This evening I have been immersed in 2 Chronicles Chapter 5. It has always been one of my very favorite chapters in Scripture, but it's been a long time since I've camped out there as I did tonight. This thrilling chapter describes the powerful, unified worship of the Israelites as they gather to dedicate Solomon's newly-built temple to the LORD, the God of Israel. As I read these passages I like to stop and imagine the sights and the sounds, the blasting of trumpets, clanging of cymbals, and the heavenly voices of a people who are wholeheartedly worshiping Yehovah, the King of the Universe! 
2 Chronicles 5:11-14:  11 The priests then withdrew from the Holy Place. All the priests who were there had consecrated themselves, regardless of their divisions. 12 All the Levites who were musicians—Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun and their sons and relatives—stood on the east side of the altar, dressed in fine linen and playing cymbals, harps and lyres. They were accompanied by 120 priests sounding trumpets. 13 The trumpeters and musicians joined in unison to give praise and thanks to the Lord. Accompanied by trumpets, cymbals and other instruments, the singers raised their voices in praise to the Lord and sang:
“He is good;  his love endures forever.”
Then the temple of the Lord was filled with the cloud, 14 and the priests could not perform their service because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the temple of God.

It leaves me utterly breathless! The music, the passion, the myriad of voices crying out as one voice, "He is good! His love endures forever!"  And this worship is so greatly pleasing to God that He descends from Heaven in a thick cloud that FILLS His temple! The k'vod, the glory, is so weighty, so overwhelming, that the priests could not perform their service.

I once had a dream so similar to this scripture that I have remembered it in detail for all these years. The dream came at a point in my life when I was traveling around the country teaching the Bible and leading worship in conferences. I had been lying in my bed reading this passage of Scripture and prayerfully asking the LORD if He would do this the next day at the little church in Maryland where I was to lead worship the next morning. Then I fell asleep and I dreamed that I was beginning to worship the LORD at my keyboard, lifting my voice in Spirit-led songs, when suddenly a strong wind began blowing through the windows of the old church and all my music sheets rose in a flurry of crackling paper and blew out the window!  In the dream I was startled and I began to panic because I could not keep playing and singing the songs without my music. When I awoke I asked the LORD to give me the meaning of the dream and that was when He first directed me to 2nd Chronicles Chapter 5. "I want you to stop depending on your own plans for the service and your own music sheets for the worship. Give Me your plans and let Me orchestrate the worship!  Surrender it all to Me and let My Ruach breathe and blow on your instrument and your voice and you will see My glory!"

It was a powerful lesson that I've never forgotten and try always to honor.  I long for this kind of God-breathed worship more than I want my next breath. It is hard to find such an anointing of the Holy Spirit in our modern church worship. And as our nation falls further and further away from God, our church services lack any trace of His Presence.  It causes me to cry out, "Ichabod!" which in Hebrew means "the glory has departed!"  1 Samuel 4:21-22 "She [the wife of Phineas and daughter-in-law of Eli] named the boy Ichabod, saying, “The Glory has departed from Israel”—because of the capture of the ark of God and the deaths of her father-in-law and her husband. She said, “The Glory has departed from Israel, for the ark of God has been captured."  The ark contained the tablets of the testimony, the manna, and the rod of Aaron that budded. In other words, it contained the living Presence of Yeshua, through His Word, His living bread, and his priestly authority. But all this had departed.

Still, my heart was gladdened today by news from the state of Tennessee. This article reports on a bill just signed by Bill Lee, Governor of Tennessee:
"Here is something different from one in charge. Tennessee Republican Governor Bill Lee is calling for an entire month of prayer and fasting. He wants the people to ask for God’s hand of mercy and healing in Tennessee. In what has been described as a “historic gesture,” Tennessee Governor Bill Lee has signed a bill calling for 30 days of prayer and fasting beginning July 1 in the Volunteer State.
Tennessee House Joint Resolution 0803 asks the state’s people “to seek God’s hand of mercy and healing on Tennessee.”
A letter signed by Tennessee state Senator Mark Pody and Representative Monty Fritts accompanying the resolution invites “those who are physically able and spiritually inclined to do so to join in a 30-day season of prayer and intermittent fasting for the month of July as a means of humbling ourselves to receive God’s grace, mercy, and blessing in Tennessee and in our Nation.”

I don't live in Tennessee. Actually, I wish I did! But nevertheless I can join in - and you can join in - to keep 30 days of prayer and intermittent fasting for this fallen nation. Perhaps in humbling ourselves before our God, and praying for His mercy and healing over our broken nation, He might relent and send a mighty wind of His Ruach to stir the Church to bow the knee and cry out as one voice, until the priests and the pastors can no longer perform their service - because the Holy One of Israel has taken over and His cloud fills the houses of worship!

Last night a dear sister, who lives in Israel, shared a blog with me that resonated so strongly with me that I knew I must share it. The blog is called Fresh Light and this one was titled WHEN GOD GOES QUIET. I cannot begin to tell you how affirming this word was for me.  For many months it has felt to me that God has "gone quiet" or that I am no longer able to hear His voice. That still, small voice used to be a regular, rhythmic part of every day for me; "call Doreen, she needs to hear from you," or "Debi is sick, send her a card of love and cheer," or more heavy, prophetic things like what God is speaking through a weather pattern or two ships that collide on the sea. He would speak to me in the little things during my day and in much bigger pictures in the night. But in this past year, I feel like I have hardly heard him at all.

The blogger of Fresh Light has apparently experienced the exact same thing - and she has reacted in the exact same way as I have.  She basically confessed that she decided to just go on with life without sitting in her usual place where she would wait upon God and journal what she heard from him. She said she became so afraid that she would not hear anything that she stopped trying to listen and started "leading a normal, happy life of baking, gardening, and having lunch with friends." 

EXACTLY. This is exactly what has happened to me! I stopped going to my "trysting place." David Wilkerson always used that phrase to describe the place he went each day to meet with God. The Webster's Dictionary defines it as " a place for a meeting, especially a secret meeting of lovers; a rendezvous." I love that! It depicts the deep intimacy that one experiences when they have a trysting place to meet with the Lord. For me it has always been my study downstairs. I would faithfully take my journal and a pen and sit...and wait...and expect to hear the Voice of Jesus, my Lover, my Bridegroom King. I have dozens of journals filled with His voice, the words imparted to me in the trysting place. But I too confess that I stopped going down there. I too filled my days with baking and gardening and tending to John's needs, not wishing to be disappointed again when my Lord failed to meet with me.  It has been a dry and thirsty season and I have missed Him so much! But in the same week that I got to read this blog, feeling somewhat encouraged that I'm not the ONLY one who has had this dry season, I finally heard His voice loud and clear!

I was in my bed at night, interceding in tears for a very dear friend who had been in the hospital for three weeks with no diagnosis. Teams of doctors had run dozens of scans and tests, poking and prodding, scratching their heads, and still coming up with nothing; and in the meantime she was fading away from us, losing cognition, memory, and all energy. I went to the hospital to pray for her and sing worship songs over her and I was deeply grieved at her tiny, lifeless form that struggled for breath.  Crying out to God that night for an answer, I HEARD HIM! I heard that Voice I've been missing so much! "Go back to the beginning of her illness," He said, " and you will find the answer. Look back."

I spent the next few hours of the night trying to retrace the first time she knew she was ill. It must have been about two months ago and she went several times to the E.R. complaining of shortness of breath. "I cannot breathe!" she would exclaim. "Lungs!" I cried out to God. Even though the illness had progressed with strange, seemingly disconnected symptoms of skin rash, hypothermia, night sweats and high fevers, lethargy, painful knees and joints, it seemed the Lord was pointing me directly to her lungs. I notified her daughter, the doctors did some lab cultures of rare bacteria strains, and at last she tested positive for a disease called Mycoplasma Pneumonia. LUNGS!  Now there is a treatment plan. Now a protocol is in place. Now my dear, dear sister in Christ will recover. I am overwhelmed with joy for her and for all of us who love her -- but I am also dancing a little personal, happy dance that I heard that clear Voice of God speaking to me!

I know what the blogger of Fresh Light means when she says, "God goes quiet in order to get us to seek Him with all our hearts." It is the picture intricately painted for us in Song of Solomon 2:9: "My beloved is like a gazelle or a young stag. Look, he stands behind our wall, gazing through the windows, peering through the lattice." He wasn't coming in. He was gazing through a window, peering through the lattice, to entice His beloved to long for Him, yearn for Him, and open the door to Him!

I am going to return to our trysting place, genuinely longing for Him again. I am going to ignore the enemy's voice that will no doubt try again to deter me and convince me that I won't hear anything. The days just ahead of us are going to be a terrible roller coaster of events, my friends, and we will only be able to safely navigate them if we are listening for the Holy Spirit and being obedient to what He tells us. Seek the Lord while He may be found!