Are You Here, God?

I don’t know how teachers do it today, but do you remember roll call? The teacher would call out the students’ names and you’d say, “Here” or “Present.” If you were in school, that meant that you were in attendance and the teacher recognized your presence in the classroom.

The other day I watched a video and the man kept repeating, “In His presence, there is peace.” In His presence…first, let’s remember that God is everywhere, all the time, He is omnipresent. He’s there on your good days, and He’s there on the bad days too. It’s easy for us to say God is with us when everything is going great, but when hard times come, we can easily fall into a trap of anxiety, fear, blame, and regret. But the truth of the matter is that God allows us to experience these “bad” days so that we learn to lean on Him more.

Lately, things have been hitting us from all sides. My husband had rotator cuff surgery and has been out of work for almost four months, and we’ve hit the point of reduced pay from his employer. (Don’t get me wrong, I’m extremely grateful for the time he was off with full pay, but we’ll have a few paychecks that will be lower than normal until he goes back…hopefully in another month.) We came home a couple of weeks ago to an 80 degree house. Thankfully, it wasn’t a complete A/C replacement, but it wasn’t a super cheap fix either. Then, the other day I heard a dripping sound…in my living room! Dennis discovered that the overflow pan in the attic had overflowed! We were able to dry it up and hopefully the minor ceiling repairs will be pretty easy, but we just looked at each other and said, “what’s next?” We’d get the next hit a few days later when I got a bill from our new electric provider and my bill was over $500…and that’s with a $150 bill credit!

If you’ve ever heard Pastor’s sermon on the differences of men and women, and how women’s brains are full of wires that are all connected, then you’d understand why I was having trouble sleeping at night. I can easily work myself into panic mode, wondering how all of this was going to play out. Then I saw the video…In His presence, there is peace. God is SO good, He knew I needed a nudge, a gentle reminder that He was in control, that even though I was struggling to make heads of tails of our mess, that He hadn’t abandoned us.

I literally fell asleep that night, like counting sheep, saying, “In His presence, there is peace and I will trust in God.” We’ve had some unexpected money come our way recently, so I thank my heavenly Father for His faithfulness and timeliness of His grace. He is here with me, and He’s where you are, too. All you have to do is recognize His presence.