A Present Help

The area of motherhood that always seems to stretch me the most is anything related to my kid’s health. From the moment my oldest was born and required extra testing and care, I felt helpless. It then persisted throughout both my son’s childhood with chronic asthma and infections. Perhaps I feel this way because I don’t have medical training so I am clueless when it comes to understanding their medical concerns. When there is a health scare, there is nothing I can do to fix the problem; I am dependent upon health experts to tell me what to do.

I felt that way recently when my oldest fell and split open his elbow while out on a caving trip with his friends. They were two hours away, in the middle of nowhere, with no cell service. By the time I found out and got him to the urgent care, twelve hours had passed. He then got an infection which the doctor fought with an intense array of antibiotics. There was nothing I could do but follow the doctor’s orders.

Except.

Except for prayer. Except for trusting in the Lord. Except for seeking his help and asking him to deliver and provide and heal.

In helpless moments, Psalm 18 reminds me: “The LORD is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold” (v.2). And as the psalmist wrote elsewhere, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble” 46:1). God is a very present help in times of trouble. Sometimes I forget that. I forget that his help is here and now. I forget that in this moment, right now, he is my rock and fortress and deliverer. Not that he was, but that he is.

He is my place of safety. He rescues me from trouble. He is my salvation.

All in the present. Right here. Right now.

So often I consider the Lord’s salvation as past tense, as something he did at Calvary over 2,000 years ago. Or even future tense, in that he has saved me for eternity and one day in the future I will meet him in glory. But in the present, in the here and now, the Bible reminds me that he is with me. He is my salvation in moments when I don’t know what to do or where to turn.

The Puritan, Richard Sibbes, wrote: “A Christian must look at the trouble with one eye, and to God with the other. See God to be your salvation. Let the trouble be what it will, if God is your deliverer. It is no matter what the disease might be, if God is your physician…God is our God. He chose us, in due time he called us, and made a covenant with us to be our God. He loves us, and preserves us…”

Life is filled with trouble. But we have a great and mighty God. He is present with us, ready to take us in as our fortress. He is our salvation—in the past, in the future, and right here, right now.

Dear friend, turn to the Lord with all your troubles and find him to be your present help.

Photo by Dušan veverkolog on Unsplash

Trust in the Face of Change

One thing I’ve learned about life is that once you get used to a particular season or role, life changes. I’ve found this to be true in parenting, marriage, work, and ministry. I remember well how hard it was when my boys dropped their afternoon naps. That was a change I didn’t like at all!

I used to resist change. Or at least try to manage it so that I could know what to expect and prepare for it. I guess it’s because there’s a certain degree of comfort when you think you know what lies ahead. When you feel equipped to face the day because it’s the same as the one before it. When you’ve finally reached a level of confidence in how to do a certain job or task. Yet change inevitably cuts into our life with a harsh reminder that we don’t have control over our lives. For we all too quickly forget that we are dependent upon God and need his rescuing grace.

I’m in the middle season of life, a season filled with constant change. Certainly, there are many physical changes (that’s a whole other blog post!). There are changes in motherhood as I increasingly let go of my duties and watch my children learn to fly on their own. There are changes in marriage as my husband and I find more time and opportunity to focus on our relationship in ways we haven’t for far too long. Some changes are good and bring great joy; others are hard and bring only grief and sorrow.

This year is my oldest son’s senior year. It’s a year of lasts: the last cross country race, last birthday at home, last school events, last holidays. It’s also our last year to pour into his heart all the things we want him to know before he’s unleashed into the world to make his own way. It’s an emotional year for me, a year filled with both grief and joy. Grief at the finality of this season of parenting, the ending of all these years of homeschooling, the ending of all the daily interactions and family life I’ve grown so used to these last seventeen plus years. But there’s joy too as I celebrate with him the fruition of all he’s worked so hard for. It’s a joy to engage with him as a young adult and talk together about his future. I’ve enjoyed watching him think through decisions and develop goals for his life.

Meanwhile, this past fall my father was diagnosed with dementia. Like most diagnoses, this one took us by surprise and flipped my parents’ life upside down. Dementia is a disease that is often referred to as the “Long Goodbye.” I now know why that is. The diagnosis has brought with it grief and sorrow, worry and fear. I’ve found myself in a new role, helping my family navigate it and serving them in whatever way I can. As anyone in this middle stage of life can attest, it’s challenging to care for the needs of your family at home, while also wanting to help your parents who live far away.

In the midst of these changes in my life, I continue to work in discipleship ministry for women—writing, speaking, discipling, and coordinating women’s ministry. I’ve also been developing a lay- counseling/discipleship/one-another-care ministry for women at my church and am excited to see the many months of labor finally come together. While I’m excited to serve the Lord in this way, I feel a profound sense of my weakness. I worry about getting it wrong. I fear letting people down. I feel uncertainty and a weight of responsibility. This change too is another one where I feel my desperate need for God’s grace to equip and sustain me.

While much changes in our lives, from season to season, in our roles and in our labors, one thing remains the same: God never changes. He is the constant in all the unknown. He is the steady horizon when the storms of life swell over us. When everything is chaos, when we are filled with fear or sorrow, our God is with us. When we fill ill equipped to a new task or overwhelmed by uncertainty and lack of knowledge, we can turn to Christ, in whom are found all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Col. 2:3). We can take comfort in our Lord’s providential care for us and his sovereign rule over all things. While we don’t know what the future holds, we can trust that God not only knows what will take place, he has already determined all that will happen. Though we are weak, we can rest in his strength. As we face the changes and transitions of life, we can be confident that the Lord is at work. He will be our refuge.

I often find comfort in the words of the psalmist, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling” (Ps. 46:1-3). Some events in life feel like our whole world is shifting. It feels like it’s the end of life as we know it. The psalmist reminds me that even if the earth were to give way, even if the mountains were to fall into the sea, God remains our refuge and strength. He is our help and hope.

Dear friends, if you find that your own life is in the midst of transition and change, trust God to meet you where you are with his rescuing love and grace. He is our certain hope in all the uncertainty of life.

God's Grace in Our Fears

A  new year is always a time of reflection and thinking back about what took place in the prior year. We often think about what we learned and hopefully how we want to grow and change as a result. For me, last year held a season of fear. You may remember I dealt with a health problem. I had a growth on my thyroid that the doctor's thought might be cancerous but were not able to determine from the biopsy. At the end of July, I had thyroid surgery to remove the growth (and half my thyroid).

The entire situation was disconcerting, worrisome, and at times, frightening. Certainly, all the medical procedures were no fun. But also the thought of cancer was frightening. It was a fresh reminder of my age, stage of life, and of the way time continues to sift through my hands. 

There is much to fear in this fallen world. Sickness, natural disasters, violence, job loss, relational conflict, just to name a few. The unknown future can be frightening. Such fear paralyzes. It's like a heavy cloud that envelopes us, suffocating, and blinding us to everything else.

Tracing Grace

Situations like mine, and perhaps like the one you are in right now, require extra grace. Grace to know that God is with us and will not leave us. Grace to believe and trust in his goodness. Grace to rest in God's sovereign care.

So that was my prayer last year: for God to give me grace. I needed him to guide me in the unknown. I prayed that I would see his hand at work—that I would trace his grace, gathering it together like a strand of lights to light the way in the darkness. 

God was faithful. 

I found friends and family who prayed for me and told me so.

I discovered kind doctors and nurses who spoke with confidence and reassurance.

I felt peace when I least expected it.

God provided even the smallest details like friends to watch my kids while we were at the hospital.

Not only did I see his grace in my circumstances, I also remembered his love and faithfulness to me in the past. I've experienced many fearful events and unknowns in my life and God has never failed me. He has been a rock and fortress time and time again. In all the little challenges and the big trials of life, God has repeatedly proven himself faithful. And in my greatest need of all, forgiveness of sin, he gave me his own son.

Because he gave me Jesus, how could I think he would fail to be faithful in anything else? 

Psalm 46 and Fear

As you know, I love the Psalms. One psalm I've always paused at in reading is Psalm 46. "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling."

For someone who is often weakened by fear, it's hard to imagine not having any fear in the face of something terrible. The important thing to notice is that the psalmist doesn't say, "even when the very worst happens, if you have strong faith and believe really hard, you won't have any fear." Rather, the psalmist says that because God is our refuge and strength and help in trouble, we will not fear.

The psalmist also remembered who God is in his power and holiness: "There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved; God will help her when morning dawns. The nations rage, the kingdoms totter; he utters his voice, the earth melts. The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress." God's presence keeps his church safe. This passage reminds me of Paul's assuring words that nothing can separate us from the love of God for us in Christ (Romans 8:38-39).

The psalmist then remembered what God has done in the past: "Come, behold the works of the LORD, how he has brought desolations on the earth. He makes wars cease to the end of the earth; he breaks the bow and shatters the spear; he burns the chariots with fire." 

Because God is faithful and gracious, because he is our Rock and Refuge, because of who he is and what he has done, the psalm concludes: "Be still, and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!” The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of  Jacob is our fortress. Selah."

Soon after my surgery, I learned that I did not have cancer. (In case you were wondering). But I know that life in this fallen world will include more unknowns and more fears. The psalmist reminds me that God is with his people. He is our help. He is our refuge. Even when the world seems flipped upside down and even when the worst happens, God rules and reigns. He is faithful. The God of Jacob is a covenant keeping God; we belong to him.

God's grace is always present in our fears.