New Year, Ageless and Unchanging Savior

"Behold, the Lord God comes with might,
and his arm rules for him;
behold, his reward is with him.
He will tend his flock like a shepherd,
he will gather the lambs in his arms;
he will carry them in his bosom,
and gently lead those that are with young." Isaiah 40:10-11

Those of you who know me know I hate change. I also hate the unknown and uncertainty. I think that is one reason that the move to England has been a challenging one for me. It is also challenging for a variety of other reasons. We have less money than we've ever had, in fact, we now owe on student loans for the first time. We don't know when we are coming home or where we will live when we do come home.

And then there is the infertility. Family planning. Ha ha, what a joke. As if we have control over that. I still struggle with the pain of being broken. Will we ever have more children? How? Will we choose an embryo adoption again? What about traditional adoption? International adoption? My health? Where will the money come from? Will doing a homestudy still feel degrading? Will anyone choose us to be parents to their child? If it is their child, how can it be ours? What if...? What if...? What if...?

But this is all useless and foolish and worst of all, faithless. God has been so faithful to me. I have nothing to fear. Even now, He is the one that is reminding me of all this through what we are reading for family devotions, the testimony of others, and Pastor Phil's sermon this past Sunday. (Click here to hear it. You can also occasionally hear a baby making noise in the background. Sheesh, whose noisy kid is that? Bet you can guess.)

It is so easy to to get wrapped in what is before my eyes. That often seems more real to me than God's promises. I often act like an unbeliever with the way I worry and fret. It is easy to think that worry is not a sin. But it is. But praise God, he forgives me for this. Jesus is a high priest who understands my weaknesses and cleanses me. All my worries, I lay down at his feet. Money, health, future children, Iain's safety, the future-- all is under his control and care. If Baby Noah's family can lay him before the Lord, waiting for death, and yet praise the Lord; if God can stop the flowing Jordan for His people to cross; if Christ can become a man, die, and rise from the dead; if God can do more than I can ask or imagine, what have I to worry about?

The LORD Almighty-- is anything too hard for the Lord?

"Who has measure the waters in the hollow of his hand
and marked off the heavens with a span,
enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure
and weighed the mountains in scales
and the hills in a balance?" Isaiah 40:12

"Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, 'Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.'" Hebrews 13:5