deep crevice in the rock. Dark enough for me to prevent me from seeing how far it went back into the hillside. At such an angle that the light was dim. In this crack in the rock was growing a fern. A small plant, sturdy and healthy-looking, growing in a most inhospitable spot. Damp and  hidden from view unless you were sitting exactly where I was sitting. I would never have noticed it if I were just walking past. You knew it was there. You showed it to me. 

Look, in the darkest places, life. Not just surviving, but flourishing. 

The fern was thriving in the darkness of it's little crevice. Unfurling it's fronds in the space it had taken root. 

'Rock of ages, cleft for me.Let me hide myself in thee.'

It was beautiful. Bright, improbable green against the grey and brown of the rock.  You can bring life out of darkness. Hope out of despair. Beauty out of ugliness.

As I leaned back the rock was hard behind me and cold underneath me. Each side of me there was rock. In front of me opened out a vista to gaze at for hours. Openness and space.  Unyielding stone behind and yet in front, a vision of your glory.

When my back is against the wall, there you are in front of me. With beauty and majesty and glory spread out to breathe new life into my soul.

When I was suffocating, there you were with fresh air.

Deep breaths.

A safe place. A few moments of stillness. Solitude. A space where my lungs could fill. I thought I was finding a place to have a cry and lick my wounds; maybe tell you all about my hurt feelings and upset, but instead you took my hand and led me to a place where you could soothe me. A spacious place.

'You brought me out into a spacious place...'

2 Samuel 22:20

Rock of ages. From the beginning of time you have been unchanging. All else fades or evolves or shifts. I know that the seemingly permanent landscape of the countryside that I love so much would alter unrecognisably before you will change even a tiny bit. You are firm and solid, reliable and faithful. Everlasting. Eternal. A safe harbour. A place to run to.

My refuge.

'Oh Lord, my strength and my fortress
my refuge in times of distress.'

Jeremiah 16:19

My rocky fortress indeed. Hidden from view.

I was distressed and you took me away to a place I could breathe. You held my hand and showed me your treasures and you smiled on me. My refuge indeed.

I may have missed church this morning but I still visited your sanctuary. I met you and we sat together a while. It was a holy place where I could worship.

Thankyou, my God.

On the way home I turned up the worship music and sang.