Like many of you, my thoughts and my heart has been with the people of the Philippines this week. This storm seems to have affected more than any other in the past five or six years. Maybe it is because, having been a missionary, I cannot imagine what it would be like for the missionaries in the Tacloban mission to be evacuated from their areas just when the people there need them most. How worried they must be about the members, converts, and investigators they have spent the past weeks or months serving. Perhaps it is because, having a little brother on a mission, my heart is very tender for the families of those missionaries who have spent the past week praying, fasting, and pleading with Heavenly Father to keep their missionary safe and bring him or her home again. Perhaps it is because I look at the world through a mother's eyes now and my heart aches as I think of what it must be like for the mothers of those missionaries and all of the mothers in the Philippines. To lose your children--for a short time or until the next life--seems to me to be torture of the worst kind.
These were the things on my mind as my husband and daughter and I drove to our new home yet again last night to clean and make repairs as we prepare to move in. I am nervous for this move, but also feeling incredibly blessed that our family is able to afford a house at this time. Our house is not new. It is not in pristine condition. It doesn't have all the latest features and finishings. It definitely is not perfect. But we don't care about any of that, because it is ours, and it is quickly becoming home.
The lights of the city flew past as we drove north. I thought about how tired I was after a day of packing and cleaning in between playing with, feeding, and reading to my cranky daughter who is having a hard time adjusting to the change she senses but doesn't understand. I keep telling her it will be a good thing, but she still bursts into tears at the slightest tumble or reprimand. I wondered where I could find the energy to clean for another two hours and then make the journey home and get Kevin into bed when it would be way past her normal bedtime (our babysitter curse had struck again).
Growing tired of the ads on the radio, my husband turned on a CD instead. The one that just happened to be in the CD player was from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir--their Called to Serve CD that came out while I was on my mission. We don't often listen to the MoTab on days other than Sundays (both of us having got our fill while we were missionaries), but last night I found the music soothing, comforting. And then my favorite hymn started playing.
How firm a foundation, ye Saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in his excellent word!
What more can he say than to you he hath said,
In the midst of typhoons, earthquakes, and tropical storms, the Gospel is still true and the work still moves forward.
Who unto the Savior, who unto the Savior,
Who unto the Savior for refuge have fled?
And those missionaries, some of whom having walked 40 or more miles past washed up and bloating bodies to find safety and refuge, find that the Savior is there, right beside them, offering hope.
In ev'ry condition--in sickness, in health,
In poverty's vale or abounding in wealth,
At home or abroad, on the land or the sea--
In the midst of teething toddlers, out of control blood sugars, half-filled cardboard boxes and tight budgets, God's work moves forward.
As thy days may demand, as thy days may demand,
As thy days may demand, so thy succor shall be.
No mater how long or hard the day, the Savior offers the comfort and strength only he can give.
Fear not, I am with thee; oh, be not dismayed,
For I am thy God and will still give thee aid.
For the parents on their knees, pleading with the Lord to keep their loved one safe, unsure how they will keep functioning until they get word, God gives them the ability to keep moving forward.
I'll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
Upheld by my righteous, upheld by my righteous,
Upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.
Our Heavenly Father somehow makes it possible for us to know that everything will be okay, one way or another.
The soul that on Jesus hath leaned for repose
I will not, I cannot, desert to his foes;
That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,
I'll never, no never, I'll never, no never,
I'll never, no never, no never forsake!
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| "Lost Lamb" by Del Parson |
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