I heard someone say recently that the safest place to be in a hurricane is in the eye. The eye moves with the storm but is strangely calm because the winds that converge towards the center never reach it. The Coriolis force diverts the wind away from the center, causing the eyewall, leaving the center calm.
Hurricanes are large, cause a lot of damage, and yet the center is calm.
Still.
Be still, and know that I am God. Be still. It’s a command. Still, coming from the Hebrew word raphah, meaning to let drop, to relax, to become weak. Know, a deep intimate knowledge, that He is God. Know, it’s relational. Deeply relational.
Let it drop? Become weak?
Finding Stillness in the Storm
I am the kind of person who likes to have it all figured out. I am a planner; therefore, I want all my ducks in a row. I want to know what happens next, and what tomorrow brings. Yet over the past year, but more so over the past 4-6 months He has been asking me to “be still”. I can’t say I am good at that. I want to “do”, I want to be active in tangible things, and this is how He created me.
So, this ask to “be still” … well, He created me for this as well; to let drop what I cannot handle so I can know Him intimately every day.
And in being still, I have had some of the sweetest moments with Him. A moment around a cross as I felt His love and faithfulness crash over me in ways I have never experienced before. Walking with Him through a path in the woods as He whispered: “be free and fly”. Then after Hurricane Maria hit while we were vacationing in Puerto Rico, having beautiful moments with Him on the patio that overlooked a view of the ocean that hadn’t been there a few days prior. 
This doesn’t mean that everything has been sunshine and rainbows. There have been moments that are downright hard. The past couple weeks I have had more of these moments than I would like to admit. I have cried quite a bit more than usual from just feeling like everything is too much. Life has felt like a bit of a hurricane, and it would be really easy to get swept away in what is going on all around me. If I am honest some days it feels like I might.
Yet, the stronger the storm has seemed, the more I have heard Him whisper “be still”. And as I have let myself become weak to the point of tears, in these moments I have found deep intimacy with Him, knowing who He is.
Love. Faithful. True. A good, good Father.
Growing in Your Knowing
I have to go back to the picture of the eye of the storm. How small is the center, yet it is still? I imagine if you were in the eye of the storm there isn’t much room to move to the left or the right, to the front or the back. If you moved too quickly you would be swept up in the strength of the storm.
Beautiful one, I get this image of you with your feet firmly planted, arms lifted in worship while the storm around you rages. And there is a rainbow, His promise. His promise that as you are still, you will come to not just believe, but know that He is God.
God will never give you more than you can handle. That’s a lie. He will totally allow more than you can handle so you can become weak only to rely on Him. But He wants us to go beyond relying on Him. He wants us to KNOW Him in the deepest, most intimate way.
A Prayer for You
So I end, praying that you become weak, that you let it drop, whatever you are carrying, right out of your hands (or off your shoulders), and that with those empty hands that held the burdens you were carrying, you will lift them up in worship to our King. Jesus. Because, yes, He is God. And He wants you to know Him.
