FOR P - FROM PRAYER PARTNER HEATHER

For P: I really felt like God was saying that He knows and understands how you feel...you feel like you are in a very dark place, like a dungeon, and that your troubles are like huge waves crashing over your head that threaten to destroy and kill. But God is with you in those dark places, and because He is the Light, He will bring his light into the situation you are in and destroy the darkness, holding back the waters so that you can breathe and gain new strength to fight the battles you face. You are in a battle: spiritual forces are attacking you, but God will hold you safe and enable you to go forward with confidence because He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords! There is a wonderful old hymn which I felt God wanted me to share with you in your place of emotional trauma:

Now I have found the ground wherein
Sure my soul’s anchor may remain,
The wounds of Jesus, for my sin
Before the world’s foundation slain;
Whose mercy shall unshaken stay,
When Heaven and earth are fled away.

Father, Thine everlasting grace
Our scanty thought surpasses far;
Thy heart still melts with tenderness,
Thy arms of love still open are,
Returning sinners to receive,
That mercy they may taste and live.

O Love, Thou bottomless abyss,
My sins are swallowed up in Thee!
Covered is my unrighteousness,
Nor spot of guilt remains on me,
While Jesus’ blood, through earth and skies,
Mercy, free, boundless mercy, cries.

By faith I plunge me in this sea,
Here is my hope, my joy, my rest;
Hither, when hell assails, I flee,
I look into my Savior’s breast;
Away, sad doubt, and anxious fear!
Mercy is all that’s written there.

Though waves and storms go o’er my head,
Though strength, and health, and friends be gone,
Though joys be withered all and dead,
Though every comfort be withdrawn,
On this my steadfast soul relies,
Father, Thy mercy never dies.

Fixed on this ground will I remain,
Though my heart fail, and flesh decay;
This anchor shall my soul sustain,
When earth’s foundations melt away;
Mercy’s full power I then shall prove,
Loved with an everlasting love.

This hymn is backed up by scripture (sorry about length!!) See especially verses 54-57 about the waters flowing over our head: it was that picture which I felt God was showing me to describe your situation, BUT GOD WILL NOT LEAVE YOU THERE ALONE!!

Lamentations 3 says this "And I said, My strength and my hope is perished from the LORD: Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. My soul hath [them] still in remembrance, and is humbled in me. This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope. [It is of] the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.[They are] new every morning: great [is] thy faithfulness. The LORD [is] my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him. The LORD [is] good unto them that wait for him, to the soul [that] seeketh him. (vv18-25) For the Lord will not cast off for ever: But though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies. For he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men...(vv31-33) ...They have cut off my life in the dungeon, and cast a stone upon me. Waters flowed over mine head; [then] I said, I am cut off. I called upon thy name, O LORD, out of the low dungeon. Thou hast heard my voice: hide not thine ear at my breathing, at my cry. Thou drewest near in the day [that] I called upon thee: thou saidst, Fear not. O Lord, thou hast pleaded the causes of my soul; thou hast redeemed my life. (vv53-58)