An Isaiah 35 house

The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,

the splendour of Carmel and Sharon;

they will see the glory of the Lord,

the splendour of our God.

Strengthen the feeble hands,

steady the knees that give way;

say to those with fearful hearts

'be strong, do not fear

your God will come, he will

come with vengeance,

with divine retribution,

He will come to save you.'

Then will the eyes of the blind be opened

and the ears of the deaf unstopped.

Then will the lame leap like a dear

and the mute tongue shout for joy.

Water will gush forth in the wilderness

and the streams in the desert.

The burning sand will become a pool

the thirsty ground bubbling springs.

In the haunts where jackals once lay,

grass and reeds and papyrus will grow.

And a highway will be there; it will be called the way of holiness

Isaiah 35:2-8

If you read my last blog post, you will know that towards the end of 2016, I started devoting some time each Tuesday morning to specifically read through Isaiah and pray into our move to London. I said I would give you and example of how I have felt God speak to me through this.

So, on 21st February 2017 (almost a year to the day that I felt God speak to me in my kitchen about moving to London) I was sitting in my swivel chair, with my coffee in hand and Bible open. I was up to Isaiah 35. I read it through and felt 'meh' - you know those times when you read something as part of your daily reading and you're a bit disappointed because you can't immediately 'get something out of it?' Well that's how I felt. I was a bit like, yeah whatever, I'll just pray instead then!

I started to pray quite generally about London and a house, etc and then felt God say to me 'You haven't asked me for what you want.' Ok, I thought. So I got out my coloured pens and wrote 'LONDON HOUSE' in big letters in the middle of a page in my notebook. I then wrote lots of quite practical things around it;

- Not on a main road so Yoda (our cat) is safe

- Close to someone else from Revelation Church

- Near a school where others from Revelation Church go

- Outside space for Tim's tools and equipment (he's a builder...we currently have 3 sheds, yes that's right, 3 sheds in our back garden!)

- Inside space that we can use as a work area (I am likely to need to work from home)

- A garden or very close to a park

- A good reception room layout downstairs to maximise hospitality

- A bedroom for each child

- And one 'dream' one would be to have a house large enough to use as a base for Relational Mission in London, to have an annex or potential to convert part of the house to use as meeting rooms, extra bedrooms so that we could host people needing overnight stays.

I finished my neat spider diagram in green pen and was like, there you go, God - there's my wish list. And then I felt God say, 'now read Isaiah 35 again'

I'll admit I was a little bemused - really, God, because I have literally just read it and not got a lot from it!

But I read the lines again and by the time I was at verse 8 I felt such an overwhelming compassion for the people of London, I was in tears (yes, a hallmark of my journey!). The words written at the top of this post hit me between the eyes and I felt God say, 'now this is what I want your house to be like.'

- Where knees that give way will be steadied

- Where the blind will see

- Where the deaf will hear

- Where the mute tongue will shout for joy

- Where lives will be renewed

- Where courage will be given to those with fearful hearts

- Where the lame will walk

- Where people will be set on the way of holiness

I selected a pink pen and wrote the above things into my spider diagram. Wow, what an amazing promise. The places that are mentioned, Lebanon, Carmel and Sharon were known as fertile lands, where things grow well and I just had that sense that God wanted us to use our home like this.

Now, don't get me wrong, these things are nothing to do with Tim and I and what we can achieve or do, but all to do with God and what He can do through our obedience to Him. I also didn't feel at all that God was disregarding my list, it was more like He was saying, 'I understand that those things are important to you, now here is what is important to me.'

And so when we pray for a house, which we are still doing, we pray that it will be an Isaiah 35 house. Whatever it looks like, whatever street it is in, we are praying that it will be a place that facilitates the amazing promises God has given us.

It also helps us to pray for ourselves. The very nature of a move to London and looking down that list, I reckon that we will be confronted with a lot of people who are very different to us and I have to admit, I am a bit scared about that. It's challenging to consider how open I am to those who are different to me. My desire is to have a home that is always full of people and so I am praying that God helps me get over my own hang-ups! Quite often I think we can be the ones who stand in the way of what God wants to lead us into and I don't want to be that person.

Esther highlighted this the other day when we were in London. So, we were walking along Regents Canal, chatting and praying. It was very hot so we sat in the shade for a bit. As we were sitting there, a very distressed lady walked past us. She was hideously thin, had open sores on her face, a blood splattered t-shirt and pretty obviously a drug user from the state of her veins. She was making a moaning sound as she walked past us and up the hill to the bridge. Esther stared at us and said 'why didn't you do anything?' We started to say, 'what could we have done?' but Esther continued, 'she was clearly in pain and you did nothing, you should have done something.'

I felt pretty rubbish.

I said that we could sit and pray for the lady, which I did. I prayed that God would bring the right support across her path that day....and then the lady walked back down the hill towards us!!!

So what did we do?

Nothing again. Another lady motioned to us from the top of the bridge that the distressed lady had just had a fix. Esther was so cross with us and expressed this. And I get it. I was scared to approach her, knew we were about to catch a train back to Norfolk, was aware she was a drug user and I had my 12 year old daughter with me, etc, etc. But I could have offered to pray for her. I could have done that. And I didn't because I was scared. I want to get better at that.

Next blog post: The letter through the door