“Be Still and Know that I am God” is a conscious decision you make that is an important aspect of Letting Go, and Letting God do His Perfect Work within a given situation.
In a human capacity, being still means to become unmoving, not walking, not talking, not doing. In God’s capacity, we continue living our lives, but this living is for ourselves, walking for ourselves, talking for ourselves, and doing for ourselves, while letting our midlife spouses stand or fall on their own. It also falls within the realm of understanding that we have no control over them, but all control over us.
Being Still also means being willing to trust God, and have faith that He will do the work we know we cannot do within the same kind of situation. How many times have you run ahead of God and made a huge mess, and then appealed to Him in dismay, misery, anger, and dissolved in tears, asking Him to “fix” all of these things? Then, because He didn’t seem to be moving fast enough, you stepped in ahead of Him AGAIN, and created an even bigger mess…it’s something to think about, because I know we’ve all done this.
When you’re being absolutely still, and resting within the peace that God provides you, you are not trying to control, manipulate, fix, or otherwise, rearrange a given situation that involves other people. You detach, distance, stand aside, and learn to wait, and watch for the Lord to do a work like you’ve not ever seen in your life.
God does many great works, He brings forth miracles, and many other wonders you could never explain, except that it was God that did it. However, He will only work when two things are present–your willingness to BE STILL AND KNOW THAT HE IS GOD, and keep the faith that He will move when the time is right.
This movement isn’t in human time–this is in God’s Time, and it goes back to the fact that God knows the future, and He knows what’s ahead. Since He knows all of the these things, it behooves us to trust Him, have faith in Him, and combined with the hope we learn to keep alive in our hearts, we come to know that He really does know what’s best, and He knows the best time for Him to do His Work in our hearts, and in the hearts of those around us.
I was doing some writing offline, when I began thinking about all of the people who had spoken of God as being so “limited” in His Knowings. This shows a clear lack of understanding of God, and all that He is.
If God did not know what was ahead, why would He encourage people to Be Still, and why would He encourage people to make a Stand for their marriages early enough in the midlife crisis to prevent the left behind spouse from walking away?
It bears thinking about, because we do serve an unlimited God, who can do all things. However, considering that we must first walk the road to learn the lessons that are exclusive to each one of us, it stands to reason that God would not intervene in our journeys, except to show gentle reminders that this harder road won’t be walked for nothing. Time is never wasted, when you choose the harder path that leads into greater learning, wisdom, and understanding. Walking the harder road that involves a time of Being Still is a foreign concept to most of us who haven’t come into this kind of understanding just yet.
I know I didn’t understand it at first. Being Still involved letting go, doing nothing about what my then midlife spouse was doing, trusting God to work out the situation on the inside, while allowing Him to guide me on the outside. We learn to set boundaries on behaviors that directly affect us, and that is a major lesson we should learn. Boundaries help us learn to BE STILL, because when we crossover, and begin interfering in someone else’s problems, we are not allowing God to work, we are tying His Hands, so He cannot move for our benefit.
It’s not that God won’t move, it’s just that we get in the way, when we refuse to Be Still, Stand Back, and seek to interfere with a situation that is clearly not in our control. God’s business involves the whole of a person, and He knows that doing His Work inside, will eventually trigger positive results on the outside.
However, if we are constantly interfering on the outside, the midlife spouse will be influenced to continue avoiding themselves on the inside, rendering God’s Work null and void for that time. Being Still helps us to leave the midlife spouse completely alone, and since God also tells us not to be afraid, we learn to overcome our fear of losing what has already been lost.
God is walking with us each and every day, and if you listen closely, His voice is speaking encouragement to your heart. He believes in you, He loves you, and He has faith, confidence, and even hope in your successful navigation through your journey. He is an ever-present help in time of greatest need.
Also, God won’t do everything for you, but He will enable you to move forward once you begin making the effort that leads forward into the increase He will provide.
I’ve seen it happen.
I have come across to a lot of you as a very energetic person with a great deal of work to do. I’ve learned the importance of prioritizing my life, with God, who comes first, me, who comes second, and my husband, who comes third, and if son has need, he’s in line, and the rest falls into place, as God wills it to.
I know what happens when you don’t Be Still, and have that knowing that God is who He is. I once thought I knew more than God did, but boy, was I ever wrong! I achieved more messes than I did successes, simply because I was guilty of not obeying that one simple directive:
Be Still, and Know that I am God
God cleaned up the messes I made time and again, but for each mess I made, there was a consequence faced for it, and faced each one as it came. Time was added to my journey to ensure I learned the lesson attached, there were times when God let an emotional cycle that *I* caused run for much longer than it would have, had I obeyed the above directive, and I cried many tears that would not have been shed, had I just done what I was instructed to do…the above directive.
It wasn’t until his second bout of crisis that I really got what this meant, and I can sit here and tell you that I’m seriously glad for what I went through. Part of it was because it taught me more than I would have learned from one bout of midlife crisis, and part of it, was because a person like me can get quite stubborn at times, and God will recycle stubborn and prideful people through as many times as it becomes necessary to learn what we were meant to learn.
We don’t learn to become Still all at one time, just like we don’t learn to become fully Detached all at one time, and just like we don’t learn to love from a distance all at one time, either.
Everything we learn is a process in itself, and God orchestrates the process by which we, as individuals, are going to learn what He knows we must learn. Learning first becomes about need, then it becomes a necessity, and afterward, it becomes a habitual way of life.
We NEED to learn to Be Still. It is a NECESSITY to learn to Be Still. Lastly, to Be Still becomes a positive HABIT we learn to keep practicing for ourselves.
The best time to practice Being Still, is when you don’t know what to do. Why is that? Because as long as you’re running around making all of these huge messes that you only make worse with your increased meddling, the solution, the knowing, and God’s Guidance that lead into the first two cannot be accessed–they remain blocked from your sight.
It’s like people who constantly ask questions, but don’t process the answers for greater insight. God would add to your knowledge, but you have to Be Still for Him to provide this increase unto you. If you keep asking questions, you confuse yourself to the point you don’t know which end is up, you get angry, you get frustrated, you get into the thinking that people are holding out on you, and this prods you into pushing to the point you’re not listening anymore to anything. You will burn yourself out in a short time, if you don’t learn to slow down, and have faith that you will get what you need when the time is right for you to receive it.
It doesn’t do any good to have answers, if you don’t process them into greater understanding–BE STILL.
When you learn to Be Still, you completely STOP asking, and in a short time, you begin processing within, but it’s not a conscious processing, it’s from a subconscious aspect. This is how God gives the flashes of insight, answers, and a greater understanding of what you’ve received before, but didn’t understand before, because you were not at a certain place of processing that led down that particular road that He wanted you to go down for yourself, but you had to learn to BE STILL to get there.
Don’t look at human people to give you answers–look to God, but first, BE STILL, and come to KNOW in Truth that HE IS GOD, who knows all things, is the author of all things good, and He gives generously of His Knowledge, Wisdom, from the depths of His vast Understanding.
How do I know this? Because I’ve been a recipient so many times, once I learned this lesson of simply BEING STILL, and KNOWING that HE was GOD. I’m a Servant of God, but at the same time, I know that I am not anything, but a willing vessel for His usage.
It’s all good, because it’s all God, all of the time. ((HUGS))
Food for thought. ((HUGS))