Someone Bigger than Us
As I was enjoying a beautiful North Carolina afternoon today, I was thinking about last December when the Santa Ana winds came tearing through Pasadena (where we lived at the time) knocking down a huge tree in our neighbor’s yard and taking out all electrical power for six or seven houses. We were very grateful that the tree missed our car by a couple of feet. But for the next week it felt like we were camping in our own house. With each passing day we grew more tired, more weary, withdrawn and exhausted.
Then one morning at 3am we were awakened with a work crew out in the street, searchlights shining, a cherry-picker truck getting into position to repair the lines, and we were almost giddy with glee. For the next two hours as we watched, we were happy, joyful, alive, and at peace — even though the electricity still had not been restored.
Why? Because Someone Bigger than Us was at work in our lives, doing what we could not do, to restore what was lost and broken so we could live more fully and less encumbered. In many ways, that is what it is like to be in process with God. Except that we are much more involved, of course, as God enjoins us in the work of restoration. But I really like the idea that we can be at peace even before the work is complete, because of the confidence we have in Him who has begun a good work in us — and will complete it.