When we lived in Oxford, I remember one cold January morning walking my favorite path along the canal, pondering deeply: What kind of year had it been as it pertained to my spiritual life?

When the Fog Sets In

Several answers swirled through my mind as I continued to walk in my knee-high red “wellies” sloshing in the wetness of the dead leaves, the morning fog setting in thick. Somehow the fog seemed to serve as a metaphor for how I’d felt that year with God, and the image is resurfacing this year, as we continue to travel through this “pandemic season.” I suppose my prayer times, my journaling, my ability to listen and hear from God, and my sense of what is ahead in the future can be summed up in one word: foggy.

The Cause of the Fog

That year in Oxford, it was the hurriedness of city life and the tiredness from long nights of writing as a theology student that brought the fog. But this year, it seems to be a sense of weariness, of fatigue in the ‘not knowing’ what is next. The start and stop of life through shut downs and lockdowns. The unending question of when this pandemic will ‘end’ or if it ever will. The word ‘languishing’ comes to mind, which Merriam Webster defines as:

• to be or become feeble, weak, or enervated
• to be or live in a state of depression or decreasing vitality
• to become dispirited

Sounds a little depressing, but it is not meant to be. It just seems to aptly describe what many of us cannot necessarily put into words, but how we feel down deep in our souls.

What became clear that cold winter’s morn in 2015, is oddly re-emerging this year in 2022: Lord, please clear the fog…

How about you? Is there a thing a two, or perhaps a word or two that you would use to capture this past year–spiritually? Bumpy… grumpy… grim… great… nice… non-existent?

The Need and Necessity to Check In With Our Own Souls

I love the rolling rhythm of each New Year. It’s as if God knew we would need times (every 365 days or so) to look inside the window of our souls, and ask:

“Hey there precious soul of mine, how are you doing? What’s feeding you? What’s depleting you?”

Some may call this ‘taking stock’ or ‘checking in.’ However we want to think of it, this time of year is a perfect time to allow God to form new prayers in our hearts, new rhythms in our days, new habits in our ways of seeking Him and being in community with others.

Stillness as a Cure to the Spiritual Fog

A wonderful book I remember reading years ago for a seminary paper was by Julienne McLean called, Towards Mystical Union, which is a modern commentary on St. Teresa of Avila’s The Interior Castle (which I highly recommend), in which she calls stillness the ‘essential pathway’ to connecting with God more deeply:

“The essential quality of stillness, of the body, mind, emotions, has the capacity to restore our ability to remember, to recollect, to remain ourselves and not be distracted… That is why prayer, meditation, contemplation are the essential pathways to connecting to, and living within, this deeper dimension.” (32)

These words present a challenge, of course, but also serve as breath of fresh air to my own fog-filled soul: stillness… restoration…. remembering… recollecting… living in deeper dimensions.

The Radical Ask for God’s Help in Our Self-Help Culture

I don’t know about you but I need God’s help bringing in and holding on to this quality of stillness in my life, as I swim against the overwhelming current of our ‘self-help’ world. I need God’s help in setting aside time, meaningful time, to meet with the Creator of my soul. I need God’s help clearing out the clutter of my heart, so there is room for His Truth to run through every fiber of my being, going deep enough to feed, nourish, and change me from the inside out.

In Our Weakness He is Strong

If I have learned anything in my 15+ years of being an apprentice of Jesus, it is that when it comes to our life in the Spirit, we can and must admit our own weakness, our own inability, our own incapability, if we want the power of Heaven to flow through us. These very words of the Apostle Paul have shaped and transformed my life probably more than any other:

But he [God] said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

2 Corinthians 12:9-11

Wow. I have come to believe this truly is the key to accessing God’s power and presence in our lives. It is okay to be weak and needy when it comes to our life with God. This posture of heart paves the way for His Spirit to swoop in and meet us in the way we most long for.

Making Stillness a Steady Companion

So as we enter another year, let us heed, with God’s help, His command to the Psalmist to “Be still and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10

I pray that as we seek to make stillness a welcome companion in our lives this year, that we would experience a renewed taste of His beauty…splendor…holiness…love…comfort….compassion…that keep us going back for more.

The Lifting of the Fog

I realized that towards the end of my morning walk that day in Oxford, the fog started to lift with glimmers of sunlight breaking through, a seemingly beautiful and soul-warming promise of what kind of a new year it was going to be then and will be now for 2022.

We Don’t Have to Walk Through the Fog Alone

Sometimes it can be a gift to have a person dedicated to walking alongside us, listening intently and deeply to our story and our struggles, helping us to access the deep insight that is there waiting to be bubbled up through the Holy Spirit. That is what coaching conversations can do and be for us in foggy seasons. Book a free consult and let’s have a chat!