Misty Lowlands

Thursday 2/8/18 3:55 AM

Yesterday morning there was a thick fog as I rode to my class. It was difficult to see more than ten or twenty yards in front of my motorcycle as I drove, and my ride was filled with anxiety because of my inability to see. I continually wondered if a car would appear in my lane or if an animal might be crossing in front of me. Either scenario could be devastating while riding a bike.

Today I read the invocation in my devotional material by A. W. Tozer with a different slant. He writes, “…give me grace to rise and follow you up from this misty lowland where I have wondered so long.” The past couple of years have been a time of meandering through the mist in my personal relationship with God. I feel much like my drive yesterday, uncertain of what may lie ahead and proceeding with much caution or else just hunkering down waiting for the fog to clear. There is something refreshing about simply resting in one place, but I feel as if my relationship is not as deep or intimate as it was previously.

I’ve heard people say that if you are not growing then you are dying. Today I read an excerpt from The Growing Edge by Howard Thurman who seems to agree. He writes, “For we must know that we are not through growing, developing; that man is not finished; but that also there is inherent in life itself that which places limitations upon us.” He goes on to point out that if something continues growing unhindered, like your feet for example, that would cause big problems. He continues, “It is a wonderful thing that inherent in the life process are limitations, so that though new things start growing, old things also stop growing. I am always reminded that the experience which may be mine at a particular moment may be an experience in which things are stopping. Or it may be an experience in which things are just beginning. It is important that I know which process is taking place. An intimate part of growing into life is the development of a sensitiveness, an apprehension of process in its totality, that I may be enabled to know the character of the even with which I am dealing. Then I will not act in the house of death unnaturally by not accepting it. All of this is to say that there is inherent in life and brooding over the life of man the creative mind and the spirit of the living God.”

Perhaps my time of meandering in the misty lowlands of the past couple of years has been the dying off of one area of my life while God is preparing me for a time of growth in a new area. As Thurman suggests, I pray that I will be sensitive to know the nature of which process is which and follow God’s leading as he brings me out from the mist.