Supernatural Stability

Psalm 46

God is our refuge and strength,
    an ever-present help in trouble.
² Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
    and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
³ though its waters roar and foam
    and the mountains quake with their surging.^[c]

⁴ There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
    the holy place where the Most High dwells.
⁵ God is within her, she will not fall;
    God will help her at break of day.
⁶ Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
    he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

⁷ The Lord Almighty is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our fortress.

The impermanence of Earth becomes real when God speaks– it reminds me of when my mother would struggle financially or in her marriage, and she would comfort me by saying, “it won’t always be like this.” Those words would draw my attention away from the emergency signals reflected in her eyes, and I wondered about the face of the future. Now, I find that our hyperfixation on the future was an escape room that had the power to disappoint or keep us locked away from real peace. The circumstances that alarm us in this life are signals of God’s control and the Earth’s temporal nature. Though we’d like to escape our hellish planet, there are no shortcuts to heaven. And because of our fate as humans, our asset and liability is time. Time has a way of revealing God’s hand when it seems too late. 

When life seems to have its way with us, God is with us in the turbulence as the Earth spins violently on its axis, and we seem to lose track of time. Turbulence and time– supplements to anxiety and uncertainty. I haven’t known God to promise an escape from life, but His presence honors it. God is immersed in this tumultuous experience with me, and I am not alone on this journey. I feel relieved that I don’t have to carry any baggage by myself, let alone weigh my loads. 

I feel drawn to Psalm 46:5, “God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved; God will help it when the morning dawns.” It reveals how God’s presence provides supernatural stability.

Meditating on this scripture helped me practically, as my cousin passed away over the weekend: God became my refuge and strength as I heard about my cousin death on the way to celebrate my best friend’s birthday and her brother’s baptism.

A thirty-minute drive became a sacred space for God to hold me and be my confidant until I reached the party; I invited God into my grief and kept my tears buckled in the car so that I wouldn’t spoil the party. I experienced a profound in-between space of wanting to drown in tears but knowing my friends deserved my cheerfulness and support as they celebrated life. God was present in both my grief and glee. Knowing that God was present provided me stability, as the Psalm says, “God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved.” I engaged with Psalm 46 by acknowledging my pain but reminding myself of a greater reality that God is near. Psalm 46 builds a new hope in me that is dependent on the unchanging nature of God who sees what I cannot perceive on Earth. Not only can I show up for others with this guiding hope, but I can show up in prayer knowing that God is my strength and refuge. This scripture doesn’t provide a solution or answer to the unexpected, but I have guidance that keeps me stable and confident in God. I can say proudly that I don’t have all the answers and I don’t know what is going to happen in the future, but I have confidence that there is a future and God is guiding us there.