Angels Playing Jump Rope with Powerlines
She sees angels
While driving down a familiar country road, tall trees lining every side, we came upon our favorite clearing—a ranch with Texas longhorn cattle. The space opened up without the trees and showed off the golden fields and bluffs in the background. A little taste of my childhood between the ponderosa pines and mountains of Colorado.
What caught our eye that day was the powerline that trailed the roadside along that ranch. We all took note that one leg of the powerlines between the poles was wiggling straight up and down. Like when you hold one end of a jump rope and flick it up in the air so that the whole thing moves up and down to the end of the jump rope like a roller coaster.
We drove by marveling that only one section of powerline between poles was moving like this. Up and down, not swaying side to side. And the others were perfectly still.
In my minds eye, I saw an angel playing jump rope with the powerline like a jump rope as he stood watch over that busy intersection and the field of cattle.
“It must be an angel,” I told the girls, and then I told them why I thought that.
Faith is believing what we can’t see.
I grew up with a mom who would sense angelic things happen, like if our car swerved just the right way to spare us or like when something we needed was provided serendipitously, in a way we couldn’t easily explain in the natural. And then she’s say, “It must be an angel!” So at a young age, she started to develop my sense of imagination of what the angels and Holy Spirit might be doing at work among us.
Then in college, I was fasting and praying and seeking the Lord for His call on my life. (If you don’t know your calling, ask Him! He will tell you.)
Faith is the evidence of things we can’t see.
During this fast, I was at a young adult conference at the World Prayer Center. On a break, I walked outside past a youth group sitting out on the lawn and overheard a man telling them a story that peaked my interest so much that I hid in the bushes and trees behind the group so I could listen in! I really did that!
The man shared about a time when he fasted and prayed for 40 days. Toward the end of his fast, he began to see angels everywhere. By watching the angels, he realized that when a tree branch wiggles but there’s no wind moving any other tree branches, he saw that it was an angel actually moving the branch!
He shared all kinds of stories about angels moving on earth, unseen but right here with us. The more I thought about this as I observed the world around me, the more his testimony began to develop a greater sense of wonder in me.
The man’s stories taught me that there are so many more angels than we have imagination for! And angelic realms are alive and active and moving in this earth on divine assignments… right here in front of us whether we can see them or not. And we so often have no idea!
Faith and Developing a Sense of Wonder
Later in life, I got my hands on an old CD from Graham Cooke. He was teaching on Developing a Sense of Wonder, and it gave me a vocabulary for what God had been doing since my childhood. And I knew that’s exactly what my mom’s observations and the man’s stories began to do in me. It stirred my faith and wonder that the Lord God Almighty is right here in our midst whether I could see or feel or sense Him or not.
Developing a sense of wonder is foundational to operating in faith.
You know. Until writing this, I hadn’t remembered all the days we drove by those powerlines and that patch of field and prayed that God would put angels to watch over that intersection. There used to be accidents there often, so we started asking God to send angels to protect that road.
I wonder.
We never fully see or know how God answers our prayers. We never fully see or know how the kingdom of God is moving and manifesting on this earth below. But when we pray, “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” you can be certain that we are inviting heaven down to earth! And the sight is more wonderful that we have imagination for!
The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It’s our handle on what we can’t see.
Hebrews 11:1, MSG
Selah.
Til next time, toodle-loo and Peace be with you.
