What Might A Hug From God Look Like?

What might a hug from God look like?

It was a hard, tender day. Albeit good. (Hard doesn’t always mean bad.) First, God woke me with couple songs that stirred the deeper things I’d been hiding from in my heart. Places I’ve been pushing away that need to be grieved so he can bless with his comfort. It also rustled up some of the dreams and longings I have for writing and art.

From there, I wanted to ask what he had in mind for me ”to do” for the day. I was looking for something to produce. He simply asked me to be still, to let him hold me and love on me in those places. So, I did. I played the songs once more, letting my weight sink into his chest. That allowed healing tears to come.

He took me back to my journal of his word for me this year, Breathe. Oh! What goodness. What beauty. What rescue.

After having a couple days of feeling a little stronger physically while still recovering from the crazy my body’s been through (you can come back to read more here), this day I woke a few steps backward. Just a general not feeling well, and struggling again to get my wobbly, heavy, weak legs moving. The whole recovery process has been this way, up and down, back and forth.

I remained a bit aware of all these different things as I moved throughout the day. I was also aware he is with me. Close. Not shirking my emotions but embracing the honesty of them with me. Knowing they are the doorway not only to my heart, but also to His.

The hubs missed lunch, so he asked me to bring something to him. A very late meal, more like “lupper.” Leaving the parking lot after the food drop, my Apple Music queued Graves into Gardens: Morning and Evening, by Elevation Worship. Rolling melodies surfaced some of those hidden places yet again.

Oh the tears beneath my sunglasses. I just wanted to feel a physical hug.

I spilled my thoughts to God as I drove, praying he come for me in these Eden longings for life and love. The longings to be seen and known, felt and heard. To be hugged.

I decided to cash in a free belated ice cream birthday treat expiring in my inbox. The last time I did so, the place gave me the wrong flavor – a dairy instead of non-dairy one – a no for my healing tummy. The guy had prepared a regular size vs the small size the free scoop was supposed to be. Kind. But in his aggravation over the dairy being wrong, he insisted it was dairy-free (even though the label read low-fat yogurt) he smarted off, threw it away, and brought me the corrected scoop in a tiny size. Fair enough, since that was supposed to be the original free offer anyway.

With the memory of previous ice cream woes, I didn’t know what to expect today at the same store. The same guy flitted back and forth behind the counters. I was tired, teary from a raw heart, but aware of God’s gentleness as I waited. A smiling young girl finally noticed how long I’d been standing there. Though I didn’t ask for it, she gave me a sample of the newest non-dairy flavor. I’m not usually a fan of chocolate icecream, but, good grief, the oatmilk-based Salted Fudge Bar is seriously like real chocolate, more than any dairy version I’ve ever had!

I told her I was cashing in a belated free birthday scoop (I have no idea why BR has emailed a few extra ones this year!), but that I wanted to add a second scoop to it (to share with the hubs). Next thing I see, a huge TRIPLE cup of decadent, cold, deliciousness piled high being handed to me! At the register, she quietly nodded with a shhhh-don’t-tell look in her eyes, “Just have it.”

I hope she truly heard and felt the genuine gratitude I gave her. I know it’s just food, but her kindness was so much more than that. I heard that sweet familiar voice of God whisper, “Consider yourself hugged.”

A smile stretched my face at his knowing glance, and I prayed that young, beautiful girl be blessed triple in return.

God began and continues my week with this text from www.flagmessages.io. He’s so good like that! Check it out to receive yours.

What about you?

What different forms have a hug from God taken for you recently?
Or do you need to pray for one, like I did?
What places are you hiding from him and yourself?
Where are you searching for productivity, where Jesus just wants you to be still so he can hold you?
Is there a journal entry you need to re-visit? Or one you need to start?
How can you be kind to someone? You never know what deeper meaning it may have to them.

Ask God to renew your union with him, in every part of you: spirit, soul, mind, body, heart, and will. It is his first provision for us, and the prayer of Jesus that we be one with him in the same way he is one with the Father; complete union, perfectly one. This prayer has been renewing my days and opening up more experiences of his life and love. Try it.

Jesus prayed unity for us:

“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”
John 17:20-26

Hit reply if you have something to share. Consider yourself hugged.