Provision through the storm

Some of us who read RBC Ministries' "Our Daily Bread" notes have spotted in the past how at times they are uncannily relevant to what is happening on the day they are meant for. This is the case even though they are written some nine months in advance.

Of course, you could say that this would happen anyway by the laws of chance. Yet God moves in mysterious ways. In the lovely book of Ruth (2:3 ESV), we are told about the destitute heroine, "So she set out and went and gleaned in the field after the reapers, and she happened to come to the part of the field belonging to Boaz" - the very man who was in a position to transform the situations of her and her mother-in-law! Did it just happen - or was it divine Providence?

Let me quote Jennifer Benson Schuldt's article from this Sunday in full:

"Early one morning the wind began to blow and raindrops hit my house like small stones. I peered outside at the yellow-gray sky and watched as trees thrashed in the wind. Veins of lightning lit the sky accompanied by bone-rattling thunder. The power blinked on and off, and I wondered how long the bad weather would continue.

"After the storm passed, I opened my Bible to begin my day with reading Scripture. I read a passage in Job that compared the Lord’s power to the atmospheric muscle of a storm. Job’s friend, Elihu said, 'God thunders marvelously with His voice' (37:5). And, 'He covers His hands with lightning, and commands it to strike' (36:32). Indeed, God is 'excellent in power' (37:23).

"Compared to God, we humans are feeble. We’re unable to help ourselves spiritually, heal our hearts, or fix the injustice we often endure. Fortunately, the God of the storm cares about weaklings like us; He 'remembers that we are dust' (Ps. 103:14). What’s more, God 'gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength' (Isa. 40:29). Because God is strong, He can help us in our weakness."


That very night, the worst storm in decades "happened" to hurtle across southern England. It symbolised many things. We humans are resentful when we come across outbreaks of power beyond our control. They may be forces of nature, the attitudes of assertive people, or weaknesses in ourselves. We wonder whether God cares because He does not prevent these things from happening or take them away at once. Yet the evidence of the Bible is that God is supremely powerful, that He does not forget us, and that in Christ He empowers believers even in the midst of their weakness.

The punchy thought at the end reads, "God is the source of our strength".

Isaac Watts wrote a much-used hymn that began,

I sing the mighty power of God
That made the mountains rise,
That spread the flowing seas abroad
And built the lofty skies.

Later verses - one of them left out of most modern hymn books - run:

In heaven He shines with beams of love,
with wrath in hell beneath:
'tis on His earth I stand or move,
and 'tis His air I breathe.

His hand is my perpetual guard,
He guides me with His eye;
why should I then forget the Lord,
who is for ever nigh?

Scripture (unless otherwise stated) taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.