And the daily meditation from Charles F. Stanley read as follows…
Though Jesus could stop the storm, oftentimes He doesn’t. Isn’t that the issue that makes us all struggle? If He is God and He is good – and He is – then why would He allow all the difficult things we have to face? Why does life have to be such a struggle?
And I thought to myself, Where are you God? Where are you when we need you? I am done with this pandemic! I’m sick of it! It’s no fun and it has impacted us all and changed what we knew as our normal lives. And as I looked up from the meditation I was reading and saw the bright morning sunshine shining ever so brightly on a freshly fallen snowfall that had meticulously painted every detail of every branch of the multitude of trees in our backyard, I realized – God is right here with us. We just need to open our eyes to see the miracles he performs every day.
I seem to be hearing it wherever I go. “The pandemic has changed us forever. The world has changed and we will never be the same.” Really? Maybe there is more to this than we have been willing to admit, especially when it comes to God’s presence in our lives. In Jeremiah (29:11) God speaks to us saying, For I know the plans I have for you – plans for your welfare, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.
“To give us a future and a hope.”
As I write this people are now getting their first Covid-19 vaccination shot and the science is telling us it will also be effective against some of the newer strains of this coronavirus. Here in Indiana it now appears that our daily death toll is trending downwards and so is the number of new cases of Covid-19. Ah, do I see a future for us, a brighter, better future? Do I have newfound hope? If we have been changed by this pandemic, is it possible that we might have been changed for the better? How so? Could it be that we are now more caring and compassionate, more respectful of one another, more loving, more grateful? Can we find ‘the good’ in change?
Given the choice, I wish it never would have happened. I wish we could go back to what was ‘the normal’ that we knew and I wish the 2 million-plus people who have died world-wide from Covid could still be here living amongst us. But if this pandemic has changed us, then let us all be wise enough to see ‘the good’ in that change. And let us remember that as much as this pandemic may have changed our world and/or who we are, there is one constant we can always count on.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Hebrews 13:8
That will never change and honestly, that’s as good as it gets! Be grateful.
