Sun rises from darkness (photos)
The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it (John 1:4-12)
I wrote my last post in one mammoth sitting.
I just woke up one morning and started writing. From start to finish.
The I let it sit for a day.
The morning after I wrote it, I went on my usual sunrise prayer walk.
I wanted to take some photos to try to capture the holiness and beauty of my experience. To attempt to capture the sanctity of sunrise, to make its point.
My camera battery was flat and it’s basically blasphemy for my to take my phone.
So I left empty-handed.
I felt excited, joyful and started my prayerful intentions —
Within moments as I reached my gate, I witnessed the most enormous rainbow explode from out of the path ahead of me.
I ran home quickly and got my phone.
I laughed thinking that God is probably just messing with me, and by the time I got back to the gate, the rainbow would be gone and I’ll take that as my sign — to just enjoy the walk, immersed in prayer. That it was probably a test.
But the rainbow was brighter and bolder when I get back.
The message I got was actually — YES.
Today, your purpose is to fully and openly share the beauty of God, and you shall be rewarded.
Then there were even more rainbows.
Now my crusty old iPhone 7 doesn’t take the best pictures these days, but it managed.
The confirmation was even more powerful, because in the night I was visited by darkness. It wasn’t the first time. The last (and only other time I can remember) I’ve been visited by darkness in my sleep was the night before I got baptised. Even my Pastor said he felt it too.
It’s common, apparently, before taking these kinds of leaps that the enemy will have its “last ditch attempt” to try to persuade you away from the light. Oh, I felt it. Anxious, pervasive, dark and tormenting thoughts overcame me. Both times.
But I knew it wasn’t mine, or from me.
I don’t have those kinds of thoughts, and I knew what I needed to do in my hazey lucid state recognising that something wasn’t right and I was not going to have a bar of it.
I called on the Lord, and energetically shouted OUT. Away with you.
The way he would rebuke and cast out demons from the sick.
With an unpenetrable conviction that I was protected, that the battle had already been won against darkness in Christ, and that when I woke up, there would be light.
In the morning, both times, I felt lighter and freer than I ever had.
The ultimate breakthrough.
I was given confirmation, through the beauty and grace of God, that I was walking the right path. I mean, can you get any louder than rainbows?
A friend of mine told me that she would pray for my protection, knowing that I was going to share my testimony, and then shared her own experiences around sharing her testimony publicly. I appreciated those prayers.
But I also knew, with deep confirmation on that sunrise prayer walk, that the heavens were indeed rejoicing.
So I found my peace, and scheduled to hit send.
In the end, the photos made the post too large. So here we are.
Now they have their own post.
For their own purpose and intention.
For the beauty of the story of sunrise, beyond words.
I’m also going to re-share the final chapter of my last (enormous) post for those of you who didn’t make it all the way through, or weren’t interested in reading my whole testimony. This last chapter is about my sunrise prayer walks, and the birth of Book 2: Stories of Sunrise, and what they’re all about. See below xx
The Beauty of Sunrise.
A friend of mine introduced me to Prayer Walks. I’m not exactly sure how she does them, but I’ve come to learn it doesn’t matter how you pray. It just matters that you try. You do. You be devoted in your faith and your connection.
Because every human will have their own, unique experience and connection with God.
God only ever meets you where you are.
Continually revealing new revelations for your walk in the perfect time.
Everyone is at their own unique point in their journey and their walk.
Everyone.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve known Scripture of the KJV your whole life. It doesn’t matter if you opened a Bible for the first time yesterday. It doesn’t matter if have a direct, audible daily line with your Creator or you don’t hear from Him for years and years. It doesn’t matter if you’re distracted by the world of the Flesh, or if you’re living devout as a Nun.
What I’ve come to learn that matters, is that God meets you where you are at.
And you have faith in that. In Him.
And you continue to have faith in that. In Him.
And you trust, submit and obey to His will.
There’s those words that I mentioned at the beginning. Those words that can make a modern feminist shudder. I hear you, sister. Those words have been poisoned by the world. By man, by sin. But when those words are used in the context, out of this world, by God… all I can say is, watch your life change.
Watch your heart find peace.
Watch your marriage become whole.
Watch your anxiety melt away.
Watch your capacity to give expand.
Watch your children’s nervous system relax.
(Children are so naturally at home in the arms of God)
Watch miracles happen.
My prayer walks usually happens at sunrise. Sometimes at other times in the day, but almost always at sunrise. I love to get up and go and breathe the new day into my heart. Plus my husband usually goes to work, so it’s “my time” before the responsibilities of the day begin.
I don’t take music or a phone or anything else.
I walk around the perimeter of the 60acres of forest on our block, or I walk the 3km down the end of our driveway past the neighbours forests and farms.
Either way, I am alone. I am amongst my favourite Church (nature), and I witness the beauty of Creation.
It’s so beautiful I pretty much cry every morning.
I awkwardly talk to God, “Hey God, me again! Har har… How are you today? Ahh, silly question, why would I ask YOU that?”
Some people preach that He loves hearing our voices. My experience has shown that to be true. Whenever I’ve connected orally or prayed with my spoken word, it’s been a totally different experience.
It’s often as if I hear His whispers speaking back to me in the hush of the wind through the trees, or the sudden appearance of a giant rainbow.
Sometimes my prayer walks feel arbitrary, and I just “think” the whole time, caught up in my ego, caught up in the world of flesh and material matters.
Sometimes they give me unparalleled insight.
Either way, they give me peace.
A walk in nature is a healing thing on its own. But add prayer, and now we’re talking…
When I was deciding “what to do” with these Stories, as I knew that my journey to “nothingness” had come to its natural end (at least in this part of my life), I went on a prayer walk, and all became clear.
Beauty.
The first time I acknowledged “God” in my writing, was last year when I was travelling to the Kimberley, and I was learning about the Renaissance. I was learning about people’s devotion in that period to try to “capture” the beauty of God through art.
I had so many “downloads” during this time. Of course, it took me many months to make sense of them. I’m still making sense of them.
Many of which, will unfold over the coming years — in God’s timing.
I am patient and trusting, but I know what is coming.
A retreat, a place, of Godly beauty, where the intention is to know God through beauty.
When I walk along the track in the mornings, and I witness the dew drops illuminated by the rising sun on the old wire fencing, the spider webs sparkling, the golden light turning darkness into the fresh greens of forest, the kangaroos eating their morning fruits, the farm animals meeting me with curiosity or fear along the fence line, the mist of the morning air hovering above the road…
When I witness the sheer beauty of sunrise every day I go on my walks…
And how it changes, every day…
I just know.
Over the last year I have written many different posts.
Posts sharing about my own past experiences, sharing about my current experiences, sharing about my Truths in the moment, sharing about my opinions and perspectives on different topics.
Sometimes they’ve just been simple. But often there has been a “crusading” energy behind them, because of my inflated sense of self-importance that my words matter in some way. That they might even “impact” lives.
And I often get messages and emails sharing in all the ways they have.
I know, even this post, will impact someone’s life in some way.
That’s the thing about walking your walk, and then allowing people to witness it.
But I know that I am being called down another path.
My priorities in the World have changed.
It’s inevitable once you meet your Creator and your Saviour that your whole life changes. It has too. You can’t simple carry on how you were before.
I want to invest my energy into cooking food for the hungry and the hearts that need nourishing. I want to sit and have cups of tea with my grandmother and the elderly and listen. I want to have dinners with friends regularly rather than feeling scarce in my time and energy. I want to be totally and utterly immersed in the simplicity of connection with my very real world in front of me. With those that I can touch. And preparing paper, hand-drawn cards to those that we love that are far away.
The internet is a funny illusion like that.
I don’t believe in this artificial world we have progressed to that it is truly possible to connect or impact through this medium anymore. We have gone past the tipping point, and that’s that.
God has made it clear to me, my work is in the Flesh and the Spirit, and not this deceptive, illusionary medium that perpetuates the “Not God” phenomena I shared about in the chapters above.
I close Book 1: Stories of Sunyata: Becoming Nothing in a World That Expects Everything.
And I open Book 2: Stories of Sunrise: After Nothingness, Comes Everything.
Like the literal void before Creation, like the darkness before the sun comes up.
Genesis 1:2
From nothingness, comes everything.
Going forward, I don’t know what I’ll share in this new book yet.
I suppose most authors know what they’re going to write in a book before they write it.
But these are books of discovery for me.
I was thinking of even simply taking photos of my morning sunrise prayer walks sometimes and sharing them. One little snap that captures a thousands words. Poetry that has been inspired by the beauty of God. Reflections on my walk as I continue to have new revelations.
I will take photos on a camera. Write poems with a quill pen on paper. I will write in a journal. Perhaps I’ll even get a typewriter.
And from time to time, I’ll upload it here, into this new book.
Snippets and musings of beauty.
Forging a new path and story with a heart in tune with the beauty of God’s.
End. Next. Begin.