Being still

As I laid on the cot in the doctor's office, receiving my bi-weekly acupuncture treatment for my knee, I had to be very still. Any movement on my part would cause the already prickly needles to send waves of pain shooting through my body. It was at that moment when Psalm 46:10 came to my mind, "Be still and know that I am God."

By nature I am not a still person. I have to be busy, so that verse always seemed to puzzle me as I wasn't sure how to define still. Thanks to my acupuncture treatments, I am beginning to understand. Then I came across this short piece that helped my understanding even more. It's called the "Isolation Chamber".

There is a time and place in our walk with God in which He sets us in a place of waiting. It is a place in which all past experiences are of no value. It is a time of such stillness that it can disturb the most faithful if we do not understand that He is the one who has brought us to this place for only a season. It is as if God has placed a wall around us. No new opportunities -- simply inactivity. During these times, God is calling us aside to fashion something new in us. It is an isolation chamber designed to call us to deeper roots of prayer and faith. It is not a comfortable place, especially for a task-driven busy person. Our nature cries out, "You must do something," while God is saying, "Be still and know that I am God." You know the signs that you have been brought into this chamber when He has removed many things from your life and you can't seem to change anything. Perhaps you are unemployed. Perhaps you are laid up with an illness. Most religious people live a very planned and orchestrated life where they know almost everything that will happen. But for people in whom God is performing a deeper work, He brings them into a time of quietness that seems almost eerie. They cannot say what God is doing. They just know that He is doing a work that cannot be explained to themselves or to others. Has God brought you to a place of being still? Be still and know that He really is God. When this happens, the chamber will open soon after.

For many reasons, I can honestly say that I feel like I am living in the isolation chamber, and have been for quite some time. There are many things that God is teaching me that I don't think I could learn without this stillness in my life. I don't like it one bit, but I know that it has its purpose. Lately my life seems to be out of my control and I find frustration lurking at every corner. God is clearly asking me to dig deeper within myself to see things I wouldn't have taken the time to see otherwise. The comfort in all this, however, is that it is only for a season. Eventually the chamber will open, and when it does I think I will walk with the Lord as never before because I was willing to be still and know that He really is God, acupuncture treatments and all.