Hope in the Darkness

Well, normally I post things that I am writing, but this post is actually going to be an audio file. I have the opportunity to teach a six week women's study at my church and as I was praying about what to teach, I felt that this lesson really needed to be presented. Its about going through the dark night of the soul. Its about finding hope in the darkness. I hope it ministers to you.

Rachel

Hope in the Darkness

The Nearness of God is our Good/addendum

Psalm 73:28

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

But as for me, the nearness of God is my good; 

I have made the Lord God my refuge, 

that I may tell of all your works.

This is one of those passages that you can really pass over until you are in a crisis. When you read this passage in a crisis it really confronts you with its claim.  Do  I really believe that God's nearness to me is what is good? It doesn't have to be circumstances, it doesn't have to be outcomes that result in healing, health and prosperity. Simply having the nearness of His presence I can say with confidence: You are my refuge Oh Lord. I am really safe because you are with me. Not safe from. Not always delivered from. But safe through the fire, in the furnace, even through the portal of death.

You know at some point in my walk with God it finally began to really sink in what David realized against Goliath: that it doesn't matter what my battle is,  how formidable my opponent is, or how overwhelming my circumstances are. The reason God ALWAYS puts me in those circumstances or up against overwhelming odds is so that He can show up. He means to impress upon my heart with every single instance, that I will never be able to predict the outcome based on the odds of my success. Because it doesn't matter what I'm capable of, but what He's capable of.

And I don't say this tonight from an ivory tower of a tranquility. My husband got a call today that no one ever wants to get: He needs to fly up and see his dad because it might be his last time to see him. He has been battling lung cancer for two years and he has developed pneumonia during this last round of chemo. He may not make it through this round. Mike might be going up there to say goodbye.  Meanwhile I have to stand by on the sidelines and take care of two kids at home and pray. All I can do is pray. 

Wait let me say that to myself again: All I can do is pray. I guess I'm in good company: with the likes of Daniel (in the lion's den) Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, Abraham, Job Anna, Hannah, Moses, Elijah, Noah, Peter, Paul...the list gets long. I got a pretty good cloud of witnesses that know what it means to pray and wait for God to show up. So I'm going to say in faith at the beginning of this week, without any good outcome to report: The nearness of God is our good. I say that for myself, and for my husband. I pray that and declare that over both of us. I know that He will show up for Mike in this and for me. I know that if He chooses to shed Leo's body from his soul and take him to glory, that He will give those of us longing for His appearing, the grace to wait a bit longer. The hope to know that someday the trumpet will sound and the dead in Christ will rise first, and those of us who remain will be caught up in the clouds with them, and thus we shall always be with the Lord. I really can say it: The nearness of God is my good. 

As an addendum to this blog I wanted to share that Leo passed into glory this morning at 7:30 am May 14, 2013. How is God good to us even in this?  He did not have to suffer the terrible pain of his lung cancer which had metastasized. He was surrounded by his family. My husband got to see and talk to him yesterday while he was lucid. When my husband first got to the hospital, his dad motioned for a piece of paper to write something. He wasn't able to speak b/c he had been intubated due to fluid in his lungs. On the piece of paper he wrote "Thanks for coming Mike, I love you." God gave Mike a few precious hours with his dad yesterday to say goodbye. His other two kids and their families had just been down to visit him the weekend before so they had time with him too. 

Death is not an easy reality. It is not an easy passage. But just as God promises in Isaiah 43:1-3 "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire you will not be burned, for I am the Lord your God." Yes, we have passed through the waters and we are walking through the fire. But I know that there is safe passage for us, and there was safe passage for Leo. In Jesus Christ, he walked through the portal of death and into glory. And he will be the first in the clouds when Jesus comes back, ready to usher us home. We can't wait to see you again, Leo. But in the meantime let me say, "The nearness of God is my good."

A Dedication to the victims of West Texas and the Boston Marathon: Andrew Peterson's Love and Thunder

Love and Thunder

All over the quiet plains, beneath the the snow on the high mountains,
rustling through the cattails that congregate along the water, you can feel
the presence of a promise. One a cold night when you look at the sky your
breath catches in your throat at how bright the night can be.

The dark spaces between the stars aren't as dark as you thought they were,
not nearly as dark as the tree line on the horizon, and as you stand there
with your hands shivering in your pockets suddenly you remember
that you're standing on a rock in the middle of space. Suddenly
the notion that there's a Someone who made it all and knows us all no longer seems
quite so far-fetched; Indeed, it seems too good to be false.

But here we toil and we till the hard earth, where even the warm times with
friend and kin are lonely because because we know they won't last long enough
to quiet the ache. Our sadness points to home, the way the hunger points to the feast,
the way the light of the cratered moon is always facing the sun, always pointing
to where the dawn will come like a pillar of fire when this rock we walk on
again turns to burning day. All over the quiet plains and cold stone cities
full of dying and shame, the promise is not drowned out by the weeping;
it is declared by it.

God died as man and rose again, and the sound of the fiery blast of Death
shook the firmament. Throughout the wail and the shudder, over the
shriek and moan of man, the thunder has sounded and sung, and it is both
the answer and the promise. It sings still, and you can hear what it says if you
listen; Love never dies.

                                                                                         Andrew Peterson