Finding Job-Like Faith in Trying Times
It is impossible for me to grasp the enormity of devastation those who are affected by Hurricane Helene are experiencing. We’ve all had challenging seasons—two of my novels were inspired by some of mine. But I can look back and see God’s hand so clearly working in my life during most of those hard seasons.
There is one I continually struggle with. My son was sexually abused when he was young, and I didn’t learn about it until much later. After he’d turned his back on Jesus, suffered through years of depression, suicidal thoughts, and self-destructive behavior. It’s been another fifteen years, and he’s finally on the other side of it. I just pray I see his restoration to the Father in my lifetime.
I give all glory to God for keeping my child protected through it all—but I still struggle with the knowledge that He allowed it to happen in the first place. I also know, I know, He will use it for His greater plans and purpose—and for my son’s good.
It’s also the only way I can see the horror that has been happening (and continues to happen) to those living in the Southeast who have lost loved ones and/or their homes. They are cut off from food supplies and water. Starving, dehydrated, injured. It’s absolutely heart-wrenching. But still, God is good, and He has a plan, even when we can’t see it.
On Saturday morning, I sat down with my cup of coffee and prepared to spend an hour with the Lord. My heart was focused on the hurricane victims, and I really needed a word to guide me in my prayers for them.
I have been reading the daily devotional Streams in the Desert by L.B. Cowman for years. More recently, I started listening to the podcast Give Him Fifteen by Dutch Sheets for variety instead. But he doesn’t produce a devotion for the weekends, so I go back to my good, ol’ standby, Streams in the Desert on Saturdays and Sundays.
If you have used the same devotional for years as I have, you’ve probably underlined specific sentences and maybe jotted notes in the margins—just like my well-used Bible. On Saturday, I flipped Streams of the Desert to October 5th and noticed that I didn’t have anything underlined.
My first thought was to search for another day during the week that might’ve impacted me more in previous readings. But my second thought was that just because the author of that particular devotional (J.B. Meyer) didn’t touch on a heart issue the last few years I’ve gone through it, didn’t mean I wouldn’t see something fresh this time around.
And I did.
The verse was from 1 Kings 17:7—It came to pass…that the brook dried up. The first line is, “The education of our faith is incomplete if we have not learned that there is providence in loss, a ministry of failing and of fading things, a gift of emptiness.
I meditated on that a moment before moving on. All of us have experienced loss or failure in our ministry—but a gift of emptiness? I was pondering that as I continued to read, and the impact a little further down had me underlining and notating.
“In some way or other we will have to learn the difference between trusting in the gift and trusting in the Giver. The gift may be good for a while, but the Giver is the eternal love.”
I have to continually go back to the truth that this is not our home. We are not meant to live lives of ease and comfort here on earth. We are to ministers of the gospel, hope, and comfort, pointing always to our Lord and Savior.
How hard would it be for me to trust the Lord if I’d been devastated like some of the victims of Hurricane Helene? The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord—Job 1:21. Now there was a man who experienced complete and total loss, and yet he never lost his faith.
I think about the disciples that followed Jesus and how each of them lived extraordinary and difficult lives—many even dying in horrid ways. The apostle Paul is a perfect example. If they weren’t spared, how can we think it might be different for us?
Another sentence in the devotional I underlined is one that we might all need to take to heart in the coming weeks, months, years, as our world continues to spiral into chaos—“The woe and the waste and the tears of life belong to the interlude and not to the finale.” Amen?
Seasons come and go, some much harder than others. But it’s all temporary for those of us who love Jesus. Ultimately, we will live in paradise praising God every day. No more pain. No more suffering. No more tears.
This October 5th devotional includes a poem by J. Danson Smith that I’d like to share. I hope that it ministers to you as it ministered to me.
Perchance thou, too, hast camped by such sweet waters,
And quenched with joy thy weary, parched soul’s thirst;
To find, as time goes on, thy streamlet alters
From what it was at first.
Hearts that have cheered, or soothed, or blest, or strengthened;
Loves that have lavished so unstintedly;
Joys, treasured joys—have passed, as time hath lengthened,
Into obscurity.
If that, ah soul, the brook they heart hath cherished
Doth fail thee now—no more they thirst assuage—
If its once glad refreshing streams have perished,
Let HIM thy heart engage.
He will not fail, nor mock, nor disappoint thee;
His consolations change not with the years;
With oil of joy He surely will anoint thee,
And wipe away thy tears.
I know you join me in prayer for those suffering. May God in His infinite wisdom bring more souls to Him and work His goodness into the lives of the lost and hurting. May they feel His peace, comfort, and presence.
Comments 2
The victims of the hurricane are in a bad way. I feel bad for them knowing it could take years for some to have a home. I pray that God let them know they are loved.
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Amen!