In the middle of it…

So this week was one of those weeks. I am pretty sure you know that kind of week-where you are counting down the days until a 3 day weekend and accidentally get your days mixed up trying to rush to the weekend. A week where you have been vacillating between trying to fight back tears and yelling out loud, “Has everyone gone plum crazy?!”

Just one of them days weeks 

After I left church and a meeting on Sunday afternoon (after a great worship experience I might add), there was a sudden heaviness that kind of plopped itself right on top of me, literally out of nowhere. I am all too familiar with it too, except “it” and I parted ways over 3 years ago for good when the Lord completely healed me from depression. Yet, this time it was different.  I honestly had nothing to be down or depressed about and was really feeling so joyful and at peace just a couple of hours before. Somehow, this familiar spirit thought it could just come on in uninvited, perhaps thinking I would welcome it with open arms.  Absolutely not!  Especially not after I found out that I could be and was set free from it! The Lord served this spirit its death certificate a while ago and there would not be a resurrection!

I also attributed it to the fact that my cycle was due to visit me this week-clearly another unwanted visitor.  I am getting older and it seems these periods seem to show up with brand new symptoms each month. I came home, turned my phone off and took a long nap. Oh yeah, and I ate–probably too much too!  I still had the same feeling when I woke so I thought it would pass in the morning. Monday came around and still no change.  I fought through it as I usually do, while praying and staying in my Word. For some reason, it just wouldn’t go away. For me, this was frustrating.  At least if I could pinpoint the reason for this heaviness, I would feel a little better.  Aside from the fact that I may be getting ready to embark on a major transition in my life sooner than I expected, what else could it possibly be?!

Aha! Bingo! There it was. This was probably the cause of this heaviness I was experiencing-facing the unknown. I was indeed full of a mixture of emotions: fear, anxiety, excitement, apprehension, awe, wonderment, etc.  You name it, I probably experienced it. I had been waiting on a response since 2015 for something and honestly I had forgotten about it. I figured that if it was God’s will, He would bring it back if/when He was ready.Then a response literally came a year later, almost to the date, and I was like, “What? Huh? How? Right Now, Lord? Really?” A friend of mine even said to me, “It’s funny how we keeping asking God about stuff and for Him to reveal Himself. Then when He starts answering us, we get scared.”  Ain’t that the truth?! I definitely wasn’t prepared for it and yet, here it was. In my blog post a few weeks ago, I talked about the first of several ways of How You Wait. I certainly wasn’t prepared, or at least I didn’t think I was.

My saving grace

I can almost hear my 100+ year old grandmother saying this in her Jamaican patois, “I will bless the Lord at all times and His praise shall continually be in my mouth.” Herein lies another way that we can wait: Rejoice. Could it be that while we are waiting and even sometimes forget we are waiting or what we are waiting on, God may allow us an opportunity, or 3, to Rejoice…in the middle of it?  You see, one of the primary ways that I was able to shift my mood and not ‘sit’ in my depression in the past, once I recognized that this didn’t have to be the life I lived, was through praise and worship.  When I felt the spirit of depression trying to attach itself to me, I would immediately turn on worship music.  Sometimes I would sing along, but other times, I would just let the sound and the words seep deep into my heart as I hummed along softly or just listened. I became intentional about shifting my atmosphere and the environment around me.  Worship has been my saving grace! How could I forget it?  Especially this week. Sometimes when all your prayers have been emptied of its words, your eyes grow tired from reading His Word and your heart aches to be free from this grip, worship is what carries you on. I believe that is what the Lord was pointing me back to this week as well…to rejoice…right in the middle of it.  It is great to rejoice and thank God when you have received what you were waiting for, but what a privilege to do it in the midst of waiting.  He was calling me to rejoice anyway-to praise Him in waiting.

Maybe you can relate to this post or you have had a week or years like the one I had, where depression or a spirit of heaviness seems to grip you and wants to overtake you. Could it be, that just like me, you are on the edge of a breakthrough? The enemy may want you to take your focus off Your Father and entertain him instead so you miss out on what God is doing and where He is getting ready to take you!  My sister, dare I challenge you to rejoice right there…in the middle of it?!

Here are some things I do that have helped me through and that you can use to Rejoice right in the middle of waiting.

1. Create a playlist of worship music.  Here is mine on Youtube.
2. Put some music on at night before you go to sleep and let it play throughout the night.
3. Set your phone or iPad to wake up to Pandora in the morning, on a worship station, instead of a boring alarm sound. (Something I recently discovered.  I know I am late.  Don’t judge me!)
4. Make your own melody and song for the Lord.  You can even use scripture to help you.
5. Sing or read a chapter from the book of Psalm out loud. It doesn’t have to be worship music only.
6. Start describing who God is to you from A-Z, literally. (I didn’t come up with this on my own, unfortunately.)
7. Grab some of your girlfriends and all of you have a praise party  or mini worship session get together!

To start you off and hopefully get you pumped and rejoicing right now wherever you are, here are just 3 of my absolute favorite (currently) “Get you hype” songs! Let’s Rejoice together as we wait!  Regardless of what happens, He is always worth rejoicing over!

Never Fail, In Jesus’Name,  Happy

P.S.  this last bonus was sent to me by two different friends just this week on Wednesday and today. How cool is that?!

Trust in You