The Quest for Paradise

"Oh God, I don't want any more pain! Please help me to only listen to Your voice and not to the voice of any other."

"Keep My ways and I will be with you always. I hear every prayer of those who put their trust in Me."

A silent moment passed and then, "Tell me Samantha what is it you want of Me?"

Blurry eyed I looked up at the fuzzy screen before me and then about at the littered papers which were the evidence of my work and forcefully I said, "I want to be happy! I feel so alone!"

"You do not belong to this world, but to Me and I jealously keep what is Mine. How can that soul which is entrusted to Me find joy when they are separated from Me for I am Spirit and you are of the flesh? Do not think it strange how you are set apart from the ways of the world for indeed I am calling you to Me and I honor your faithfulness of spirit above all else. You will have reward both in this life and far more in the world to come, and yet the trials of this life must go on a little longer."

Feeling shaken beyond belief I slid down off my chair to the floor as it suddenly felt like my little office at the university had become hallowed ground. I lay there praising my Abba Father, as I felt the current of His Spirit course through me like a tide of living water sweeping away all the hurt and struggles of my life.

I was ready to do anything for my Heavenly Father, even as I no longer feared the mechanization's of my earthly father. Peace swept through me and I lay enshrouded in it completely at peace with life for once.

*****

My eyes opened and with some alarm I lifted my head up off the floor. One glance at the clock which read 6:30 had me coming to my feet in a hurry.

How long had I been out? Hours seemed to be the unavoidable answer and yet as opposed to any embarrassment over having slept on my office floor I instead felt fortified by a strength it seemed as if potent enough to keep me awake for days on end.

Busily I closed down everything and glancing in my small compact mirror I allowed myself to take the time to smooth my tangled hair out a bit. My father would just have to receive me the way I looked, which frankly wasn't bad.

I snapped the compact mirror shut and slung my purse on over my shoulder. Closing my office door I shut and locked it and hurried out of the building to see that my little car was the last one on the lot of the small Christian college that I worked for.