Desperate Arms

 Oswald Chambers said, "Faith never knows where it's being led, but it loves and knows the One who is leading." We can't trust and follow someone we don't know, so the question for each of us in the journey is, "Do we trust the One, Jesus, that we say we are following?" We would all like a roadmap as to just where it is the Lord is taking us in our lives. He never provides one. He simply bids us to come and follow Him. Whether we do or not will come down to the simple reality as to whether we trust Him enough, love Him enough to follow Him to wherever He may be taking us. Jesus asked a faltering disciple, Thomas, "Have I been so long with you and still you don't know Me?" Where might He be asking that in your life today? There's a lyric in an old song that goes, "He never has failed me yet." He never has and He never will. Trust Him. Love Him. He will not fail you. He will get you to where He means for you to be.

I saw the truth of the above demonstrated in perhaps the most powerful way I have ever beheld. A mother and her sister were being interviewed about the great tragedy they had just experienced. The mother, her son, and her parents had been trapped on the roof of their home in the midst of the devastating floods that have ravaged western North Carolina and many other states as well. While still able, she took a picture of her parents and her son as the flood water raged around the house. Just a short time later, the house broke apart and her parents and son were swept away to their deaths. She said that as her son was carried away, he, only 7 years old, cried out the name of Jesus. The mother was wedged in the wreckage of the roof and carried away by the violent waters. She said as she was, she heard the His voice whispering to her to be still in her heart, to trust Him, and that He would carry her to rescue. Several times she sank beneath the waters, but even then, she felt His reassurance. She also said that as she held to Him and to life, the Scriptures that her parents had taught her through the years kept coming to her mind. His Words of promise. She testified that she knew she was in His arms in all of it.

In the interview, in the midst of her sorrow and loss of her parents and small son, she gave glory to her God and Father. She testified that the pain and sorrow were real, but that He was even more real. She has a hope and trust in Him that this tragedy doesn't and cannot shake. 

God has never promised to keep us from devastation and loss. They are part of living in a fallen, broken world, but He does promise to never leave or forsake us. In the raging waters, that mother knew she was being held by her Father. A.W. Tozer said that "God doesn't look upon our tears except with tears of His own." Chris Tiegreen wrote, "He responds to the spirit of desperate arms around His neck." This precious mother and her remaining family know the truth of this. In our own times of desperation, may we know it as well.

Blessings,
Pastor O