It's hot. Like I just want to hire people to fan me hot. If you haven't lived in the south, and you don't know what SC 100 degree heat feels like, you can just nod and pretend.
If you have, you just said, "Bless her heart" and meant it.
You don't leave anything in the car during the daylight hours unless you want it warped or cooked. Ask Jarrett's poor Chipotle rewards card he left on the dash.
And God bless your soul if you sit down on leather seats with anything shorter than capris. It's the kind of hot you feel with every breath. It's humid and hot and even the shade wants relief down here.
And while I complain and fan with my old church fan in the car(not even kidding- see pic))
WITH the air running...all of the sudden, I remember.
I remember all those Facebook posts about a countdown to summer I saw everybody posting and the longings for heat filled bathing suit weather and all the sunshine.
We asked for these days.
We longed for change.
But for that cold season to leave, heat had to arrive.
Change could only come with heat.
No doubt: Heat changes things.
And so it is when God allows the heat, the fire of life to come to that area where I've been asking for change...and I pitch a fit. I fan and whine wanting the heat to be turned down because it's just hard to breathe sometimes.
But He is changing my season and the heat has to come.
He is transforming this vessel and the fire has to breakdown what was to prepare for what will be.
And I have to trust Him.
Melted hearts in the hands of the Refiner.
The fire doesn’t change our worth, it changes our purpose.
Melted gold is still gold…its just being shaped by the Creator into something that is going to add to its value, not detract from it!
It will not be comfortable or easy.
It may feel like running barefoot on a SC blacktop some days.
But there's a big patch of country grass and clover waiting to pause and cool my weary feet and my racing heart along the way and it's right next to the heart of my Daddy.
So when the heat comes and the fire blazes, just know that what we call destruction, God calls preparation for purpose.
It may feel like an end of good things, but in reality it is the beginning of GOD things.
God's plans are to prosper us, to PROPEL us into our purpose and future.
He is our Refiner.
He is the Rebuilder of broken walls.
So the next time you feel like Jarrett's chipotle rewards card left on the dash in this SC summer heat- all warped and bent- remember that it just means you're ready and able to be shaped for a purpose you may not yet know in the hands of your Father who DOES.
Fan on fiends. But don't remove yourself from the hands of the Refiner.
He makes all things new.
#SimpleTruth for when the heat comes.
Praying you know your worth in Christ today and everyday.
~Julie
“I will bring that group through the fire and make them pure. I will refine them like silver and purify them like gold. They will call on my name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘These are my people,’ and they will say, ‘The LORD is our God.’””
Zechariah 13:9 NLT
“For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.”
Isaiah 43:19 NLT