Prophetic Pieces

Tuesday night, Dr. Lyle Dorsett spoke a prophetic word to me thet lifted my soul and reaffirmed the picture of vocation I've begun to develop.

It was the closing session of our "Holy Spirit and Ministry" class, and in typical Christian Formation fashion, we ended the night with worship, prayer, and longings to see the Spirit we had been so fervently learned about manifest itself in our presence. If we ask, seek, knock, thirst and long for His presence, it is promised to be revealed. I don't understand the dynamics of it all. The prayers, the songs, the way we sought out God and each other. God knows I probably never will, but the soul speaks peace when things are right and cringes when things are not. That night my soul felt peace as I suspect others in the room did too.

As I prepared to leave, our eyes caught each other. Dr. Dorsett came up to me, placed his hands on both my shoulders, and looked me in the eyes. "I like your heart, Easten. You have a gift for keeping people connected to the broken, don't ever lose that passion." I promised I would meet again with him sometime before the semester closed. In my last months here at Wheaton I want to spend less time on classes, more time with professors.

What was said makes sense to me. It's one of those things I've always felt about myself but was never sure if it was right to say so. In that moment, I felt as if my presence had been seen and named for what it was. There is a deep joy in being confirmed for what God perhaps made you to be and do since the beginning of creation. It feels like a bit of coming home, being accepted and embraced in your deepest self.

Dr. Dorsett's words are but one of many pieces in the past few weeks. Weeks of conferences, conversations, and internal seeking appear to be bearing the type of fruit that might actually be worth tasting. Maybe even good enough to pick and give away, good enough to produce life in others.

I hope to write about these other pieces in detail another time. For now, there are other important things on my plate. Focus on the important, not the urgent.