Fruitful Hibernation: Reflections by Kathy Godwin
/One morning many years ago, I was sitting alone in my favorite booth at Panera. I often went there to work on whatever Bible Study lesson I was writing at the time. In the midst of my deep concentration, a lovely, friendly lady caught sight of my Bible and asked what Bible study I was doing. What followed was a brief but memorable interchange. And so that day, I met Kathy Godwin, then a sixth grade teacher at Dayton Christian schools.
Several years later, as God would have it, we met again when Kathy and her husband Joe came to the hospital to pray with my husband John right after his widow maker heart attack. And so we have loved and appreciated both Joe and Kathy ever since and became part of the same fellowship at Patterson Park Church.
Here is a bit about Kathy’s background:
Kathy came to know the Lord at seven years of age. As a teenager she had a sense that the Lord was gifting her for children’s ministry and ministry to women. So it is significant then that she would later teach in Christian schools for twenty years and also be involved with teaching women during the forty plus years of Kathy’s and her husband Joe’s church ministry. Family-wise, Kathy and Joe are parents to two sons and daughters-in-law and grandparents to four grandchildren with one on the way.
Well, Kathy has been walking through her own lengthy “quarantine” of sorts for many months before we have started ours with the current pandemic … and the Lord has taught her. So I am delighted to introduce Kathy today as our “Guest Branch” at “A Branch in the Vine.”
Thank you for sharing what the Lord has given you, dear sister.
FRUITFUL HIBERNATION
Hibernation! It is for bears, bumblebees, hedgehogs, ground squirrels, bats, turtles, woodchucks, and a few other animals. But we humans do not hibernate very well!
We are all learning and experiencing much during this mandated hibernation. Our experiences and emotions vary – some are entertaining or teaching lively, restless children or some are struggling with loneliness, some the frustration of trying to work from home with many distractions or all the above and more!
So how are we responding to this huge block of time that God has dropped into our laps? Is this happenstance? Or could God be working His purposes in our lives? Are we cooperating with Him? He is such a patient, but persistent Teacher!
Believe me, I’ve experienced lots of solitude - hibernation - over the year 2019 to the present. I’m convinced that God has a purpose for 9 weeks of laryngitis, then months of chronic pain with lumbar and sciatica, as well as, cervical vertebrae pain, and now laryngitis again for three months and counting. Sure, I’ve wondered at times what is going on and why! However, I’ve continually asked God to show me and help me profit for His glory from what He is trying to teach me.
Throughout 2019 and 2020, I’ve recorded in my devotion journal some principles that God is teaching me, and then I review those pages as reminders. Some ask what He is teaching me. It would be too lengthy to share! However, I’m asking God to help me share a few major points, which I have by no means mastered!
1. Over and over, I’ve needed to accept this time from God and ask Him to show me how to make it count spiritually, one day at a time.
“Be glad for all God is planning for you. Be patient in trouble and always be prayerful.” (Romans 12:12,NLT/’96)
* Every time I begin to struggle, I recall this verse and ask myself, “Am I being GLAD for ALL God is doing in my life? Am I being patient? I’m certainly being prayerful!”
2. Nonnegotiable, I begin everyday with Him. Bring my focus to God and His Word.
“I rise early before the sun is up; I cry out for help and put my hope in Your
Words.” (Psalm 119:147)* Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth challenges, “As you read, pause frequently to meditate on the meaning of what you are reading. Absorb the Word into your system by dwelling on it, pondering it, going over it again and again in your mind, considering it from many different angles, until it becomes a part of you.”
* “Disciplining our emotions and appetites is strenuous. But refusing (or simply ignoring) the life-sustaining…power of God’s Word is spiritual suicide.” – Alicia Chole.
* Your circumstances might only allow time to pray before your “feet hit the floor”, asking God to direct Your day and submitting to His Holy Spirit.
3. With His Spirit’s help, I’m to abide in Him. Often I ask myself, “What does that look like, and how do I practice this?” (John 15) How can I abide throughout the day, if I’ve not even begun my day with Him? [This is a lengthy, rich topic that merits exploring. I’ve been breaking this down in my devotion journal over these last months.]
“Perhaps one of the most profound things I am learning about abiding is that it never takes you out of the moment you’re in…Abiding is not primarily about cloister and quiet. The invitation to abide is the invitation to draw spiritual sustenance directly from its Supernatural Source amidst the dailiness of life…If we abide, fruit happens. We do our part, but there is a life that flows up through the roots and branches that is beyond our ability to understand or produce. Abiding is and always will be a moment-by-moment thing.”
- “Life as a Branch” Discipleship Journal
4. I am learning that “being is so much harder than doing”. At home alone and voice rest certainly forces me to look at my “being” without the “doing”. Do I feel like my value as a servant of God comes from mostly doing? Wow! So I’ve concentrated on literature (including His Word) that promotes my growth as a believer, as well as, encourages me with handling so much isolation and physical discomfort. [Suffering and the Sovereignty of God, John Piper; Anonymous: Jesus’ Hidden Years…and Yours, Alicia Britt Chole; He Will Hold Me Fast, Connie Dever; New Morning Mercies, Paul David Tripp; The Valley of Vision, compiled by Arthur Bennett…to name a few.]
5. Even with limitations of voice rest and at times “nursing” pain, I ask God to show me how to serve Him and/or be productive, how to edify others. How do I practice the Westminster Catechism, “Man’s chief and highest end is to glorify God and fully enjoy Him forever.” What does this look like no matter the circumstances to glorify God? Am I enjoying Him and how? [I’m trying to text or email encouragement to ladies, send cards, pray as God brings people to mind, prayer walk (as weather allows), etc.]
Friends, these are just a few highlights of indepth Truths and God’s working in my life from the past sixteen months. They are the tip of the iceberg. Sometimes it seems like, “three steps forward and two steps back”. However, I pray that these insights might encourage you and prompt some soul-searching. “Anything that makes us need God is a blessing.” – Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth
Love you all! Kathy
