I was driving home one day recently when a summer thunderstorm was moving through our area. As I drove down the highway if I looked to the left there was nothing but dark ominous clouds and I could see sheets of rain off in the distance. If I looked to the right there was bright sun, blue sky, and fluffy white clouds. Have you every experienced something like that? Maybe you were in the middle of a storm but for just a moment the clouds parted and the brilliant sun’s light broke through the darkness for just a moment.
We all have stormy moments in our lives. Unfortunately right now it seems like another immediately follows one storm. These storms take the shape of illness, grief, uncertainty, anxiety, loss, unrest, anger…the list goes on. When the storm clouds hover overhead too long we can almost forget the sun and we believe that all there will ever be is clouds. But the truth is the sun is always there even when we can’t see it.
The same is true of God. When we are in the midst of stormy seasons in our lives it can feel like God is not with us, but that cannot be further from the truth. We read in the Psalms,
“Where can I go from your spirit?
Or where can I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there;
if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
If I take the wings of the morning
and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light around me become night,”
even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is as bright as the day,
for darkness is as light to you.”
Friends, like the sun that continues to warm the Earth even from behind the storm clouds, our God continues to sustain us even when the storms of life are raging around us. God does not promise that you will never experience storms, but when the storms come God will not abandon you and more than that God will continue to provide, sustain, and strengthen you.
