heartcry

i recently just put into a formal thought the fact that there are many different types of prayers. i realize that there are categories of prayer like confession, supplication, worship, asking, etc., but as an intercessor, my tendency is to pray for others and rarely myself. that's not exactly conducive to a relationship with the Lord... if i am praying for others all the time, then how can i be listening to and responding to Him? hmmm...

i realize that this seems contradictory to the inward-focused heart work that the past several months worth of posts have centered around. i guess the difference in my mind is that heart work is just that - work. intercessory prayer for someone is different. prayer for myself is different still. this post is about the latter.

if you've read captivating, then you are familiar with the authors' stories about how intimate the Lord can be - just because He loves us and desires to show that love in crazy ways. for john, it was a huge whale breaching in front of his eyes. for staci, it was a cove full of starfish just for her.

it took me awhile to really get focused in on the fact that i was actually going to the retreat. i was distracted by a million different things in the weeks leading up to the retreat, especially the week that i left. i did not have much time to prepare my heart, to focus in on what i wanted to accomplish, much less what He wanted to accomplish. so i started reading captivating again, trying to get focused... and that's where this story picks up...

i began reading on the flight to houston. i didn't get very far, just far into it enough to reaquaint myself with the overall message of the book. i remember closing it in preparation for landing in houston, eyes shut, just focusing on my heart and trying not to think - to let my heart speak instead. i felt a silent cry go out to Him - not really a cognitive thought - for something from Him to speak to my heart - something undeniably from Him straight to my heart. silly as it sounds, if i had to put that heartcry into words... i wanted snow. but not just snow - it's not that uncommon in the higher elevations of the rockies in september - i wanted snow that was undeniably from Him to me.

i don't really remember the layover in houston, and i cat-napped on the flight to denver. did i mention that i had been up since 9:30 wednesday morning, and by the time i got to denver, it was 26 hours later? can we say punchy? but that's a different story. suffice it to say that i did not think about much - particularly about that heartcry - for the rest of thursday. that day was spent traveling, meeting a hundred women in the denver airport, traveling some more, getting registered and settled in, etc... all stories for a different time.

the session thursday night set the tone for the rest of the weekend, and by friday noon, i was totally overwhelmed by the hurt, loneliness, and despondency around me. i mean, i was floored. i found myself praying overtime - in total intercession mode - for these broken and bleeding hearts around me - so much so that i actually had to put in a prayer request to the on-site intercessors to pray for me - that i could focus on myself and my heart instead of those around me. that sounds selfish, but what good am i for anyone else if i don't address my own issues - if i don't let the Lord in and draw near to Him? i ended up see-sawing a lot - going back and forth in heart work for myself, and being unable to not pray for the women and the team there. i guess, in retrospect, that they go hand in hand. the closer i drew to the Lord, the more open my heart became to Him, and of course, the more open and aware i became of His heart for the women there. it was a beautiful dance.

friday night helen, a new friend, told me that she had spent the day crying, and i told her that i was unable to really delve deeply to where my tears dwell - i'm not much of a crier - and she promptly told me that saturday was my day. i'm laughing now at how right she was...

to put it mildly, the morning session on saturday was intense. seriously intense. it centered around His desire to be the Lover of our souls, the One in whom we trust and love and look to before anyone else in our lives. i was engaged, but being the intense person that i already am, i was not overly emotional. in reality, i was so amazed by the truth of His love, the beauty of the message that He has given ransomed heart, and the absolute need for that truth to become so pervasive in my life that it becomes just part of who i am, of who we are. i don't know if it was planned, or if staci just sensed the intensity of that moment, but she decided to take a break. she ended the session by saying that there will never be a man in our lives like the Man... and then...

the back doors of the conference center flew open, and it was snowing so hard, it was coming in sideways! i absolutely lost it. i burst into tears - no, that's not right. i completely broke down, sobbing uncontrollably because i knew - i knew - that this was from Him. He had given me a vision the night before of me dancing in the snow with Him. i was floating in the hot tub, ears underwater to isolate myself from the chatter around me, and gazing up at the silhouette of the mountains and the stars and i saw just a flash, no more than an instant - just enough to make an imprint on my heart, barely my mind - of dancing in the snow with Him. as the doors flew open and the snow flew in, the women collectively gasped in wonder and awe and everyone ran outside to play in the snow. i'm not sure how i made it outside, i just remember dropping to my knees in the snow, heart bursting with joy.

helen came up to me and said, "let's make snow angels!" so we did, in joyous abandon. then we got up and danced a jig... and He spoke to me again, "you are dancing with Me." i was laughing and crying, wrapped in His love, completely abandoned to the joy of the moment - of Him. someone said later that no one could have punctuated staci's statement that way except Jesus. and how!

we went back into session, only to come out again an hour or so later to find the snow almost completely gone - like it had never happened... and then it snowed the rest of the day, and the rest of the night. someone out there has pictures of us in the hot tub, hair covered in snow and ice. the wind was blasting, snow was landing in our eyes - it was glorious.