The earth’s cheeks sink in for lack of water. Dust lies on luxuriant branches waiting to breathe again. It’s a glimpse of the world absent of her wildflowers. Colors of waving joy faded to sepia while He withholds water and we wait in shallow breathe. Perhaps it’s a living mural of how a soul turns cracked and dried up without living water.
I’m walking along this cottage road in Ontario, Canada I’ve travelled consecutive years of summers. Her gravel chest knows the shape of my feet, tall branches blink leafy eyelash at the crown of my head. I’m missing her color-strewn side arms. The way spikes of lavender and gold wave above tall grass and blooming weeds.
The family table misses the vase holding the bouquet from her arms this year.
Docks sit idle empty in water to ankles of steel while boats anchor far from shore. Corn chews tasteless on the cob and beans string skinny. And when a chipmunk scurries across the road, stopping suddenly for a portrait, I hear Him ask the same question he asks the blind men sitting on the roadside when he passes by, “What do you want me to do for you.” Matthew 29:32
I read this question from the Circle Maker by Mark Batterson earlier in the week. It echoes now among the stillness of familiar path. He’s asking me the question directly and I’m feeling like an unprepared contestant on Jeopardy, not ready to respond.
Because this is about more than the need for rain to satiate thirst, it’s about vague prayers and squelched expectancy when it comes to dreams for the future. My dreams and desires; the result of the perimeters of my own capabilities. He’s asking me to be specific, to trade my impotence for his omnipotence.
How will you respond when He asks, “What do you want me to do for you?”
Like the two blind men calling out to Jesus on the roadside, I’m asking Him to help me see. Open blind places of the heart to dream. Glorify Him beyond the rooms I’ve created in the house of circumstance.
Batterson describes it this way: “Most of us don’t get what we want simply because we don’t know what we want. We’ve never circled any of God’s promises . . . our dreams are as nebulous as cumulus clouds.”
Do you know what you want?
Lone voices echo from inside cottages, like pine cones crashing to the ground on an icy winter day. The wail of a child’s cry bounces off tall pines. And those of us enjoying the stillness of morning, we’re unprepared for the fury of what comes hours later.
He answers pleading prayers on the shore of floating clouds in a way unexpected, illustrating truth I hope never to forget.
Please join me for the continuation of this story on Wednesday.
Counting gifts with Ann today: 
- For Ontario peaches and cream for breakfast.
- The way Harrison’s heart soars when he gets on the kneeboard behind the boat.
- The call of the loon outside our bedroom window to welcome us back on our first day of vacation.
- A flock of geese, larger than I’ve ever seen, floating by at first morning glance out the window.
- How everyone wants to go for our first grocery shopping trip in Killaloe, even the kids.
- Because eating food you don’t get at home is such a treat.
- Sitting outside in the gazebo for dinner, watching the sun set over the lake.
- Red Rose tea, cheese curds and milk in a bag.
- The way I made everyone laugh trying to act out the word skateboard during a family game of Cranium.
Linking with these friends too: Hear it on Sunday, Use it on Monday, Playdates with God, Soli Deo Gloria, Just Write.