This is an article I wrote which originally appeared in April 2018 on The Restore Movement website (http://www.therestoremovement.com/)
I press the accelerator and pull away from the shallow water, leaving the shore and all that is on it behind me. The cool, salty air rushes against my face and pulls at my hair. I take in deep relaxing breaths. I see other jet skis in the distance doing giant circles and spraying high pillars of water, but all I want to do is glide over the undulating water and head straight towards the horizon. Escape.
If I go slow, I slide smoothly through the swells. With some speed, I bounce over them – the rate of speed determining how out of control the feeling is. I choose fast. There is an island not too far off in the distance. I’ve never ridden all the way out to it before and decide that today is the day. Usually the open water brings a slight, underlying sense of fear in me, but I easily shake off the thought of the deepness and darkness of the sea beneath me and break away into adventure, leaving the worries of the day behind me.
As I go, a prayer wells up inside me unbidden, “Oh God…” but I stop it abruptly because I am afraid of what His response might reveal. Life is in a rough patch at the moment and I don’t want to think about it. I want to hide in the great openness of my surroundings. But it still comes to me. Against my wishes I begin to think about what I do not have: a place to live, a job to pay the bills, someone to understand the complexities of my fears, and how I have lost the passion to follow my dreams. I also think about what I do have and can be thankful for: a car, a friend’s couch, a small amount of savings that covers my minimum needs. As for my dreams, there is a very small, very slim, very vague sense of hope. But it’s nothing that I want to disturb. I’m afraid that if I try to even touch it, it will disappear in a puff of smoke. My need weighs too heavily, I can’t think of losing more.
Prayer wells up inside me again, “Oh God…” comes to my lips. The great aloneness that surrounds me causes the great aloneness inside me to open up. “Oh God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water…” Psalm 63 burns up and out of me. I’m saying it out loud, fairly shouting it over the sound of the engine and the spray of the water and the rushing wind. I finish with a personal postscript, yelling “Oh God, my hope is almost gone and I am about to perish!”
At that moment, less than fifty yards away and running parallel with me, I see a large, dark mass rise out of the water. Someone had mentioned earlier that there were some humpback whales that had been seen in the vicinity. The massive creature breaches silently, smoothly, glowing in the wet. I freeze for a moment staring at her majestic beauty. I think, “How absolutely amazing. Oh, please please please, don’t come any closer.” She does three more dips and then disappears, leaving no evidence of her presence behind.
I continue on my circuit around the island thinking about the huge creature now hidden beneath the water. My body flexes in remembrance. A thought bursts into my mind: she is like my big, overarching dream that God has given me. It runs down deep beneath the surface – living, moving, growing out of sight and not revealed except for rare moments that spark awe and wonder. I think about all that God has for my life and the moments I am allowed to see the big picture, so overwhelming it almost makes me want to run. My spirit flexes in remembrance. I also realize that my humpback is most certainly not alone. Others of her pod are near. They too are below the surface, unseen and unknown, along with a great quantity of smaller sea life like the seals, dolphins, and fish. They all lurk there too – like smaller, more easily understood and handled dreams and goals. I am gliding along heading for the island, a clear destination I can see. They are gliding below me in deep, smooth currents as well as in rough waters. They are always there, just not always seen. Then a phrase I have often used to encourage others comes to me: “God is always hard at work behind the scenes on our behalf, even when we can’t see it or sense it.”
I don’t know when I will see a whale emerge from the depths again, but the seals and fish I do see remind me she is out there. I don’t know when I’ll see my big dream again, but I see small things that remind me of it. And just like that island in the distance I’ll keep heading in the direction God has me going and trust that He is always at work behind the scenes – and beneath the surface. His purpose will rise in my life.
Burn Bright Coaching 
Lovely! Thanks so much for posting this!
Thank you for dropping by!