waves

last week God gave me this image as i was encouraging someone to keep holding on. sometimes as we journey with God, we feel as if we are not moving or making any progress at all. this often occurs during our winter season -- the season where He is stripping everything so that new life and new things can come about in preparation for the spring season. it is during this season i am sure people get depressed the most - they feel blah because they are "standing" still while everyone else appears to be zooming past them.

God prompted me to consider the ocean. remember when you use to go to the beach and stand in the water while the waves crash all around you? and finally you look up and back to the shoreline to only realize the waves pushed you further into the ocean than you realized or did on your own. the waves are kind of rough at times, but it is those very waves that pushes you out further into greater expanses and horizons.

oftentimes our winter seasons can be as such, we don't feel as if we are moving forward or making progress or getting anywhere but when we look up from our circumstances and look back to where we were, wow, we did make progress. and oftentimes, it was God Himself that carried and moved us.

i have tons of messages from that illustration alone!