Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.”
Anxiety won’t relent, Augustine wrote, “until it finds its rest in Thee.” Anxiety needs its better half in Jesus. We can be slow to get the message and spread our trust as wide as possible. But anxiety will not be quieter until it is home. We need the One who is solid and endures. And we need the One who is close and compassionate.
Some long months ago a good friend remarked to me, “I wake up every morning and realize I’m still in this nightmare.” I nodded in agreement. The nightmare, without question, was COVID. I, like my friend, felt a similar realization each morning myself. Sometimes I would awaken and briefly forget the battle we were facing but it didn’t take long for me to remember those first terrifying weeks of frightening predictions. The lockdowns. The closures of schools and businesses. On and on it goes. Finally, the slow reopening with all the mandates in place as we tried to regain some normalcy.
Who wouldn’t consider this ongoing scenario nightmarish? Our entire world had been upended by something so small it’s not visible to the human eye and yet so powerful it’s taken entire nations captive.
God is bigger than any earthly troubles
Living with a spouse who teaches in a public school and a daughter who is a social worker in schools, it’s no surprise to me when they came home sharing how this last four years has shaken everyone from faculty to students and their families. There’s certainly no shortage of fear, unrest, and unease about the worldwide uncertainties we face.
This is why today is the day to surrender our lives into the care and keeping of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The only One, as Welch states, “who is solid and endures. And we need the One who is close and compassionate.” Amen.
Gratitude shifts my attitude
Morning by morning, I’ve been trying to break the dismal habit of silently groaning, “Oh, no, I’m still living in this nightmare,” to a more God-honoring wake-up prayer which says, “Thank You, Lord, for this day. I will rejoice and be glad in it. By your abiding grace and strength, I will walk through this day with a grace-filled heart of gratitude. And I will submit my will to yours in every area. Amen.”
We can find true rest in God
Learning to rest in God when anxiety about the unknowns of today (and tomorrow) threatens to undo us can be one of the most valuable spiritual lessons we learn in this life. It is also one of the most difficult. For some inexplicable reason (slow learners that we are) we try in vain to control our circumstances to minimize our pain or to avoid suffering at all costs; which is completely understandable given the pain and suffering so common in our broken world.
But it is also why most of us have probably spent an over-abundance of time and energy attempting to figure out how to avoid pain and suffering and the devastating aftermath that can affect us socially, economically, and spiritually.
God cares for us personally
Learning to rest in God during a worldwide pandemic which ushered in formally unknown restrictions and loss of personal freedoms is possible. It is. James explains how we need to approach our pain and suffering and uncertainty. We do so by coming to God in prayer with an attitude of grace-filled gratitude for his personal presence and provision for us in the midst of our pain and suffering and uncertainty.
We realize that we are James describes, “but a mist,” therefore, we draw near to God in prayer and he draws near to us. We can’t say it too many times, “We need the One who is solid and endures. And we need the One who is close and compassionate.” Thank him today for being solid and enduring and for coming close and being compassionate.
During those moments when I feel like I’m living in a real life nightmare, I will stop myself from mentally revisiting the difficulties of these past months and years. Instead, I will take my thoughts captive and start thanking God for his rock solid love for me. I’ll praise him for being the One who endures all time and is sovereignly ruling right now. Then I give thanks for being my heavenly Father who comes close and showers me with compassion every morning.
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