Be Still

Psalm 46:10 says "Be still, and know that I am God..."

We have two pictures in our house that have this verse on them.  I have always liked these pictures, but I have to say that I never really thought about what that verse meant until the other day. 

Lately, I have felt like my emotions are just so raw.  If I hear bad news concerning anyone, my heart just aches.  I think about Joshua and Anna getting bigger, and my heart aches.  I think about Anna being my last child, and I just want to cry.  I think about the fact that I never got to have (and never will have) the natural delivery that I so desperately wanted, and I just want to crawl in bed and go to sleep for the rest of the day.  It bothers me that so many people knew that I so desperately wanted to have a natural delivery with Anna, and while everyone knows that I had to have another c-section, no one has mentioned the subject to me.  It's like it never happened.  What do I expect, though?  I can't see someone coming up to me and saying, "So, I guess despite all of your prayers, you still had to have a c-section..."  So many people never really understood why it was so important for me to have a natural delivery, anyhow.  I guess you sometimes never understand how someone else feels unless you go through it yourself - until your choice is taken away.

Anyhow...
 
In church, we recently sang the song "Still" by Hillsong.  I have heard and sang this song many times, but it wasn't until recently that God really spoke to me through it.  These words, also from Psalm 46, really stood out to me in this song:

When the oceans rise and thunders roar

I will soar with you above the storm

Father you are king over the flood

I will be still and know you are God

When I experience heart ache, uncertainty, or chaos in my life, it is so easy for me to start strategizing, working on a plan (MY plan - not God's), and I also start to worry.  Worry comes so easy for me that I often don't even realize that I'm doing it until much later, if ever at all. 

God wants us to remain still - knowing that He is God and is in control.  Everything may seem to be going wrong, and our world as we know it may seem to be falling apart quickly.  God doesn't want us to panic.  He wants us to trust Him, pray, and remain still in the knowledge that HE IS GOD!   Being a Christian doesn't mean that we'll never have problems.  It does mean that we have an all-knowing God to lean on and trust in! 

I need to remember that I'm not the one who is supposed to figure everything out and make sure everything is ok.  It doesn't all depend on me. It's a good thing!  My short-term plans often seem to work, but I always end up steering away from God without realizing it. 

I encourage you to read Psalm 46.  God wants our hearts to be calm and still during times of discouragement.  We experience so many disappointments on this earth, but we have hope!  If we are born again, we know that someday we will live with our Savior, and we will no longer experience all the hurts of this world.
Picture credit given to www.manywallpapers.com