50 ROADS #23 THE ROAD WHERE GOD SANG BACK

The very word “God” has become such a loaded word, and I want you to know that I know that. I wish it wasn’t so. I feel like as a human family, we need a shared benevolent parent now more than ever. But we won’t talk about that today.

I feel like I know God, and I feel like God knows me. We’ve traveled way more than 50 roads together. That’s why I have struggled with feelings of deep confusion when it comes to what I thought I used to know about the nature of God, and the way life works, and how if you are just a good kid who does all the right things, everything will work out.

I lost my faith for a while. And then I got to experience the way others sometimes treat you when they think you’ve got a horrifically contagious disease called a “faith crisis.”

This is the road where I earnestly asked God a question, not sure if I even believed in God anymore . . . and then God answered. And I can never ever ever deny that, even though I’ve struggled with the way things have happened between God and I. We are working it out, and it’s something that’s too private and sacred to discuss.

We are very good, close friends. And we are having some very honest and difficult conversations, currently.

And goodness gracious do we ever live in a time when saying GOD causes so much inflammation in the collective human psyche. How did we get to the place where God has been weaponized? I refuse to participate in what I believe is the actual definition of “taking God’s name in vain.”

Because we are all very different as individuals, we all have different ways in our relationships, including our relationship with the Divine. But I believe we are all one big family, trying to figure out how we got here and who put us here and who in the world is in charge of this family. I think on our deepest level, we are all trying to figure out who our Divine parent is, and where our Divine parent is and how we got so divided from each other as a family.

At least I am.
I am homesick for the mutual love of our human family.

I’m going to tell you upfront that I have a hard and fast rule, generally, that I don’t discuss the sacred nature of my faith journey with anyone but my husband and on rare occasions, I will be knee to knee and eye to eye and heart to heart with someone, and when it feels appropriate, I will share my thoughts, my experiences, my faith, my personal values and what I have hope in being true – what I put my faith in. But generally, I allow others their journey to figure things out in the way that feels most true for them, and I respect that right deeply.

And I ask others to grant me the same respect for what I’m trying to figure out on my journey.

My journey with God at the moment is really just too tender and complicated to put out on a community table. We are bound together at this time as we work to figure things out pretty much 24/7. It’s a wild time that some DO call a “faith crisis” — as if you could label something this multidimensional and personal. It is not a crisis at all, it is a homecoming. I have no need to defend it or define it, thankfully. It is not open for public scrutiny. I hold it in the deepest recesses of my heart. I guide my life by it. It’s between me and God. And it’s right for ME, it’s pure and it’s raw and it’s honest. AND I would never assume that just because the kind of relationship I experience with the Divine is right for me, that living it out the way I do is right for everyone.

There is no way that is even possible.
We all have so much complexity.

I really have no business asking you what you believe as some kind of qualifying question to see if you are worthy of my time, and you have no business doing that to me, either. Most religious people belong to an organization that professes to be rooted in love and care. Qualifying another human being through questioning their belief system doesn’t feel like love to me. So I don’t do it. And I don’t allow others to do it to me. And frankly, when I see others do it to each other, I speak up.

And if you were to try to explain the multidimensional experience you have with the Divine, I would tell you the same. That it’s none of my business and that I know you’re doing the best you can and you’re going to get it figured out exactly perfectly. I’d tell you to go straight to the source and don’t involve anyone else. It’s just too personal.

And….I’d tell you that I love you no matter what. I just do. And I ache for you to love me no matter what. I know you are on your own journey and you are finding your way as best you can. I know that you think through carefully what you believe and how you live your life. I know you are always trying to do the next good and right thing. I know that you are good. I KNOW that you are valuable and precious beyond any quantification, and you don’t ever have to do a single thing to earn that value. I know you are different than any soul who has ever walked this earth, so your journey is different too.

And the same is true for me.

So with all of that being said, I want to tell you about what happened on this road. And like I said, I usually use the word “Truthteller” but I’m going to make an exception as I share this road with you. Just know that this is not where this book turns to some kind of tool to convert you to my belief system. This is definitely not that. In fact, the things I thought I knew for sure shattered to pieces like so much of the rest of my life and I am currently in a relationship with my Truthteller that has been stripped away of everything but He and I. Yep, these days it’s just me and Jesus, trying to find our way back to each other. At least that’s what I’m doing.

I started having visitations in the night from Jesus when I was a little girl. I don’t know if it was in dreams or if I was actually awake, but it was very real. It extended into my life as an adult, just little visits here and there. But then when Marq had his brain injury, it happened more times than I can count, and it sustained me. I can never deny the existence of Jesus in my life.

I don’t talk about it publicly, like I said, because these days, it just seems to cause a deep canyon of division. And besides, I only know for sure what happens between He and I. And for me, for 45+ years, Jesus has been telling me that it’s pretty simple, it’s all about love. Just love each other. And then love each other more. And then love each other no matter what. It might seem childlike and simplistic, but I think we can all agree that as simple as “love each other” is, it seems to be the most difficult task we’ve ever had as a human family.

But I’m not gonna talk about that now. I’m gonna tell you about what happened when I sang that plea to Him on the last road…the plea to TAKE ME AWAY.

He answered.

And He said, SURE I will take you away . . . I’ve been waiting for you to ask….

Here was His answer (and I very vulnerably included my recording so you can hear it if you’d like)

I hear your heart
I hear you plead

Rest assured
I know what you need
It’s easy to see
What your burdens weigh

So I’m gonna take you away.

First we will heal up your eyes
You need to see
The beauty of the sunrise

The starry sky
Cloudy blue or gray

With your eyes
I’ll take you away

Look up and see

The way the trees sway
Let’s heal your ears
So you can hear what they say

Feel the wind blowing on your face
I’ll take you away to this place

I’ll take you
Take you away

We’re gonna have
Such a good time today

You have forgotten how to play
So that’s how I’ll take you away

I hear your heart when you pray
I know you think that you don’t wanna stay

You’re tired and worn day after day

You need to take yourself away

I’m always here,
I’ll never stray
I watch you suffer
Every day

You’re not meant
To live this way
Come with me
it’s gonna be okay

I’ll take you
Take you away
Cuz this whole world
Needs you to stay

And love your life,
Let’s start today

Close your eyes and
Take yourself away….

I don’t know that there’s anything more personal that I could ever share with you. In fact, just a few weeks ago, I shared this song/prayer with my husband for the first time, when my friends D’Laine and Kat came to visit. They flew across the country and drove almost 4 hours up into the mountains to see us for a few days.

And because it had been years since we’d seen each other facet to face, we got really deep and personal, and I finally shared this secret with them. And I sang them this song.

We sat in the tipi and cried together. It was love.

On another road, I will tell you about my voice. How I’m getting it back. If you know me, you know that I wish I could talk and sing loud, but my voice just won’t do it. It’s soft and quiet and I’ve struggled with that for years. I’m working so hard to get a strong voice.

This song/prayer is the most powerful way I have ever used my voice, but it’s been 5 years since this song first came to me in the night, and since then I’ve written countless songs like this and never found the courage to share any of them. I am working on that with my Truthteller, and maybe the songs are just supposed to be between He and I for now.

This is a miracle to me, friends. And that’s why I wanted to share it. God cannot be put into a neat little box, God meets us where we are and how we will best hear and learn and heal. God talks to me through songs and through nature. So that’s where He took me . . . to beautiful, remote places where I could hear Him and hear myself and hear US, our conversations with each other.

I wanted to put this song/prayer and this road near the middle of this book because the second half of this book is about what happened when He took me away, and when I learned to take myself away, like the song says. And you just wouldn’t be able to understand what happened next without hearing what I asked for, and what the answer was….

Here was my final verse……….just a little proclamation of where this took me.

And it’s miraculous to me that this song was given to me in 2017, but I didn’t hit the road until 2019. It took a while for me to be able to TAKE MYSELF AWAY. I will tell you about that 2 year process that led to be TAKEN AWAY on another road.

WIDE OPEN EYES
I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO SAY
I THINK I’M GONNA BE OKAY

I’LL THINK AND HEAR AND FEEL
IT ALL TODAY
MY OPEN EYES WILL TAKE ME AWAY

I’LL ALWAYS COME BACK
COME BACK TO STAY

BUT RIGHT NOW I’LL TAKE ME AWAY
………………………………

So, my dear soul siblings….
Do you ever long to be taken away?
AND
How can you heal your eyes and ears and let that take you away to REAL LIVING?

Tomorrow, I can’t wait to share with you The Road To The Mountaintop.

I love you. Thank you for being a safe place for me to share.
I hope you’ll sing your songs too.

xo
melody ross