[His] Tender Words

I didn't attend my own church this morning, but rather a friend and I went downtown to a church I've been wanting to visit for a while now. I don't think I can even begin to express in words how the Holy Spirit spoke through this pastor. It was insane... amazing insane. I haven't quite been to a service like the one I went to this morning.

After the service, I met up with my mentor at this church. We both had the same idea of how our time together was going to look...

boy were we wrong. God had something else planned.

We sat talking for 10 minutes about how our weekends were, when out of no where the pastor of this church came walking in. He surprised us both because we thought we were the only two left in the building.

"So I hear the LORD spoke wise words through you this morning Pastor H." He looked at us both and just smiled, "the Father is so good to us!"

Amen.

The three of us sat in silence with huge smiles across our faces for what seemed like hours. He then turned to me and began speaking words that made me think to myself "umm... are you stalking me?... because why else would you be saying all this stuff?..."

For half an hour this pastor spoke words about where my heart was... the frustrations that I've been feeling... the desires I have for the beautiful things God has placed in my life... relationships... (sidenote: I've never met or talked to this man before in my life)

He wasn't directing these words specifically at me... yet at the same time everything that came out of his mouth was directly for me. Once these 30 minutes passed he just looked back at me and said, "I'm sorry... I have no idea why I said all that. The Spirit just told me too... I'll let you both get back to your meeting."

My mentor and I just sat for a few moments taking in everything he had shared that had been on his heart. She then apologized and said she wasn't feeling great so she had to leave, but then said, "It's funny how God works Jackie... Pastor H doesn't just come and sit down and talk like that with people for as long as he did, especially when he said he's as busy as he is today. God spoke to you through him didn't he...? I can tell..."

More than I can explain.

Though our purpose of getting together was to discuss how our mentoring stuff was going to look, really we were supposed to be there because the LORD wanted to speak some words to me. The same words that He has been speaking for a while, and the same words that I've been hearing, but I haven't fully been understanding the seriousness and depth of them...

How beautiful is it when God uses people we don't know (and do know) to wake us up... and to speak tenderly to us.

But then I will win her back once again. I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her there. I will return her vineyards to her and transform the Valley of Trouble into a gateway of hope. She will give herself to me there, as she did long ago when she was young... (Hosea 2:14-15)