The Net

Let’s go fishing!

I have equipped you for the catch.

The net drags across the desert sand.

It goes against the grain!

It rubs backwards and forwards and yet is not worn.

It bristles in the sun.

It remains strong and clean and ready to collect its prey.

The wind blows upon it.

You are puzzled by this, for you think the circumstances dictate what it is you will catch. You think the environment is wrong, the net is useful in the sea but useless for the sand.

Yet what have I spoken, what is it I expect?

Streams of living water in the desert

Now it springs forth, do you not perceive it, will you not give heed to it, will you not align yourself to receive it, position yourself, compose yourself, ready yourself. Put your hands out, ready to catch?

Ready for a catch?

Did I not promise “living water”?

There is life in the stream.

This is not just water, behold it lives.

The water flows with life in it.

Out of the dry place, comes the root.

Out of the lack, comes the flow.

Out of the desolate place, fullness.

You wait for the rain, but don’t you see? You go with my flow.

“When peace like a river, attendeth my way, when sorrow like sea billows roll, thou hast taught me to say, it is well, it is well with my soul.”

You expect the fullness to come from the circumstance, the stream to flow from without. You wait for the rain to come.

Yet you carry my flow, you carry my reservoir, my resource, my overflow.

It pours from your pores when you pause.

You seek fullness, yet you carry overflow.

Isaiah 58:10-11 And if you pour out that with which you sustain your own life for the hungry and satisfy the need of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in darkness, and your obscurity and gloom become like the noonday. And the Lord shall guide you continually and satisfy you in drought and in dry places and make strong your bones. And you shall be like a watered garden and like a spring of water whose waters fail not.

You pour out wondering and worrying when you will run out. Yet have I not promised to sustain you? Have I not said your waters “fail not”

You ponder the consequences of failure, yet align yourself with my promise. For I have not brought you into the desert to starve, I have brought you here to bring fullness. To pour out in the place of lack.

You are surprised at all the lack around you, yet you are my stream, you are my fountain, in the dry place.

You contain the answer to the problem, the wet in the dry place.

You are my instrument of transformation. Do not be alarmed at the resistance, do not play the instrument of lack, play the melody of the stream. Like Davids harp, burst forth and overwhelm the tune of discord.

Sing to the Lord for he has done marvellous things…. Exodus 15:1-2 THEN MOSES and the Israelites sang this song to the Lord, saying, I will sing to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider or its chariot has He thrown into the sea. The Lord is my Strength and my Song, and He has become my Salvation; this is my God, and I will praise Him, my father’s God, and I will exalt Him. 2 Chronicles 20:20-22 And they rose early in the morning and went out into the Wilderness of Tekoa; and as they went out, Jehoshaphat stood and said, Hear me, O Judah, and you inhabitants of Jerusalem! Believe in the Lord your God and you shall be established; believe and remain steadfast to His prophets and you shall prosper. When he had consulted with the people, he appointed singers to sing to the Lord and praise Him in their holy priestly garments as they went out before the army, saying, Give thanks to the Lord, for His mercy and loving-kindness endure forever! And when they began to sing and to praise, the Lord set ambushments against the men of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir who had come against Judah, and they were self- slaughtered;