“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:9

This verse came to mind when studying the retreat identity God revealed through His most awesome Holy Spirit. I kept praying about our retreat theme, “Water: What a Difference a Day Makes”…H2O….maybe the “H” could define something and the “O” could define something else.

Thought I’d start with the dictionary. God vetoed that route. Told me to go straight to His Holy Word instead…said that I’d find all I needed there and more. Boy is He smart like that! When you get on the right footing with God, he really blesses the pathway and fans the flame of enthusiasm.

Hydrogen and Oxygen are two distinct, invisible, intangible elements, until they decide to work together and flow as water. Both very powerful…highly reactive…and potentially destructive…on their own without the other. So here’s the thing. The H represents His plan…do you think it’s coincidental that that atom gets to be doubly represented? Father and Son, perhaps? Or coincidence that the atomic number is 1? The O stands for Our plan, feeble and fumbling at worst, a leap of faith at our best. Oxygen’s atomic number is 8…perhaps because we’re a bit lower on the totem pole of importance standing next to our Lord…

You’ve heard God has a sense of humor? Yeeeeaaaaaaahhhhhhh….case in point………..God decided to reveal that to me in the shower……….Steamy water, water flowing freely…and clear, steamy doors that are waiting to be sketched on by His Holy Spirit through my willing finger.

The drought last year wasn’t our plan, but it was our Heavenly father’s. So many things in our lives shifted…but God…EMMANUEL…was with us through it all…whispering “be GRATEFUL. FIND JOY. REMEMBER ME.” And we’re learning how to count our thousands upon thousands of gifts through the droughts…the snowstorms…the twists and turns……….all because we KNOW whose children we are.