Saturday, January 30, 2010

Joy to you and me

I spent a blissful five days in Florida this past week, basking in 70 degree weather and the presence of awesome love. It would be impossible to catalog all of the ways in which God moved during this trip, but I'm going to try in a series of posts.

First, about the church service we attended.

It is always interesting to compare other services within the same communion (ICCEC) as ours. Some are higher church, some are more charismatic, some are close to us in the style of worship. In this case, the style was pretty similar. Several prayer teams were available after the Eucharist, and DiDi urged me to ask for prayer about a physical condition. The Holy Spirit was heavily present, and I stood behind her for the prayer -she- was receiving, because she was swaying with the weight of it.

When it was my turn, the woman prayed for the physical stuff, and after pausing, prayed that God would remove the little scrap of sorrow from me and replace it with joy. I had my eyes closed, but DiDi reported that when she spoke the words, her hand flung out toward me first as if to pluck something from my chest, and then whipped back as if slamming something in.

Joy immediately bubbled up within my chest, and a giggle snuck out of my mouth. At the same time, both DiDi and the prayer warrior also began to chuckle, and gradually, the laughter grew and grew between the three of us until we could not control it. We laughed until tears ran down our cheeks and our stomachs ached. We laughed as the recessional music played and the dismissal was announced. And through our laughter I heard the laughs of people behind us. DiDi later told me that when she looked around, she saw the whole congregation laughing.

The church was filled with His joy.

It was an awesome gift, delivered before what was to be a hard afternoon and evening. A profound gift of joy and laughter, not only for us, visitors to this far-away church, but also for His family who regularly gathered there. And for the woman who stood in obedience to pray for those who come before Him, seeking.

3 comments:

Diane Marie Hall said...

Joy immediately bubbling up....wow!
praising God .

Ike said...

Gospel humility frees you from the need to posture and pose and calculate what others think, so that you are free to laugh at what is really funny with the biggest belly laugh. Proud people don’t really let themselves go in laughter. They don’t get red in the face and fall off chairs and twist their faces into the contortions of real free laughter. Proud people need to keep their dignity. The humble are free to howl with laughter.

Suzanne Marie DeWitt said...

May I always be humble enough to howl!