The One Thing To Remember When Everything Is Wrong

The rain smacks the concrete of the porch inches away from my bare feet on an icy cold Monday. I have a teething baby on my hip, a toddler entwining around my legs whining and my arm thrust out, holding the screen door open when he delivers the news, apologetically. After paying to get it fixed last week, another potentially fatal problem had cropped up. I nod and smile and look past his somber eyes to our one car sitting stone still in the driveway and try to ignore the sinking rock that started in my throat and just dropped right down into my stomach.

It's rainy, it's a Monday, she's teething, the car is broken...and the lists just goes on and on and on. I can get swept clean up under the wheels of the difficulties of life if I'm not careful, hopes dashed into pieces beneath the crushing weight of all the things that ever can and certainly will go wrong. There are plenty of them, cropping up one at a time or in a big heap at once, dumped on you like a Michigan snowfall in Spring.

I go about my day after that decidedly off kilter. Everything is wrong, I don't know what to do and can't I just crawl back into bed and pretend that this day doesn't exist? It seems like an attractive option but impossible, for me, with a house full of little ones. But then, one after another, little reminders crop up.

A friend texts me randomly, "Do you need to borrow a car this week? We have an extra." I stare at it - hope held right there in my hand. My husband comes home from work after a hard day and tugs me close...undeserved. My kids wrench me from my gloom as only kids can do and a conversation with my sister leaves me in tears of laughter. I'm piling up reasons for joy and gratitude left and right, my hopeless fog sliced deftly in two by a small but mighty gleam of light.

There will always be a reason to have hope as long as we hold onto the only thing that won't fail us. There will always be reason for joy when you approach the life God has for you unconditionally, not waiting for the sunshine or the easy days or the stars to align to live a life of gratitude.

Cars break, babies cry, dinner burns, rain falls - but there is never anything bigger than the promises God has for us. Always promises of healing, help and hope.

I wake up on Tuesday and smile at the day to come. Ever and only with His help.

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