A Stream in the Desert

Two days ago I was struggling.  It was a hard day, emotionally and spiritually.  I felt overwhelmed with the weight that God has placed on me, my husband and my children.  I struggled with dark thoughts, and deep feelings of despair.  I cried… a lot.  Adam doesn’t have a lot of patience for me when I get in this sort of state, and after getting frustrated he started in with one of his pep-talks.  I was too tired to be defensive or argumentative, so I just sat there on the floor and listened.  He’s very matter-of-fact, my husband, and practical.  Falling apart emotionally doesn’t help the situation, so he doesn’t quite grasp why I insist on doing it. Call it a glaring difference between man and woman, I suppose.  We women cry because we need to.  It’s a release.  After emptying myself of all the tears I had, I felt better.  And Adam’s insistence on focusing on the positive helped…just a little.

After I managed to pick my worn-out body up off the floor, I started looking for some inspiration.  I went to the Bible, but decided instead to pick up a book passed onto me by a friend called Streams in the Desert.  There is a passage for everyday of the year, and I’ve picked it up a few times to read what that day’s passage was.  I found this:

“Poverty, hardship and misfortune have pressed many a life to moral heroism and spiritual greatness. Difficulty challenges energy and perseverance.   It calls into activity the strongest qualities of the soul.  It was the weights on father’s old clock that kept it going.  Many a headwind has been utilized to make port. God has appointed opposition as in incentive to faith and holy activity.  The most illustrious characters of the Bible were bruised and threshed and ground into bread for the hungry.  Abraham’s diploma styles him as ‘the father of the faithful’.  That was because he stood at the head of his class in affliction and obedience.  Jacob suffered severe threshings and grindings.  Joseph was bruised and beaten and had to go through Potiphar’s kitchen and Egypt’s prison to get to his throne.  David, hunted like a partridge on the mountain, bruised, weary and footsore, was ground into bread for a kingdom.  Paul never could have been bread for Caesar’s household if he had not endured the bruising, whippings and stonings.  He was ground into fine flour for the royal family… If for you He has appointed special trials, be assured that in His heart He has kept for you a special place.  A soul sorely bruised is a soul elect.”

I pondered that for the rest of the day, and went to check emails after everyone had gone to bed.  I read a message that mentioned Nick Vujicic, who I had never heard about, so I promptly looked him up on YouTube and watched an interview.  If you don’t know who he is, he was born without arms or legs, and is now a motivational speaker who travels the world.  In the interview, he talks about how difficult his childhood was, and how he had chosen to turn away from God because he didn’t understand “Why”.  But at the age of 15 he got his answer.  God chose to answer his question, “Why?” with another question… “Do you trust Me?”  Boy did that really hit me between the eyes.  I love God with all my heart and I believe completely that He has a plan for us.  I believe that all of this emotional bruising and beating is for a reason.  But, I’m impatient.  I want to know right now how this is going to end.  I want a document signed and stamped by God that promises me that Adam and I will share a long happy marriage together, that Ali will grow up to be a happy and functioning adult, and that someday Finlay will be able to communicate with words instead of sign language.  I want his promise that Calum will grow up unscathed from the pressure of being not only the oldest, but the only neurotypical child in his family, and I want to know that someday I will finally get some relief from my daily headaches.  Where’s my signed document? 

But, I realized that I don’t need it.  First of all, He has already promised us salvation.  This life may be hard, but we all have the comfort of knowing someday we can share in His glory, in His presence, in Heaven.  Eternity is much more significant than today.  I can’t change my situation today, no one can.  No one can make Adam, Ali and Finlay better today.  And if they did, would that make me whole?  I am only complete when Jesus lives in me.  And right now, He does.  Today.  That is all I need.  To help remind me of this, I have put a piece of paper above our picture of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in our kitchen.  It reads in large Sharpee-written letters, “Do you trust Me?”  I’ve been looking up at it probably every five minutes since it was placed up there.  And every time I look at His face and read that question, I can say with certainty, “Yes.”  Yes, Lord, I trust You… completely.