Adventures with personal revelation

A few weeks ago I was in Miami staying for a few days with Lindsay.  She & her husband were telling me one night about several great podcasts that they had listened to.  They were so enthusiastic about them that I was motivated when I got home to put some on my mp3 player so that I could listen while I worked in the house and yard.

I listened as I was working out in the yard, then later while I was driving somewhere.  When I got home I set the mp3 player and earbuds on the back of the sofa and forgot to ever put them away.  A couple of days later I decided that I wanted to listen again but couldn’t find the mp3 player.  Remembering that I’d last had it on the sofa I looked around there without success.  I went and looked in other possible places, then returned to look around the sofa again.  I walked throughout the house looking in various places, always circling back to the sofa.  At some point in the evening Josh and his friend came into the family room to play xbox and I worried that I looked like a circling vulture, walking around and around the sofa hoping that this time I would spot the elusive mp3 player or the red cords of the earbuds.  Eventually I gave up and went to bed.

Several days later I wanted the mp3 player again and started praying to be able to find it.  Again I walked through the house and again I kept coming back to the sofa, even picking up the sections and looking under them, but not finding it.  I kept praying as I looked, but no luck.

Yesterday I wanted the it again and so I prayed again and looked again.  I even picked up the sofa pieces and looked under them again.  And then as I stood looking at the sofa, on a whim I pulled one of the seat cushions off.  There they were, black mp3 player and red earbuds.  They really had been in the sofa all along, the place where I’d felt impelled to look without even realizing it.

 

Several months ago I taught a class on personal revelation at a Saturday event for women.  For months I read and studied about personal revelation to try to understand it better.  I studied hoping to understand better what it was and to know how to improve my chances of experiencing it and recognizing it when it came. 

Teaching the class was a great experience.  Preparing to teach it was a great experience.  But in the end I felt no more certain of receiving revelation that I had when I started. What I did feel was more certain that revelation was happening in my life and that there were principles governing it.  That generally I had to be living worthily to receive revelation.  That it was harder to receive revelation when my life was noiser.  That revelation NEVER felt like revelation.  That revelation was rarely one bit “louder” than it needed to be to get the job done.  That revelation was often only apparent in retrospect.  That revelation was never mine to claim, but only God’s to give. 

 

And that is why when I found the mp3 player and earbuds I had to smile.  That’s right, I thought, I was a little irrational in my searching, continually coming back to the sofa to look.  It probably was just the smallest touch of personal revelation, nudging me back and back and back again until I looked in the right way.  Prompting me to offer a prayer of gratitude, gratitude that I can listen to a podcast again while I work, and gratitude that God would help me, even in such a small thing.  Gratitude for personal revelation in my life.