This weekend I went home to SLO to go to a retreat in Kern County up in the mountains with my mom and neice. El Camino Pines. Georgiana Rodiger was the speaker because it is basically her retreat - not her camp, but the retreat has been up there twice a year for more than 15 years! - we are her "Rodiger Girls." :)
Anyway, it was very refreshing and I needed a tiny change of pace from the hustle and bustle of UCI-life. Re-connected with some awesome ladies I haven't seen since I was 15 and met some new people. One funny thing is, one of the young men who help out the staff up there said he knew someone who goes to UC Irvine and told me her name, but I didn't think I knew her, but when I got back to my house on campus and was imputing all the Clair de Lune contact numbers into my phone (Clair de Lune is the all girls a cappella choir I am now in! Woot!), I realized I knew this girl he was telling me about! That's so crazy! It's such a small world!
In the mountains it is very easy to give thanks to God and to just be in utter awe of his amazing work; at one point on Saturday evening, I just lay on the ground, gazing up at the starry heavens thanking God for His love and support and for always taking care of me even when I complain.
Every retreat, Georgie leads a "Jesus Walk" in which all the women will lie down in the main cabin/chapel and do a series of short relaxation exercises and then lead them through a type of vision/dream up to a meadow to meet with Jesus. You laugh, but it's dear to my heart and I know to many of the other women. In the "vision" - for lack of a better term - you are to fly out of the chapel through the huge glass cross on the main chapel wall and fly to a hill with pine trees - much like the pines surrounding the entire camp. Walking up the path, you reach a cave; don't go in; keep walking, you can go in on your way back; down the path, you reach a meadow and a stream. Cross the stream and meet Jesus on the other side, and when you are done, come back, but not before you have asked him for your gift, because he has a special gift for you. That is the essence of the "Jesus Walk."
I have a get-to-sleep-helper CD thing that I listen to at night when I am tired but can't fall asleep. It similarly leads me through relaxation exercises and then tells me to envision a peaceful place to which I've previously been. It's been quite awhile since I've been on the Jesus Walk, so I've always imagined the last Jesus Walk I went on for this "Speed Sleep."
This time, I allowed myself to have a new journey, seeing as I am now six years older and my life is different than it was before, as should my journey be.
If you would like to know what my Jesus Walk was this time, continue reading; if not, this post is done. Thanks for reading.
A little backstory:
If you've followed my blog for awhile, you know I've never had a boyfriend. It hasn't been an easy journey, going along without that male companionship that a woman is eventually supposed to have. On one of the mission trips I went on with Grace Bible Church to Mexico, a few girlfriends of mine and I were talking about this very subject and one girl picked up a small rock from the gravel road by which we were sitting and said, "You have been in many relationships, with men with women, platonic and maybe not yet romantically, but any different kinds of relationships and in every one you have given a small piece of yourself. And every relationship, another piece of you have been given away, in efforts to make the relationship work, or to keep it alive or simply in enjoying the journey. But now, all that is left is this rock. You have given away all of you but this rock. And when you meet the man you are supposed to be with for the rest of your life, you have only this rock to give him. And you say to him on your wedding day, 'Over the years, I have given myself away and all that remains is this rock; but I give it to you because it is all that I am. I have nothing to give you but all that is left; this rock.'"
I kept that rock with me wherever I went for almost a year. It now resides at home in a safe spot on one of my craft shelves where I could see it every time I went into the back room of my house in Oceano. But the point is, I've kept it. For awhile, I started getting discouraged that I will never meet the man God has chosen for me, but I am always praying, "God, please prepare me for my husband... And prepared him for me, cause he's gonna need it."
This is what i wrote down immediately after my Jesus Walk:
I flew up on hummingbird-like wings and flew over a yellow meadow with tall yellow grass up to about the knees or hips and a hill in front of me with pine trees popping up all over the place but just on the hill. As i walked up the path, covered mostly in dead, crunchy pine needles; it was shaded by the tall pines and had a butterfly and lizard roaming about.
Straight ahead of me was a black cave a little taller than my own height and it was surrounded by rock and branches of trees. It wasn't covered by anything but extremely dark inside and I really didn't feel like going in. I heard soft, deep drumming from inside.
Outside of the cave was the continuation of the path going left and going right.
The path to the right was kind of dark and I didn't really want to that way because I knew the stream was by the left path. It was extremely hard for me to look to the right where the creek was and I had to force myself to turn to look at it at the right. I've never really been able to look or turn right in my dreams/Jesus Walk. I wanted to move my creek to my left side by resisted.
So i took the left path and came up a tiny bit of hill to open space, not meadow or anything, just space and on the right was a tiny creek covered in grass and as i walked I noticed the sky became more blue, with tiny white clouds and a bird flying above and the creek started getting wider and the grass got taller until it was almost above my head and the creed's width was indistinguishable.
I begun to walk through it with the cool stream running gently over my toes and there were a few flies humming about but never bothered me and I squished through the creek, in between golf-ball-sized pebbles and mud because now there really was no more water.
I was very unfocused the whole time and it was hard to concentrate on the walk and meeting Jesus. And I kept narrating everything that was happening as if I was telling what was happening - like now - in the past tense.
It was disappointing that i just couldn't shut off my head. But I tried to stop and shout out to Him.
So i tried to stop and asked God to please prepare me for my future husband because I'm tired and I would like to start sharing my life with the man he has chosen for me.
Finally I started getting impatient with myself and started calling to Jesus, "Where are you?" Just before i got through the tall grass, I saw a really bright ball of light that just kind of floated to me and I thought, "Is it you? Why won't you should me yourself in human form?"
And I reflected quickly on previous forms I've met his as - a young man in a red t-shirt with yellow lettering and jeans with short, brown hair; a guy my age with shorter light brown/blonde hair and a big smile; a long, brown-haired man in a brown gown.
But the light came closer and encompassed me and there I was in a giant light bubble and Jesus was hugging me.
I kept getting unfocused but trying to stay with Jesus.
Then I tried to ask for my gift and I kept seeing a tiny pink/purple and blue box with a yellow daisy in a window on the lid - the box Amy had painted Saturday at the craft table - and I knew inside was my rock that I got from Mexico on a mission trip with Grace Bible Church. I knew it meant God was giving me back the only piece of me that is still left to give to my future husband. But I already knew that i had it so I took it but kind of asked shyly with a smile, "Do you have anything else for me?" And immediately he presented a long turquoise necklace but her wouldn't tell me what it was for. I don't wear necklaces and I've always like the color teal and can appreciate the jewelry but I would never actually wear it.
Then I said goodbye and Jesus took me through more tall grass like in the painting I made Saturday and it was very dark like in the picture and I came to a tall tree and looked up at the stars and they looked just like in my painting and I came immediately back through the cabin window and was back on the floor.
The whole time I heard myself narrating everything going on and a certain hymn was just playing on a loop almost annoyingly, but at some point I embraced it and it no longer bothered me.
Whenever I need to be reminded that Jesus loves me, I look up at the stars. And it's been awhile since I've done that. He knew that, too.
The rock I got in Mexico is a symbol of what is left of me to give to my future husband. Through out my life, I have put so much effort into relationships - many of which were/are on-sided - and have given myself away to so many people and to so many things and hobbies that now there is only a rock's worth left of me. I have given it to God and I think now he's finally giving it back to say, "You're ready." Maybe. Some kind of permission?
Hopefully. I don't know if I'm ready, but I sure wouldn't mind it much.
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