Day 13: In the Secret Place

This is day 13 of my fall series – 31 days to An Autumn Harvest of our Words. For these posts, I thought I’d explore a different twist on why our words matter…

Has God  set a law of sowing and reaping

and harvest time

— not just in the natural world around us —

but also into our very spoken words?

When we buy a packet of zinnia seeds, for example, we expect to see beautiful golden blossoms eventually bloom in replica to the colorful picture portrayed there. In the same way, the thoughts we put into words from the moment we wake each morning and continue to reiterate throughout the day are bringing us a harvest of one kind or another.

The question is —

Are the well-meant words we sow with our mouths

producing weeds and eaten by worms?

Or are we planting our speech in anticipation

of God’s overtaking blessing to our lives?

To follow this series, it’s important to begin here, A Prequel Post to the Annual Autumn 31 Days Linkup   and then click here for new posts each day:  An Autumn Harvest of our Words

Thanks for joining in on this Fall winnowing of our words!

— Day 13 —

I am postponing the original thought I had for today’s post because the Lord seems to be prompting additional light in my spirit about Psalm 91… God’s Covenant Invitation for us to shed any cloak of fear that may have dropped upon our shoulders lately… “Come,” He is bidding…  “live in the Secret Place…and I will keep you in My circle of protection… “

Digital Camera

I have a clear memory of one moment in grade school where in imagination now, I see a furrow of puzzlement on my young face.  We’d just been discussing the God of the Hebrews in the Old Testament times, how often He showed up SO BIG in the lives of His people, that others for nations around would literally stop  in their tracks and proclaim with conviction, “Surely this God of the Jews is the Awesome, One True God!”

I mean, there was Daniel in the den of lions… unscathed.  Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in a blazer of a fire (and a fourth man, the Lord!) without a scorch mark on them!  And, Passover.  The Red Sea…

“Why isn’t it like that today,” I remember puzzling, “where unbelieving people could take one look at God in our lives and know HE alone is God?  See clearly and radiantly how He surrounds His People with favor and anointing?

Shouldn’t it be?”

It is a question that seems to be reverberating inside the adult me more and more lately as I hear of His Spirit moving, drawing, healing, restoring all around the world.  And I think I hear Him whispering in the wind…

“Yes, it SHOULD be…  O My People, I want to give you ears to hear…

that you would truly begin living and abiding in the Secret Place…

Now is the time of SEED WORD harvest! “

Does God want to set us, His Bride, so brightly on a shining hill, make us more untouchable to the enemy than we’ve understood as Cross Victory, so all the world will come to bend their knee and believe?  If so, and the Bible truly gives precedent for it… the Lord Jesus Himself commissions us to go out and do greater works than even He, in His Name…

…why isn’t it fully happening?

FEAR, the answer falls, much as a thud against the walls of my heart.  Lack of living by every word that comes out of my mouth… because it appears foolish and unrealistic  to HOPE with true certainty and security in what I’ve promised. 

In the natural world, HOPE is only what we would like to happen,

if it only would.

In God’s Word, HOPE, is a sure and certain promise!

Like Peter, you could walk on water in Me, but you are looking round the boat at the raging waters much as all the rest of the world… Put My Word in your mouth!  The more you say it aloud, the deeper it will root down inside you, leaving no space for contrary lies… You will truly abide in Me, in the Secret Place under My wings as you put the sword of My Spirit in your mouth… consistently…And nothing shall be impossible in Me!

Just this morning, as I stirred to the sound of my radio coming on, I felt melancholy clutch at my thoughts.  Bleh! was the overwhelming word in my mind… along with the temptation to just revel  in some discouraging, non-specific, fear-tipped arrows aimed at my peace. And I nearly gave in.

Until I remembered Psalm 91 seedlings from The Message I planted here yesterday…and purposed to wield them aloud in my room then and there.

“I just spent the night in Shaddai’s shadow!” I declared,

albeitly NOT with super strength behind my voice.

Still, I continued, a little bit buoyed.

“Today, I sit down in the High God’s Presence!

I say – God, you are my refuge!  I trust in YOU and I am SAFE!”

In the literal time it took to say those words of Faith, lightness skipped across my covers and sent the darkness scurrying.

Wow, Lord.  I mused.  It doesn’t always happen so quickly that I feel the difference.  But He was showing me… See, power and HARVEST in My words!

“Begin each morning by declaring Psalm 91 truth, and go to sleep with it on your lips too…” he dropped into me then.  “Search out and proclaim my promises throughout your day for whatever is coming against you…  This is the way I make you untouchable to the enemy!

“Are you feeling anxious?,” He asks.  “Waking up in the middle of the night with a pounding heart, wondering why?  Have you been feeling depression and fear like a cloak falling over your head out of the blue sky?

Close the door on FEAR!

Speak to and command the storm

as I did at sea with my disciples.

‘Peace, be!’

And it will!”

I remembered then, cloud drifts of the sour-note dream I’d been having just before waking this morn.  And I saw as sunlight path on water…  Declarations of who He is [MY SHADDAI], and MY POSITION [abiding in His shadow] —

These are what  sent those clouds far out to sea…

and placed me back in His sheltering arms…

How different my harvest of words might have been if I’d given into speaking out my melancholy!  With thin comfort of pity party!   Doors open to my own destruction…and depression settling in for duration…  Ugh! Reaping words of sadness we sow even over ourselves…

Thank you, Father, for reminding me right away today,

and for putting Your Word as a sword in my mouth,

and helping me to choose LIFE.

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Action for today and every day:  Write down these opening words to Psalm 91 inserting your name in it as a personal promise.  Keep it on a notecard by your bed, to declare aloud before bed at night, and first thing when waking.   Keep similar notes of other promises you feel Him leading you to confess aloud and put them around your home, in your car, wherever you will see them and speak them out throughout the day.  The more we say them with  our voice, the deeper they will take root and cast out fear!

Prayer in worship:

Father, I lift everyone reading here up to you today, including me.  Are there doors we have unwittingly opened to destruction in our lives through fear, doubt, dabbling outside of your promise?  If so, reveal those doors to us now.  And in Jesus’ Name, we forever close them this minute!  We want to live and abide in the Secret Place with You!

You are still the God of the impossible, the God of the Miraculous, Our Covenant-Keeping, the same yesterday, today and forever Jehovah who wants to rise His Glory so powerfully over those who will hear and declare Your Word with You — that all the world will stop and say, surely God’s people are a people He has blessed!  The one and only True Awesome God who covenants to hedge His people with songs of victory and provision in a dark and famine struck world!  Give us ears to hear, Lord.  Wake up your bride to holding Your word as banners high… to not living in fear because You hold us tightly in Your Protection and care.  May we truly grow in speaking out and harvesting Your Word Truth, and display the splendor of Your majesty poured out to reflect from us!

The fear of the Lord leads to life; then one rests content,

untouched by trouble.

~ Proverbs 19:23 [New International Version]

You said it, I believe this is how You intend us to live, Lord….

safe, in Your Secret Place. 

More untouched by trouble than we know

(or have known yet).

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© Pam Depoyan

  I encourage you to check out the many beautiful, heartwarming or just plain fun October blog series’ participating under a slurry of topic umbrellas at write31days.com