Watch and Wait

In a prayer zoom last night I received a picture that made no sense at first, so I asked God to show me more, and who it was for. I don’t know exactly who it was for, but I did feel that it applied to many people right now, & that I needed to share it with my blog readers too…

At the start I just saw a frog hopping about on some steps. As I kept watching I saw the steps were leading down from a temple. There was water also flowing down the steps out of the temple, that gathered in a pool at the bottom of the steps before continuing on its way as a river. In one part of the pool where the water was deep and still, there stood a heron, intently watching the frog but not moving

The water was similar to the river of life that flowed out of the temple in Ezekiel 47. The frog immediately reminded me of the plagues in Egypt – it was a pest, representative of the things that plague us. It felt kind of demonic.

And I felt God say that in this season there are many things sent to plague and distract us, hopping around like frogs on the periphery trying to get our attention. But the key to dealing with them is to be like the heron. Stay still. Don’t move from your spot in the still, deep waters. The frog-like distractions will hop about just out of reach, trying to draw your focus: if you move towards them, they’ll stay out of reach but further away, so if you keep following them you will end up wading through shallower water and eventually out of the pool altogether.
As you remain still and unmoved by the presence of the enemy’s distractions, they will hop closer and closer, trying to distract you… until they get close enough that you can make like a heron and pick them off in one swift move.

The key in this season is to wait and watch, in the still deep waters of the Spirit.

Like the bridesmaids in Matt 25, with their lamps lit, peering into the darkness, yearning for the Bridegroom to appear. Nothing may seem to be happening, but He has promised He is on His way, so let’s keep watching and waiting, unmoved by distractions.

Like the disciples commanded by Jesus to wait in Jerusalem for the coming holy Spirit… the word for ‘wait’ was the Greek word perimeno. That’s ‘meno’, meaning ‘wait’, with a prefix of peri that intensifies it, meaning “to endure, wait in the midst of surrounding difficulty, to remain steady”. There were many pressures around them at that time, but they waited watchfully (in prayer), and consequently received the promised blessing.

That picture of the heron that I saw, absolutely motionless but fully aware of its surroundings (including potential distractions), was a helpful image for me. We must commit to both waiting and watching. We can’t do one without the other: just waiting leaves us ignorant, oblivious to what is coming – but watching on its own leaves us impatient, easily distracted by our surroundings. Let us watch and wait – until we receive the promise to come!