LIKE A BUTTERFLY!!! 🦋

Bella stood in front of her house. The school was over for that day and Bella couldn't be more glad. She didn't think she could take any more condolences or bear to be surrounded by the numerous picture of Rose the school still had hung up everywhere and she sure is not looking forward to the memorial service the school is hosting in honor of Rose either in two. Bella shuffled her feet and looked up at the sky, the sun was very bright today and Bella thought of taking a walk. 

  No one was home anyway. Her dad had taken up one of the volunteer jobs he often did and her mom was attending a prayer meeting with some other church members and none of them was bound to come home early until much later in the evening. She turned around and started to walk. She kept walking occasionally giving an acknowledging nod when greetings were thrown her way in response. And just as she reached a nearby park and sunk into a chair, she had a flashback.

     Bella and Rose were talking about the success of that week's evangelism and they had been walking home when a butterfly had caught Bella's attention. Bella had always viewed the Holy Spirit as a butterfly that is as something that once you catch just a sight of it you become very unwilling to let it go but it's just as easy to lose it. Then Bella had told Rose of her thoughts and Rose had agreed to say she had never thought of the Holy Spirit that way but she loved Bella's view of it.

To encourage her more, Rose had told her that they should follow the butterfly since they had some time to kill before they were expected back home. The two sisters had held hands and followed the butterfly until they came to a park where the butterfly had stopped at a tree. 

   Rose had looked at her sister smiling at her and asked how she felt. Bella had told her that she wanted to be able to call the butterfly her own and have it as her possession forever. Two weeks later when Bella became baptized with the Holy Spirit in a church service, Rose had told her "looks like you got your butterfly After all now remember to keep it jealously because it's very easy to lose. Mind your words, thoughts, and action." Bella was five years old then and Rose was seven years old when that happened.

  

   It was that same park that Bella is currently in now. Bella watched the butterfly get ready to take off from the tree into the air again and she wondered about when the Holy Spirit left her. She missed the overwhelming peace and happiness she felt when she had the Holy Spirit. She missed the way she could feel his presence and the way she often talked to him. Bella tried to remember the exact moment the Holy Spirit left her but she couldn't tell. All she knows was that every happiness she use to feel left her after Rose's death. She hadn't expected the Holy Spirit who was her best friend to leave her also.

    Bella pulled her legs up to her chest as she wondered why the Holy Spirit left her. She knew all about not grieving the Holy Spirit and all but with the closeness she had with Him, Bella had thought that it would be difficult for the Holy Spirit to leave her. She had lost Rose, her parents often didn't know what to say to her. It mostly felt like they were just housemates and her brother had cut off communication after blaming her for their sister's death and to top it all off the one person she never thought would leave her left also. What happened to the scripture that says the Holy Spirit will always be there to comfort her because right when she needs Him, he had left? And at that moment where Bella cuddled up on the bench, tears falling from her eyes, she felt a cool breeze that blew not only around her but also in every part of her body, and then she heard at that moment in a voice that felt like a gentle whisper that felt like a caress,

"The LORD is with you, while ye be with him; and if ye seek him, he will be found of you; but if ye forsake him, he will forsake you."

With Love,

Grazie.