A Timeless Message

“Only trust Him, only trust him, only trust Him now, He will save you, He will save you, He will save you now.” As I stood at the foot of my mother-in-law’s bed in the ICU singing this song God put on my heart, I didn’t know it would be the last song she heard on this earth.

Yesterday she had brought her dish and smile to a family Thanksgiving dinner and today she is gone.

As I made my way home after grieving with the family and realizing all the arrangements to be attended to, I saw a painting in my house of a horse and recalled the scripture in Ps. 33 that a horse was a vain hope for deliverance, despite all its strength, it cannot save. As I looked closer at the picture, I noticed the title, “Running on the Inside.” I knew God was whispering to rest in this coming season. My schedule had filled up completely with people and service that I hadn’t even heard God’s voice lately.

While each of us in the family took care of all the funeral arrangements, legal matters, division of property and cleaning the house, I found a book I had borrowed 25 years earlier titled, “Blessings out of Buffetings.”
I revisited its theme of suffering in the life of a Christian and realized it was still appropriate in this hour. The first chapter asked the question. “Do you remember the dreams and hopes you had in yourself at one time? Do they now seem shattered and like dry bones?”

The author went on to assure us we were still right on track with the way the Holy Spirit was directing our lives to comfort another with the comfort we receive. Paul says at times we were stretched beyond what we thought we could endure but this all happened so that we might not rely on ourselves but on God.

I recalled visiting Ida in the hospital a few years back when she broke her neck. She was actually beaming when I walked in. Puzzled at her happiness, I asked how she could be smiling. She replied that she received a word, “selah,” to pause and ponder. That one word made all her suffering worth it as she knew she could spend more time resting in the Lord.
Now Ida has become like the kernel of wheat fallen to the ground, broken yet  producing many seeds and fruit in her family and friends’ lives.

As I stood at her bedside singing the song about only trusting Jesus to save us, I knew she had trusted Him in the toughest trial of her life. She had taught me the importance of a divine pause, and the truth that blessing can come out of buffeting.