Tuesday, July 21, 2026

The weather was weird.

It wasn't supposed to be that cool. I had packed my lily pads, fans, and all the water. July usually hangs heavy around here, thick with humidity that sticks to your skin before you even reach the car. But tonight the air was different.

Alive and windy.

Not a breeze.

Wind.

The kind that can't help itself by the sea.

The kind that calms and calls.

The kind that makes you listen.

The kind that catches your hair in your face and makes the trees sound like they're whispering to one another. I watched them sway deeply, dancing with the wind, and I felt they were just as happy as I was to be there.

We sat in an outdoor theater, and somewhere along the way I stopped paying attention to the stage because the wind had become the better storyteller.

I couldn't help but think of Jesus' words to Nicodemus.

"The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit." John 3:8

This wind was intentional. It wasn't a slight breeze, and it didn't bring rain or thunder. It brought me to a memory, a realization.

In Hebrew, the word is ruach.

Breath. Wind. Spirit.

The same word that hovers over the waters in Genesis.

The same breath that fills the valley of dry bones in Ezekiel 37.
How often do I remember the valley of dry bones and recognize the countless valleys He has already led me through, breathing life into places I thought were long dead?

The same rushing wind that filled the house at Pentecost before anyone even understood what was happening.

Jesus said the Spirit is like the wind. You can't see where it comes from or where it's going, but you know when you've encountered it.

And that wind blowing through my hair reminded me...

Lately, I've felt more windswept than grounded.

The weight of living under a miracle is strange. It is beautiful before it is comfortable. Sacred before it makes sense.

Nothing in my circumstances changed at that theater Tuesday night.

I still make about half of what I made a year ago.

I still wake up at two in the morning more often than I sleep through the night.

I'm still untangling myself from the lie that productivity determines value...
and titles determine identity.

It's astonishing how quickly the world teaches us to forget who we are.

And how patiently God teaches us to remember.
How an unexpected wind can find its way into the deepest corners of my soul and fan into flame what fear had nearly smothered.

The wind got my attention.

My friend gave it words.

She didn't offer solutions.
She didn't pretend everything would suddenly make sense.

She simply reminded me Whose daughter I am.

Jehovah Jireh.

The Lord Will Provide.

The God Abraham came to know on a mountain where obedience looked costly, and God's provision arrived in a way he never could have orchestrated himself (Genesis 22:14).

I wonder how often I've reduced Jehovah Jireh to a financial promise.

As though His provision begins and ends with paychecks.

But His first provision is always Himself.

His presence.
His peace.
His promises.

Everything flows from there.

Then another verse found me.

"See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are."
— 1 John 3:1

Not future tense.

Not someday.

Not after I finally become enough.

That is what we are.

Children.

Heirs.

Daughters.

I have spent so much of my life trying to earn what was never offered as wages.

Children don't negotiate inheritance.

They simply belong.

Employers pay wages.

Fathers give inheritance.

Maybe this is what remembering feels like.

The wind never let up.

It followed us through the evening, almost like a faithful companion.

By the time we packed up and walked back to the car, my bank account hadn't changed.

My calendar hadn't changed.

My future hadn't become any clearer.

But something inside me had.

Maybe that's what Paul meant when he wrote:

"And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus."
— Philippians 4:19

And maybe that's why the wind felt holy.

Because for just a little while, it drowned out every voice telling me to strive...

...and reminded me that daughters were never meant to live like employees.

The wind kept blowing.

Almost insistently.

Like it refused to let me leave carrying the same heavy pockets I'd brought in with me.

I remembered that's what the Holy Spirit does most often.

It's not the dramatic moments we tend to chase.

It's the quiet reminders carried on ordinary Tuesdays...

that as His daughter, my confidence rests less in what He will provide... and more in who He has already proven Himself to be. 🤎