It might feel like we're locked in the tomb, but SUDDENLY is coming!

Early this week, as I asked the Lord what He wanted to show me, there were two plants in my garden that particularly caught my attention. The first were some of my azaleas. Although at first glance, they didn’t appear to have any blooms on them, on closer inspection I realised they were covered in tiny buds that will SUDDENLY burst forth. I felt the Lord saying that in the place where we see nothing happening there will be a SUDDEN shift.

The second plants were the daffodils, and the word trumpet. The centre part of the daffodil is known as the “trumpet”. It felt to me that the TRUMPET is being sounded. As I reflected on what that was like, I found the following reasons for the trumpet to be blown on the “One for Israel” website:

· Time to pack up camp and move on, when the Israelites were traveling in the desert

· Time to gather the people and call an assembly

· To mark a sacrifice on a feast day

· A warning of war or danger

· To praise

· To declare a procession or feast

· Proclaiming a king

· Assembling the troops for battle

· To be used in battle

· To declare victory

It doesn’t take much to see how this relates to the season we are in. It is time to move into a new place; time to gather in unity (even if it is only virtual!); we are in a battle, but we can still praise and proclaim Jesus as King. He has already won the victory!

A number of people have suggested that right now we are in a “selah” moment, a time to pause, to stop. This morning I read of a picture Kaylie Singh had “…of a dark room and a person trying to force the door behind him to stay open…because he wouldn’t be able to see anything…there was a time of waiting…in the dark before the new door would be opened to him.”.

As I pondered this, I was reminded of how the disciples must have felt when Jesus was crucified and laid in the grave. The despair and hopelessness, the sense of loss of all the dreams and desires they had for the past three years with Him. There was no going back, but equally there seemed no way forward. And in that, I had a sense of us, joining Jesus in that tomb. Many of us have been seeking a way out of this "dark room" we find ourselves in. We are looking for any crack or crevice where light might enter, that might indicate an escape route. The door we came in - the desire to go back the way we came, back to "normal" - is enormously attractive, but even that is firmly shut to us.

Reflecting on the tomb, it is the place of laying down all our striving, all our desires and even our fears, and there is a sense we have no other choice but to wait on Him, to wait for Him to show us the way forward. However, at the same time, it fills me with excitement, because when the tomb opens, I see that the darkness will SUDDENLY be flooded with glorious light; there will be a SUDDEN bursting forth and the TRUMPET blast calling us into victory and the new season with our King!