Eclipse: derived from the ancient Greek noun ékleipsis, meaning "the abandonment," or "the
downfall"; derived from the verb ekleipō, which means "to darken" or "to cease to exist."
If you are currently a living being, and are even slightly aware of current events, you have heard of
the upcoming solar eclipse. It seems this rare event has caught the attention of pretty much everyone, and for good cause. This astronomical event is rare indeed, and well-worth the attention.
As lovely as it is, I don't find this particular event worth writing words about. ( My eyes
become tired so easily, and I still can’t figure out how to double space on this thing without doing it
manually.) I'm writing about something so much greater than that. Something that, if you give it the chance, has more than a slight possibility of changing your life.
Here it is.
These past few months, I haven't been sleeping. It's been hard to eat, too. Actually, it's been hard to take a breath without feeling such weight on my chest. You know those days when the battle is raging before you have even opened your eyes...the days when waking up to your own reality is worse than waking up to your alarm? My heart has echoed the words and demeanour of Anne of Green Gables, as she ascends those crickety stairs in her darkened, uncertain home: "I am in the depths of despair.”
I always hear Marilla's stern response: "To despair is to turn your back on God." Most of the time my conscience is pricked, but even so the reprimand does not deter my spirit from sinking. (this story does get better, I promise).
If you haven't had a season like this, I pray that you would be spared. If you live in the same world as I, however, odds are you have had times such as this. Perhaps you are in that season right now. Life is HARD. It's harder when you choose to follow truth in a world seeping with lies.
Harder still is when you lose sight of the goal, and you are left to battle with your deceitful heart to re-encounter truth. If you could see my soul, it would resemble a battle-weary being, knuckles bruised and bloodied from fighting with itself. There is a full on war for your soul. If you aren't aware of that yet, you will be. If you have chosen to follow Jesus, there will be battles that overwhelm you, body and soul. There will be trials that knock you to your knees and then kick you while you're down. If you give in to the deceitful desires of your flesh for what appears to be relief, the battle prolongs itself, and you almost forget how it feels to stand. I recently found myself in such a place. This raging war.
"God, I can't do this. If it's this hard, I can't do this. Life is too long. This is too painful. I can't do
this."
I was sitting at a small table in a little coffee shop, when I heard His answer to me.
Let Me eclipse you.
Now to be clear, I had not yet heard of the upcoming solar eclipse. I had no inkling of it's future existence. I had NO IDEA. Yet these words left me with no doubt that they had come from the God of the universe to my heart. I envisioned my soul as the sun, and His presence as the moon, engulfing all my thoughts and anguish and battles. So beautiful was the image to me I recorded this prayer in my notebook then and there.
From that moment, whenever I would become paralyzed with my thoughts or weary in the battle, I would cry out for Him to eclipse me, One afternoon I entered my little apartment and heard: “hey, did you hear about the solar eclipse? They are super rare, like this might be the only one in our life time. Isn’t that crazy?”
Heart. Stop. What??? The mere picture God had given to my heart had been enough. There was going to be an actual solar eclipse? A total solar eclipse? Psalm 19: 2 says that
“The heavens declare the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
Day unto day utters speech, and night unto night reveals knowledge.”
This was not a coincidence. It was not a random event. The God who holds the universe is the same God who whispered to my heart. I was in awe. I began to research this beautiful event, and found that God had more yet to teach me. As written above, the word eclipse is derived from a Greek word meaning “to abandon” , “to darken”, or to “cease to exist.”
In Philippians 3:8 Paul proclaims:
“Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ.”
He goes on to say in verses 13-14: “; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”
When you choose to make Jesus your Lord, radical decisions must be made. You cannot be partially in. He wants all of you. This requires an abandonment, the darkening, of everything else that used to hold your heart. It requires a total surrender of all that took His place, and allowing one’s soul to be totally eclipsed by something so much better. God does not call us to abandon all only to leave us empty. He has something greater in mind.
In a total solar eclipse, three celestial bodes are perfectly aligned. This straight-line configuration is knows as a syzygy, which in the ancient greek, means “yoked together.”
Pause for a moment. In this rare event known as a total solar eclipse, three celestial bodies align, and become yoked together. Jesus speaks of us being yoked together with Him in Matthew 11:29, when He says “Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me; for I am gentle and lowly in spirit, and you will find rest for your souls.” God desires to be ONE with us. This was the essence of Jesus’ prayer to His Father throughout John 17.
Verse 22 reads:“And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one.” A total eclipse. Three celestial bodies, in perfect alignment. Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit drawing us to Himself. Once we stand in the midst of this life-altering truth, everything else that once held onto our hearts ceases to exist. All of those loves we clung to, knuckles white, begin to be abandoned, and we enter into alignment with the One who gave His life so that we could yoked together with His soul.
I don’t know what this eclipse means to you. Maybe you have obtained your special solar eclipse glasses, awaiting it with eager expectation—or maybe this whole thing hasn’t really meant much. Whatever the case, please, do not let this moment pass you by without recognizing this truth:
Life hasn’t shortened, the pain has not subsided, and the war still rages on. But our souls have been extended an invitation to be eclipsed by something greater. The God of the universe who holds the alignment of the sun and the moon is the same God who desires to speak to your heart—even if it means moving heaven and earth to do so. Let Him eclipse you. Abandon those things that have burdened your spirit and entangled your heart, and be yoked together with the One who holds the universe. Don’t let this moment pass you by.
Be eclipsed.
