Here I Am Part 8

I believe I will fast forward a bit. I experienced the child like emotions of waiting-for-Santa on the morning the walk was to begin. My sponsors were not set to pick me up until 2:00. It was an incredibly long morning so there was ample time to send several prayers up to Heaven’s gates.

“O.k. Lord. This is it. The day I have been waiting for. Thank you for preparing me. I feel no anxiety and I cannot wait to get there. Thank you for the many blessings I have already received and for the ones yet to come.”

Finally the time arrived! My sponsors came and loaded up me and my suitcase and we were off. Now is the time I need to be incredibly careful as to what I post. I do not wish to spoil anything for those of you that have not yet gone on a walk to Emmaus. I will recount the spiritual impacts I experienced without much description of the actual event.

Had I known all the events that were in store for me ahead of time, I would have “anticipated” instead of being fully focused on “participating”. This is crucial to the experience. 

I am so grateful that is the only substantial information my sponsors shared with me. A lot of planning, prayer and preparation go into the walk and you gain so many blessings by just letting the events unfold in sequence.

There were several people going on this particular walk so we took 2 cars. I rode with yet another person sponsoring me that I had not previously met and honestly didn’t even know she existed! The amount of people behind the scenes eventually became quite staggering.

The first event was the “Send Off”. This took place in a little cowboy church filled with more behind-the-scenes people and those they were sponsoring. There were certainly a lot of people packed in there for only 36 women. 

It was so touching and emotional to see how many souls had come to pray for the 36. I didn’t know then that the emotions would be ever increasing throughout the next 3 and ½ days. Happy overwhelmed tears, they were just beginning.

Traditionally, after the prayer service everyone that was at the church heads over to the same restaurant where we all enjoyed a great dinner and wonderful fellowship. After the meal, the sponsors gather up their pilgrims and head over to the Emmaus walk venue.

Once there, you could just feel the excitement building. The lobby was full of lovely women that would become very important in my spiritual walk and my life. After everyone had the opportunity to find their rooms and visit awhile the welcoming ceremony began.

All the “staff” for the walk are introduced along with the pilgrims. When this is complete, the sponsors depart and the pilgrims begin their adventure in the Ark. And what an adventure it was.

"Here I Am" Part 7

I have the best memories of Christmas as a child. Moma and Daddy always made it seem so magical. They would put up the tree after Thanksgiving with Christmas music playing in the back ground.  My sister Jodi and I would have hot chocolate and cookies while we helped hang the ornaments. Several gifts would appear a few days later.

I loved just having the Christmas tree lights on. They would blink and reflect off the packages. The anticipation would build up as each day seemed to slowly pass. I remember my brothers’ reactions to our excitement.

Greg, the oldest (12 years older than me) would always ask what we wanted from Santa Claus. He loved seeing us so excited and would let us chatter on. I can remember Mark (10 years older than me) crawling under the tree with me to inspect the packages.

Mark would ask me which one I wanted to try and guess what was inside. I would point to one and he would pick it up and gently shake it. “What do you think is inside this one?” I could never guess, but it didn’t matter. I loved playing this game with my brother.

Moma always made Christmas cookies with us. Always. I can remember the laughs and giggles and wonderful smells of that little kitchen. I remember I couldn’t wait for the cookies to come out of the oven so I would try to sneak dough while Moma wasn’t looking. And all those fabulous sprinkles in different colors to put on the cookies! Christmas needed to hurry up and get here if there was any hope of some cookies being left for Santa.

On Christmas Eve we would get all dressed up and head to candle light service at church. Daddy would have the radio on in the car and the radio station never failed to have the latest updates from the Santa Claus radar. They would give some part of town as the “last sighting” with Jodi and I eagerly asking, “Is that anywhere near us? Is he close to us?”

The answer was always the same. “It’s going to be a little while yet.” I suspect they had to say that. Had they said he was very close they would have had 2 little girls begging to stay home in order to catch a glimpse of Santa Claus. Oh and the reindeer! Especially Rudolph! What child didn’t want to be witness to all that?

I remember one Christmas in particular. My sister and I were quite young. We were walking out to the car to go to the candle light service when Daddy suddenly said, “Oh I forgot something. I’ll be right back.” Being a daddy’s girl I of course wanted to go back in with him. Moma quickly said, “No sweetheart. Daddy will be right back. Come get in the car.” I complied (surprisingly) and a few minutes later Daddy was back out and we were on our way.

When we came home after the service and walked into the house magic was everywhere! More gifts! I cannot tell you what all the gifts were but two still stand out vividly in my mind after all these years. Twin baby dolls each in their own carriers; one for me and one for my sister. I remember thinking, “how could Santa possibly know I would just love this baby doll?” Magic.

I knew it had to be magic because we did not have a chimney. That little fact used to be a little troubling to me at that age. But I had proof positive that Santa was real and he was magic! Gifts appeared and Santa’s cookies were gone.

After I was finally able to put my new baby down, I began to open my other gifts. I loved the sound of the wrapping being torn off the gifts to see what else the magic held for me. It was one of many perfect Christmas celebrations we had in our house growing up.

I’m sure by now you are wondering what this has to do with my Walk to Emmaus. It’s simple really. I grew up to realize that loving parents were behind the magical Santa. I was every bit excited for the walk to begin just as I was excited for Santa to come. Only now, miracles had replaced magic and I absolutely knew I would have wonderful gifts to open at Emmaus. I couldn’t wait to tear off that wrapping.

"Here I Am" Part 6

Wonderful things took place during the next couple of weeks while I was waiting for my name to move up the waiting list and onto the coveted Pilgrim list!

I have mentioned my anxiety issues once or twice and this is generally where my mind starts to go into overdrive with all the possible things that could go wrong and all the "good solid reasons" as to why I shouldn’t go.

Once again. Complete peace. No anxiety. No rationalizing this experience away. No turning back. The fact that I am not anxious is a tremendous gift from God and I recognize it as exactly that. God answers prayer, people! I continued to pray for him to prepare my heart for what He had in store for me.

I really wish I would have written all this down just for the time accuracy of events, but basically it went something like this. After what seemed almost an eternity and an onslaught of prayer requests banging on the gates of heaven, my name began to climb up the waiting list. And not an ounce of anxiety. But my excitement was certainly growing.

I kept watch on that list as long as my eyes were open! At work and at home I would leave the browser up on the website and refresh it ever so often. O.k. Probably 100 times a day. Then about a week before it was time to go, I had made the pilgrim list! I was #36 on a list of 36 pilgrims. Oh that looked so good I had to hit refresh again! And just because God could, he moved me to # 35 for good measure!

I ran through a quick inventory of what God had already accomplished in me and for me. A person with such anxiety as I have, and I was feeling none. Blessing. Such a doubting Thomas at times and yet, I knew I was going despite the already filled up pilgrim list. Blessing. I could feel the Lord working on my heart; preparing me for what lie ahead. Blessing. The amount of prayer time I was able to devote to just this one event in my life was already bringing me closer to the one I so desperately wanted to be near. Huge blessing.

A good and wise friend of mine (Kim Hawkins), when asked to pray for me to get on this walk said something I will never forget. She simply said, “Do not rely or wait on a process to get closer to God.”  What a statement. How many times do we think…”If I can just do that, I would be closer to the Lord.” Or,” I need this and this and this before I can start getting closer to the Lord.”

No you don’t. You just need now. Start where you are. Right now. Don’t put conditions on a relationship with God that God himself does not put there. Don’t waste valuable time. Just start now. Now is all we are promised. Now is all you need.

Thank you, Kim. That statement made me realize I could have been too focused on the “if I can just do this event” mentality that I very well could have given the event more importance than the actual goal. Honestly, it makes me wonder how many time I have actually done this. Shudder. 

The short term goal of course was to attend the walk. But the purpose and overall goal was to draw nearer to our Lord. Wow. I could have missed it. I could have missed out on receiving those blessings. Blessings that would see me through that 4 day weekend called A Walk to Emmaus.