Deeps

So, while I was soaking the other day, I had this experience.  I'm not sure if it was much more intensely sensory version of the "pictures" I normally get when soaking, of if I dozed and it was a dream, but either way I have the unshakeable impression that it was definitely a God-thing.

I'm diving into the ocean, the warm-and-gorgeous-eye-popping-wildlife-teeming-coral-reef kind of ocean you see in commercials for the Caribbean (or shark attack movies, or volcano disaster movies, or whatever), only it isn't water—it's honey.  Not viscous and sticky and (frankly) absolutely gross like swimming through honey would really be, but sweet and faintly amber-colored and just a little thicker than water.  It was more the impression of honey than the actual experience of honey, sort of like a painting.  (Also, it was breathable.)  So I'm swimming through this honey, diving deeper and deeper.  The light isn't coming from above like sunlight; below me there's this bright—not really a light, but a vaguely white sense of something beautiful that attracts you, like you would naturally swim towards the light if you were actually underwater.  And as I'm swimming down towards this light, immersed in this honey ocean, I just have this overwhelming sense of bliss.  It's not an emotion I can seem to recreate by will.  It's like a combination of joy, electric excitement, peace, and contentment.  I'm absolutely, gloriously elated to be here in this ocean, but I also know that if I go deeper, it will just get better.  I could stop at any point and just rest int he euphoria, but I could swim deeper and discover even more joy.  It's perfect happiness, and yet anticipation.  It's bliss, and yet adventure.  And it's a sense of adventure like I've always imagined adventure really ought to be, like I imagine people who actually go looking for adventure feel—the fairy-tale kind of adventure, that involves mortal danger and darkness and potentially unwanted yet vital personal growth, but the knowledge that there's always help when I need it and there's something better waiting at the end than I could have even imagined when I first set out.  For the first time, I felt really equipped.  Not of my own accord, because it was still just me, but just a solid recognition that (however invisible) God was right there, always aware of what I needed and ready to answer even my slightest cry for help.

This is how God sees my journey with Him—I don't know quite if I've already dived in and this is where I am, or if this is where He means me to be—but it was so beautiful.  I want to be there.

Ignition is this weekend.  I want to go into this expectant, looking for expansion, like I never have before.

{Also, I'm wondering about the symbolism (Biblical or literary?) of honey.  I might come back to this, blogwise.}