- Joan Lopez
My Place of Safety
“He alone is my Refuge, My Place of Safety” Psalm 91:2
There are these mini videos out on social medial right now called, reels. Have you seen them?
You know the ones I’m talking about? The ones where adults are filming themselves while audio plays of a child’s voice saying something adult? -Yeah- doesn’t make sense to me either.
Well as many of us do, I got caught up in the worm hole of watching them, when I came across one that showed a woman anywhere between 35-40 years of age standing with her eyes closed and some soft music playing. The caption for the video read:
“Apparently, you’re supposed to imagine a younger you run up and then giving you a hug”
In that moment of reading this and hearing the soft music playing, The Holy Spirit hit me.
-Yes—to tell me to get off reels and go pray, but that was the second hit. LOL.
Seriously, I immediately had a mini reel of my childhood flash through my mind. All the pain, all the fear, the manipulation, the small moments of feeling maybe just maybe, I was loved. The strong sense of emotions I felt in each and every one of those moments for seconds at a time, all at once-- but it was a different experience than they had been as they actually happened.
You see, I will tell you in each and every one of those moments, the younger me could not see, hear or feel the love of Jesus. My eyes were closed, and my feet were cemented in fear, pain and shame. My heart was being held hostage by the disappointment, judgement, and heartbreak. The over all feeling of those moments could be described in Psalm 22:2.
“O my God, I call out by day, but You do not answer; and by night but I find no rest nor quiet.”
The synopsis of those life moments and the connection to this scripture is that for most of my life as a child/young adult I was broken and felt completely alone.
I am here now, 50 years old and in a fully committed relationship with Jesus through the Holy Spirit. I am also here to tell you the feeling I had in those few moments of that reel as I saw my past moments again was not a feeling; it was an enormous sense of the knowledge of the truths of Jesus. The beautifully overwhelming peace of His love.
I am His.
I am no longer broken or alone.
“He is my refuge; He is my place of safety.” Psalm 91:2
--I want you to know today, there is always room here with me in His house. All it takes is simply to turn around, open your eyes, open your heart and knock on His door.
May the Lord Almighty release the cement around your feet, touch your face so your eyes look up towards His face, and He wraps his loving arm around you as you allow Him to guide you into His refuge filled with peace, love and safety for 5-year-old you, 7-year-old you, 16-year-old you, 20-year-old you… Today you.
In His Mighty Name. Amen.