Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.” Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.” James 4: 13-15
A plane is leaving Knoxville as I write this, and my husband and son are not on it.
They were supposed to be on it. They had planned to be on it. They woke up this morning fully intending to be buckled in side by side right now, ascending, and beginning their journey towards Nepal.
Instead, they are here, manning pumps, standing in mud, and praying, praying, that the continued deluge forecast for our area is miraculously diverted. While our house is above the rising waters, the saturated ground has overwhelmed septic lines throughout our area— ours included. Our tank was pumped dry yesterday… and filled above capacity with groundwater less than twelve hours later.
And it’s still raining.
“If God knew it was going to flood, why did He tell Daddy to go to Nepal in the first place?” 8 year-old Birdie asked today as she sat, slightly stunned. She had just witnessed the flurry of activity as plane tickets were put on hold, as our community was alerted to our needs and began to swirl into action, as we stopped just long enough to remind all of the little ears that God’s provision for us has never wavered, and will not waver now.
But she still has questions. Good questions. Questions that adults wrestle with as they face canceled plans and disruption and loss.
If God knew, then why did He allow my husband to make the plans in the first place? Were we not prayerful enough? Was he never supposed to go? Am I supposed to buck it up, let him go, and handle this solo?
Or maybe, as I explained to Birdie today, God wanted it this way. Maybe He knew that each of our children will remember the moment Dad prioritized their needs over ministry. Maybe He wanted to show us the strength of the bonds He is forming here amongst those who have encircled us and call us their own. Maybe He needed us to do, or say, or be something that will be written in the chaos of these small handful of stressful days. Maybe something else will come about over the course of the days they would have been gone that He’s protecting us from.
We don’t know.
But we do know that He is a good Father, and that as uncomfortable as this moment is, it’s small. Trainings can be rescheduled. Plane tickets can be moved. The rain will, eventually, stop.
God knows all of that, too. And if we allow Him to speak louder than our protests, and if we bend to the day He has given us, we are met with something that is not panic-inducing, but rather, peace-giving.
I’ve tried to tell Birdie all of this with words today, but to be honest, I think this is the kind of thing that can’t be said. It must be shown. Which is why I’ll be baking cookies today, and brewing tea, and gathering all of my people at the table for a Rain, Rain, Go Away party. I resolve to be the face of the peace today, the calm that points to Jesus. My children may remember the pumps and the chaos, yes. But they’ll remember the cookies even more.