Chapter 19- In Which Jesus and I go for a walk in the woods.

Me and Jesus. We go on adventures.  At the risk of sounding corny and silly, I want to tell you about how I pray, because it has become part of my Josiah story.

As you know, I am a visual person.  I can't remember anything unless I see it.  The same goes with praying.  Put me in a room all by myself with no distractions, and my prayer will start off something like this, "Dear God,
Thank you for this day.
Thank you for my kids.
Thank you for my food.
Bless so and so and so and so....
and what should I make for dinner tomorrow?
Oh...I need to do another load of laundry.
Are my jeans clean?  I need new jeans.
When can I go shopping next?
Oh sorry God...Bless so and so...
man, I liked the jeans SHE was wearing the other day.
 I wonder where she got those?"

Distracted.  That's what I am.  I'm sure I'm not alone on this.  So to help, I used to imagine myself standing before the throne of God with prayer requests like a grocery list, with cupped hands yelling my requests up a long staircase to where God was sitting.  Heaven was all white- white clouds, white stairs, misty air, and a very non-descriptive shiny gold throne.  He would lean forward, cup His hand around His ear and in His omniscience fill in everything that I forgot to pray for.  After my "amen" I would turn around and see all of my requests answered.  He would sit back and on His throne, fingers interlocked behind His head and say, "Yep...I'm amazing.  Look what I can do because I'm God."  

This was helpful because I could usually get through all of my prayer requests before I managed to fall asleep.  But this isn't who God is.

After my dream I had about the river, Jesus and I go places together.  Sometimes hand in hand, sometimes arm in arm, sometimes He leads, or I'm ahead of Him and He tells me where to go.  Sometimes I'm little and I'm on His shoulders, my hands under His chin.  Sometimes I'm old and He is patient to walk beside me with slow labored steps.  Each night when I lay my head down I say, "God...where should we go today?"  I don't know what Heaven looks like- I can imagine it, but I can't fill in the details, so we go to all of my favorite places where I remember what they looked like, smelled like, and how warm the sun felt when I was there.

We take walks to the beach.  Sometimes sandy white Caribbean beaches, sometimes rocky Maine beaches where we climb over boulders together where we can help each other up.

We go for horse-drawn carriage rides in Central Park.

We climb snowy mountains with snowshoes.    

We pick flowers in fields by streams.

We walk sandy paths lined by fall-colored trees.

We ride a surrey down the boardwalk.

We sit by a weeping willow tree and have a picnic.

We go swimming in my lake.

We ride gondolas in Venice.

I pick the first place that pops into my head, because I think its His answer.  And along the way as we go, I ask Him if we can pass all the people He wants me to pray for.  They don't usually see us, but we see them.  We stop and linger until I tell Him all that's bothering me and what I wish would happen for them.  He lets me talk.  He is patient and smiles.  And when He smiles, I know that He has everything under control, and we can keep walking together, because He has other things for me to see.  I think he likes me to tell Him about my concerns, not because He doesn't know what I what to happen.  He knows how much I'm hurting for other people.  He just wants me to know that He can carry the burden alone, and He wants me to be able to acknowledge it.

  
I know this is a silly way to pray.  That I'm probably humanizing our amazing, holy God too much.  But when I pray like this, He cares about me so intimately and is so patient with me and loves me like a Friend and a Father all at once.  Confidant and Consoler. Protector and Provider.  The Psalms tell me this is who God is.

The most amazing thing about praying this way is that sometimes when I'm about to fall asleep- in that place between sleep and awake, Jesus starts to say things that I never imagined He would say- things I couldn't  possibly put in his mouth because I wouldn't come up with them on my own.  And I remember Bible verses I never thought I knew.  This is when I know that my prayer walk has turned into something much more than a silly daydream.  When I wake up, He has taught me something about Himself.  It never contradicts His Word.  And it always affirms that He is in control and I am not.

I can tell you the color of leaves and how the waves sounded when they crashed and how blue the sky is, but I can never picture Jesus all at once.  My mind won't let me.  Sometimes I just see His eyes when they're crying like mine.  Sometimes I see his rough, capable carpenter's hands when he asks me to hand things over to him.  I see his sandaled feet when I am looking down when we're walking. He has sure steps that know where they are going.

Lately, we do a lot of holding baby Lydia.  I hold her and we walk and I cry, and Jesus asks if He can hold her.  I hand her over and we walk together.  And when I look up, she has grown and is a toddler and wants to walk herself.  And she skips beside us.  And she wants to go play with my baby girl Maggie, who is in Heaven.  And they pick flowers together and have matching blonde pigtails.  That one happens a lot.  

But yesterday was one of those sacred times where God takes over.  "Let's go swimming," I say.  We went swimming the night before and it was refreshing. I was hoping we could do that again.
"I want to take you for a walk in the woods." I think He says.  He usually wins.

We went into my backyard.  I have twenty acres of beautiful oaks, pines, maples, and holly trees.  I love trees.  Almost as much as I love birds.  But I can never enjoy them because South Jersey has too many ticks.  But in my prayer, Jesus takes them away for our walk.

Before I go on about my prayer, I have to tell you about my day.  Brenda came over.  Her first of many visits that are going to occur weekly now.  I made sure the house was spotless.  It smelled amazing from candles that were burning all day.  Molly and Josiah's room was perfect- every single stitch of clothing put away in their dresser and closets.  I made pink lemonade.  I had brownies ready.  I wanted her to know what an amazing place Josiah had been living.  How the house was filled with so much love and joy and creativity.

When she came (half an hour late) she didn't even say one word about the house.  The first thing she said was how fat Josiah looked and asked what he'd been eating.  (half in a joking tone, but one I knew there was truth behind.)  It felt like a jab at the kind of mother I was.  How she thought she would be a better mother than me.  She didn't want a brownie or lemonade.  She drank water, sat on the floor with Josiah and kissed him so many times, he couldn't even really look at her face.  She told me how she had gotten a house and was going out that night to buy a crib.  She talked about how God was making everything so easy and how everything was falling into place in His perfect timing.

I hated watching her kiss my son.  I wanted to just tell her how I felt- how I couldn't imagine him leaving.  He was a part of a family now...couldn't she see?

I had words for Jesus, but when we went for a walk in the woods, I couldn't think of anything to say to Him, so I just kicked the dry leaves with every step I took.  I wanted him to know how angry and confused I was.  I was in a place I didn't want go.   I think I fell asleep because usually when Jesus and I walk places in my mind, they are beautiful places.  The sun is shining, birds are singing, and He makes me feel better.  Its spring and leaves are green.  But the woods were not a happy place today.  They were gray and frustrating- filled with branches I kept tripping over and briars that got stuck to my jeans.  Jesus would patiently stoop down and carefully grab a strand of briars so I could take another step towards the place  He wanted me to go.  When I looked around me, there was no path- just endless amounts of trees and briars.

"There's no path anymore." I said.  "How are we going to know where we're going?!"

"I made the woods," He said.

"But I can't see where we're going!" Didn't He know how frustrated I was?

"But I MADE the woods."

I woke up.

He made the woods.....the words still lingered.

He knew where we were, where we were going, and how we were going to get there.  He knew if there was a path, I wouldn't need him.  He left every aggravating obstacle in my way so I would know that HE was the one to push them aside.

I'm still angry at Brenda.  I know I shouldn't be because she thinks what she is doing is the will of God.  And maybe it is.  Maybe I've been misreading the fact that I am called to be Josiah's mom.  I so much want to see where I'm going.  But God knows its more important for me to see where I've been and to know that He's with me.

And I'm sad today.  Court is on Tuesday and I'm bracing for heartbreak.

I know I'm letting the worry of tomorrow rob my joy from today.  But some days I need to let the briars prick me so I can remember what they felt like, and give God the glory when they won't be there anymore.