God has many faces

"Don’t forget to set your alarm for five o’clock. We’re going to the beach early,” 
Margy reminded me one night during my holiday with her family in Nambour.

“I haven't forgotten!” No way would I forget a swim at the beach.

“I’m coming too!” Ten year old Pam was excited.

I prepared for bed and sat in a chair.  Sipping a cup of tea, I read my Bible and sat, hoping to feel God's presence.

I'd welcomed these holidays. I hadn't been a Christian long and was still finding my way. A recent mountain top experience with God had left me hungry to hear more of that still small voice, but He'd 'gone silent' in my busy life. 

Now I was staying with the Smiths, my friends in Nambour, for six whole weeks. Surely all that free time would enable me to hear from Him!

The days drifted past lazily and happily. 
I spent plenty of time praying. 
Surely He'd speak to me? Wasn't that part of what I’d ‘signed up’ for when I surrendered to God?

But there was silence.

While I prayed or read in those long balmy summer evenings, I’d gaze out the window at the pendulous cassia blooms glowing golden in the evening light. The leaves fluttered in the breeze. Behind black hills, the sky blazed with the fire of the setting sun.

Often we rose early to go to Mooloolaba to swim. 

Those riotous trips to the beach! I thought about the coming morning as I sat in my room. 
As the sun rose, we would laugh and sing on our way in the old car, then swoop over the Buderim slopes to the beach in the early light. Some days we even arrived soon after dawn. 

                            Photo  - sunrise at Mooloolaba -  Pam Easton

We'd swim in gentle billowing waves, clear aqua water that swelled to transparent humps and lifted our bodies off the sand. Cool silky water refreshing our hot mid-summer limbs. 

We’d buy breakfast from the bakery and eat it on the beach, crunching hungrily into crusty rolls topped with bacon and cheese, while we gazed at the sparkling ocean.

Then back over the lush, forested hills and into Nambour.

Later we'd sit around the friendly kitchen table and talk and joke in sheer contentment. Summer holidays. . . no time pressure.

Birds chirped and twittered as I rested in the afternoon. Bees buzzed loudly. The air was sweet with the fragrance of roses.

My prayer times were punctuated by Margy or one of the others bringing me a cup of tea and a snack. Cosiness filled my room. 

At the very end of those holidays, the dear familiar 'still small voice' began to speak to me again.  But that's another story.

I think back over that holiday, enjoying so many happy memories.

While God taught me to walk by faith, all I heard from Him then was silence – but all the time He was whispering in the breeze, singing through the birds, loving me through the Smiths and glowing in the joy-filled sunrises.

My huge thanks to all the Smiths for those wonderful times.

God has many faces.

All photos by Pam Easton