Well after much thought and encouragement I have started my blog. I am fortunately blessed by amazing people around me that have shown me the simplicity and yet rewards of blogging...so here I blog!
I'd like to begin by discussing my choice in title, Silent yet Leading. My awesome and wonderful grandmother passed December 2005, five months after I married. Many would characterize her as kind, giving, loving, and most would tell you that she could throw down in the kitchen! Well before she passed I dreamed that I walked into a room and she was sitting in a rocking chair looking out of the window. I walked into the room with a burst of energy and said "Grandma, I heard hear the spirit of the Lord saying: 'Silent, yet leading!' " Over the past five years God has taught me so much regarding those powerful three words.
With those three words, I believe the Lord is calling us, me in particular to retire lip service and lead with my lifestyle. In Romans 12: 1 & 2 Paul "begs" us to give ourselves unto the Lord, stating that is our only reasonable service. Meaning there is nothing else we can even do for the Lord! He wants our bodies; our being...us. Paul goes further to say we cannot be like the world but unlike the world to prove the perfect will of God. I do believe that this dream was the Lord's way of telling me that old things are passed away and new things were coming. Isaiah 43:18 & 19 supports this because I see my grandmother as a woman of wisdom. The rocking chair is symbolic to me as a place of rest to "recount." My grandmother looking out of the window sitting in the chair is symbolic of her looking back over her life. Me bursting into the room is symbolic of the "new" thing coming forth. I believe that my grandmother was looking at the trials she overcame...I believe that she was looking at her accomplishments...I believe she looked at her husband, my grandpa...I believe that she looked at her children and through them saw us, her grandchildren. She then rested in her wisdom knowing her time of peace, of perfect peace were near. She was able to rest in the wisdom that brought her through and the wisdom that held her at that present time. She knew she had given herself over to be used by God so she had rest...yet I believed that she still had questions: Did I impact future generations? Were my seeds rooted? Did they fall on good ground? I represented the new generation that gave her the answer to her questions. Through these three simple words she knew that it wasn't by what she said but, by how she lived.
In grandma's last days, I remember getting called by my aunt saying: "They are asking us to get all of the family here..." I remember I was driving and my heart was literally in my stomach. I had to pull over and scream, cry, and yell it all out. I remember at the hospital all the people whose lives she touched: the closest family, distant family, friends, co-workers, neighbors, etc. Everyone that had been impacted by a quiet and gentle spirit... When my husband and I visited her in her ICU space, I could have never been prepared for seeing this leading lady in such a state. Machines beeping, tubes, and my grandma ALWAYS had her hair done! I remember being kind of scared. My husband's strong hand on my back nudged me forward...I looked to the right of the bed...the rocking chair. I looked to the left of the rocking chair...the window. I knew then that this was the day of the activation of her Godly wisdom in my life. I remember grabbing her hand, leaning over in the bed up next to her ear and whispering "...it's Shlonda, grandma.......I was listening." Next I felt a warm wetness on the side of my face and it mixed with the tears from my eyes. Two generations forming a sea of wisdom...... We stayed like that for a while, me enjoying her however I could get her...her imparting the qualities of a 31 Woman to her granddaughter. She held my hand tight, knowing I'd need the strength as I do laundry, clean, pick up, cook but most importantly as I fashion and mold the fourth generation, her great granddaugther.
All that is to say: we have to give ourselves over completely to God so he can use us. He doesn't want our lip service, but our heart service...We have to be the doers of the word, not just hearers! Its the only way to impact a generation, to take back the nations! Many blessings!