Ranch Wife Musings | Tangled Lives

Posted on October 12, 2025 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

Originally printed in the Custer County Chronicle on October 8, 2025

Recently I had the blessed opportunity to revel in the company of some two dozen other women, fellowshipping together in a sweet time of encouragement and camaraderie. As I looked around the room at all of their faces, old and young, all walks of life, I reflected on how we had met. How long ago. Our shared histories. How our lives had intertwined over the years. How God weaves individuals together into an amazing tapestry called community.

Community. History. Belonging. Friendship. Isolation. Loneliness. As seemingly connected as we have become as a society, with easy access to hundreds or thousands of acquaintances through a handheld device, with the ability to communicate instantly and share bits and pieces of our lives with the world, you’d think that loneliness would be a thing of the past. The past – you know, back when communication was slow and travel was slower. Yet today we are more disconnected than ever. At no other time in history have we been able to converse with people across the globe with the mere tapping of our fingers on a keyboard, and yet the cultural sense of a local community is anemic at best. Phrases like “epidemic of loneliness” are tossed around almost with nonchalance, and who is in the least surprised by high percentages of people, young and old, experiencing the pain of loneliness?

But how did we get here? And what are we doing now to perpetuate it?

We can look back 200 years and see the slow degradation of the family unit, in the name of efficiency and modernism and industrialism, that removed families from their farms, fathers from their homes, and children from the care and instruction of their parents.

We can’t change what happened 200 years ago or 50 years ago, but we can recognize unhealthy patterns that are being perpetuated through choices made today.

Choices such as relegating to second or tenth place the things that used to give life meaning, like faith and family and marriage and civic responsibility, in favor of financial stability and a coveted career. Those second or tenth place things are seen now as the icing on the cake, nice but wholly optional. Professional development takes precedence over personal relationships any day of the week.

Choices such as separating life from work. We no longer live where we work or work where we live, to give a nod to author Wendell Berry. We have separated work and life, and give most of our best energy to our work, leaving little for life, and wonder why our relationships struggle. Few people live in one place long term, let alone for life, oftentimes choosing career paths that move them hundreds or thousands of miles, then struggling to engage and put down roots.

We have chosen for church to only inconvenience us on Sunday mornings, if that, preferably demanding no more than 45-60 minutes of our time, and we’ve slowly chiseled away at the many ways that church life and daily life would intersect and interact, allowing recreation, sports, and misapplied “rest” to rise in importance and priority.

Granted, there are nuances to this broad topic that simply couldn’t be fully explored in a book, let alone in a newspaper column, but I see patterns of choices that our society encourages people to make, and the breakdown of community ceases to be a mystery. It is a series of little choices that led to and perpetuates the breakdown, and I honestly believe that a series of little choices could help us to reclaim much of what has been lost.

Choices, like intentionally instilling in our children the importance of marriage and family. Instilling in them and cultivating in ourselves the importance of faith and civic responsibility. Committing ourselves to our local churches, more than just on Sunday mornings. Choosing to be a neighbor to our neighbors. Choosing to sacrifice financially for the sake of relationships and long-term effects on family and community. Choosing a simpler life. A less lavish life. A life that allows for greater flexibility and time outside the office.

I have experienced loneliness over the years. Deep loneliness, feelings of isolation and depression. And I can look back and see how my choices were perpetuating those things, how my career and life choices were hindering, not helping, my ability to form meaningful relationships and connections. And then I look at where God has brought me, at where I am now.

As I looked around the room at all of those dear ladies’ faces, representing several different occupations and vocations of wildly different sorts, two different church congregations, and other delightful chance encounters over the last 10 years, I was blown away. Blown away at how God brings people together, allowing them to bless one another, allowing relationships to form and strengthen. Blown away at the happenstance crossings of paths that have led to years-long friendships, the role models of childhood who have become dear friends in adulthood, women who cared about me and took me under their motherly wings.

And it made me so very thankful for the tangling of lives that creates a strong and vibrant community.

Sweet Fullness

Posted on July 31, 2025 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

When Brad and I got married, I knew I needed to do some soul-searching when it came to having children. I had been single a long time, and I honestly think it was God’s kindness to me that He sort of lifted the desire for children away from my heart for those 10-plus years of being a single woman. I remember as a highschooler and college-aged young woman dreaming of having 10 kids, picking names out, and truly having an active desire to be a mother. But as the single years wore on, it was a struggle enough to grow in contentment and confidence that God would provide a husband if and when He chose to do so; I believe it was God’s kindness that temporarily and gently suspended the desire for children and kept it from being another stumbling block.

So when I found myself married to a good man, I knew I wanted to be the mother to his children, but I also had this strange sense of neutrality. Some of it is temperament – I’ve never been the baby-chasing sort. As sweet as new babies are, I never feel compelled to hold and cuddle other people’s babies, and am perfectly content to admire from a distance. But now that I was married? I knew this was something I needed to wrestle with. It wasn’t that I didn’t desire children, in an active sense, but rather that passively there was no active longing. Does that make sense? I wasn’t opposed to children, but I wasn’t actively experiencing a desire for them either. It was as if my years of singleness had sort of muffled the sense of that desire. And as I pondered that, I realized how empty that was.

Too often, I see women on social media or elsewhere, professing to be Believers and proclaiming confidently that they have absolutely no desire for children and that should be fine. Granted, I don’t know their situations, but a common thread in the Bible is God’s love of the family, and His desire for His people to raise families to His glory, beginning in the Garden of Eden, with the command to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it.” Procreation is obviously part of that. And my personal conviction is that if God says something is good, we should think so, too. If God commands something to His people, we should take that seriously. We are not victims of our desires.

So I began to pray and ask that God would give me right desires, desires that pleased Him, and that if it was His will that we have children that He would open my heart to children, and remove the fears that gnawed at the margins of my heart.

And it is wonderful how God answers prayers. Before too long, I found I was no longer praying that God would give me a desire for children (because He had answered that prayer and had given me the desires I had prayed for!) but I was praying that He would make me fruitful, and would give me contentment and peace if He didn’t open my womb. Because I also knew that, although I am responsible to cultivate right desires, God doesn’t always satisfy those desires the way we want or expect, and He owes me nothing.

Well, it took my breath away when I saw the two red lines, and took my breath away again when I heard the heartbeat for the first time and saw the baby on ultrasound at 19 weeks. I’ve been living in a state of constant flux between incredible reality and surreality. Nothing had prepared me for how sweet it would be to feel the first quickenings, or how comforting it is to feel the baby move at all hours of the day or night. Nothing had prepared me for the sweet fullness of expectant motherhood. Fears have slipped further and further away.

And I can’t wait to meet our baby girl in November.

P.S. I took these photos for us with a tripod and shutter timer while we were camping in the Bighorns this weekend. Brad was great, and even consented to push the shutter button for me a few times. 🙂

Ranch Wife Musings | On Whose Shoulders We Stand

Posted on June 21, 2025 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

Originally printed in the Custer County Chronicle on June 18, 2025

Have you ever noticed the following contrast?

When Mother’s Day comes around, in sweeps the sappy sentimentality from all quarters, religious and secular alike. Church sermons laud the important role mothers play, encouraging mothers to embrace their God-given status and find joy in the motherhood journey. Ushers hand out $5 gift cards for ice cream or flowers to all the mothers. Mothers are showered with admiration and gifts, treated to lunch, and generally doted upon. All the wrongs mothers can commit are overlooked, and motherhood is suddenly elevated to frank heroism by a culture that at all other times actively discourages women from having children and decries motherhood as being demeaning and bowing to the patriarchy (but can’t even define “mother” anyway), while memes circulate social media saying that Mother’s Day isn’t just for mothers, but for anyone who wants to be considered a mother – cat moms, dog moms, anyone. I find it all very confusing.

Father’s Day rolls around, though, and it is a different dynamic altogether. Church services might give a tiny nod to the day itself, might offer a brief prayer of thanks for all the fathers in our lives, but any sermon that takes place is generally not a celebration of God’s gift of fathers but a warning to fathers that they had better shape up, and here’s how to do it. Fathers aren’t lavished with gifts, and social media takes no break from the campaign against toxic masculinity (which really is usually just a campaign against masculinity, period). Fathers are often the butt of sarcastic jokes, and many run-of-the-mill issues full-grown adults wrestle with are tacitly or explicitly blamed on fathers and mistakes that were made during childhood.

The dichotomy is striking, if nothing else.

It seems to be a daily thing on the news, hearing about violent crimes, abuses, tyrannies, behind each of which is a man being dragged through the mud, sometimes justifiably, sometimes not. But for every single one of those events that dominate the news cycle, I would guess there are 10,000 men, invisible to all but their families, standing in the gap for their wives and children, for their communities, and for their faith. Men who rightly set the standard for manhood, for virtue and morality, for right and wrong, willing to hold the line against those who threaten the spiritual and physical wellbeing of those they love.

And we need that. We need those men. Desperately.

In a society where many social ills truly can be traced to fatherlessness and abuse by fathers, what we need is more strong, masculine figures, not fewer. More men who take the privilege of their strength seriously. And those men who are exemplary in their roles as husbands and fathers should never be in doubt about their value or importance.

We are who we are because of our fathers. Good fathers give us an example to follow. Poor fathers give a warning about what to avoid. But our fathers make us, and that trickles down through the generations, for better or for worse. Men learn how to treat their wives by watching how their fathers treat their mothers, for better or for worse. Women learn how they should be treated by watching how their fathers treat their mothers, for better or for worse. The importance of fatherhood – for better or for worse – absolutely cannot be overstated.

My dad set the standard of manhood for me. He was a steady, dependable, wise, Godly force in my life through all of my growing up years (and still is), and so much of the woman I became is a direct result of the example set by my own father. His living out of his masculinity gave so much context for my living out of my femininity. So much of what characterizes my faith and my thoughts and my loves and interests are because of my dad. How I view life, how I process information, decisions I’ve made – because of my dad. As an adult, he became the standard for what I ought to pray and look for in a husband, and his example of a loving and kind father and husband set the bar when I was dating. He demonstrated devotion to God, faithfulness to wife, love of children, gentle but firm in his expectations and corrections of us, and always pointing us back to Christ. He, with all of his imperfections and flaws notwithstanding, was my standard of masculinity and manhood.

Then there is my father-in-law, who has been a constant presence in my life for the last 7 years, as the first person on the volunteer fire department to take me under his wing and show me the ropes, and, more importantly, as the man who helped make my husband the man that he is. And I’m so thankful for that. I’m thankful for the honesty and integrity that my father-in-law has modeled to his son, for the instinct to generosity, the work ethic and ingenuity (it is amazing what can be done with wire and willpower), the commitment to family and community, the importance of being a capable and compassionate leader, and that there are more important things in life than the money in one’s bank account. I’m even thankful for the somewhat twisted sense of humor that I now have to suffer with on a daily basis.

And it isn’t too long before I get to watch husband step into his own role as father. Who we are because of our fathers will shape and mold the next generation.

We stand on the shoulders of the men who made us.

Ranch Wife Musings | Look Higher

Posted on January 1, 2025 by Laura Lindblom under Uncategorized

Originally published in the Custer County Chronicle on January 1, 2025

There is something extra special about the first day of a new year. From the first delicious moments of the first sunrise, to the sweet last glow as the sun sets, there is something poignant and sacred about the start of a new year, and all the associated firsts. The world feels clean and unsullied. Winter is fresh upon us. The color that fades from the earth seems to infuse into the sky and the eyes are drawn up, up. Just after sunset is the most mesmerizing, when the southwesterly expanse gleams like an opal, clear and dazzling, from the brilliant scarlet and pale rose in the west, to lavender and blue above, and the sweetest green to the south, a whole watercolor rainbow. The first stars are breathtaking. It is impossible not to gaze, impossible not to look higher. Higher than the withered grasses and bare limbs of trees. Higher, to that ephemeral perfection of the new sky.

January 1, 2025. Really, no different than December 31, 2024.

And yet, it is. The new year opens up like the pages of an unread book, or an unwritten one, depending on your perspective. The old year is gone, like a book finished, and hopefully we remember what stories were told in it, the lessons learned, the joys had, the tears shed, the successes and failures, and look forward to the New Year with hope and eagerness.

So often, though, we squander this annual opportunity. The New Year and the making of resolutions is often merely an excuse to settle ourselves deeper in our own self-centeredness. (There, I said it. A little on the nose perhaps, but I said it.) A quick Google search of the top New Year’s resolutions yields a list rife with such goals as losing weight, eating healthier, money management, time management, improved sleep hygiene, improved work-life balance, reducing alcohol consumption, quitting smoking, drinking more water, and pursuing a new hobby, to name a few of the many things that fall into the broad category of self-care, that snake-oil remedy peddled for all our ills, whether physical, spiritual, relational or emotional, and which has wreaked havoc on our relationships and families.

Because do you notice what’s missing? The people are missing. And just maybe that is why so many resolutions and goals fail in about 22 days flat. Without a “why” that extends beyond self, I think goals and resolutions are generally destined to fail.

But here’s the thing about those sorts of goals and resolutions: they are 100% safe. They fuel our smugness as we pursue them, but our self-satisfaction can comfortably accept our failure. With the bar practically set upon the ground, success is semi-sweet, and reaps a few benefits, surely, but if we fail, it isn’t overly painful and no one really notices or cares too much. We set our sights so low! It is a lot easier to reflect at the end of the year with a shrug that I failed to start a new hobby, than to realize and truly acknowledge that I failed to grow in my love of my spouse, my neighbor, or God.

So, what if we looked higher? What if we took the chance, each New Year, to evaluate our habits and goals and ambitions in light of Someone besides ourself? Perhaps, the Person Whose birth we just celebrated?

The Bible teaches that we are to do all things for the glory of God. The Bible teaches that followers of Jesus are known by their love. We are instructed to set our minds on things above, not on earthly things, and to dwell on those things which are “true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, and of good repute, anything that is excellent or worthy of praise.” We are to seek to outdo one another in showing love, the only time I can think of where the Bible instructs competition. We are to forgive wrongs done. We are to show love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. We are to live peaceably with one another. We are to be submissive one to another. We are to have order within ourselves and within our families.

What would happen if we set goals and made resolutions that were inherently others-oriented? What if we were as determined to cut out biting words spoken to a family member as we were to cut out alcohol or smoking? What if we strove to shed that certain contentious habit with the same eagerness that we strive to shed 5 pounds? What if 52 hikes in a year became 52 encouraging cards or letters? What if we were as intent upon a half hour or hour in God’s Word as we are intent upon our physical improvement? What if we opened our homes regularly? Loved our spouses specifically? Strove to bless our neighbor intentionally?

And what if we actually invited accountability? What amazing transformation could happen.

The end of the year can be bittersweet. I am a year older, but am I a year wiser? A year more kind? A year more selfless, or a year more generous? A year more patient? Compassionate? Slow to anger? Abounding in love? Willing to go out of my way to bless another, particularly those closest to me? Because those things have the capacity to cause a ripple effect of goodness.

So go ahead and drink more water, lose some weight, and quit smoking. Your body will thank you for it. But do it to be of greater service to others and to God. Look higher, friend. Look higher.

Psalm 104

Posted on March 25, 2020 by Laura Lindblom under Photography

Bless the Lord, O my soul!
    O Lord my God, you are very great!
You are clothed with splendor and majesty,
²    covering yourself with light as with a garment,
    stretching out the heavens like a tent.
³He lays the beams of his chambers on the waters;
he makes the clouds his chariot;
    he rides on the wings of the wind;
⁴he makes his messengers winds,
    his ministers a flaming fire.⁵He set the earth on its foundations,
    so that it should never be moved.
⁶You covered it with the deep as with a garment;
    the waters stood above the mountains.
⁷At your rebuke they fled;
    at the sound of your thunder they took to flight.⁸The mountains rose, the valleys sank down
    to the place that you appointed for them.
⁹You set a boundary that they may not pass,
    so that they might not again cover the earth.¹⁰You make springs gush forth in the valleys;
    they flow between the hills;
¹¹they give drink to every beast of the field;
    the wild donkeys quench their thirst.¹²Beside them the birds of the heavens dwell;
    they sing among the branches.
¹³From your lofty abode you water the mountains;
    the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work.¹⁴You cause the grass to grow for the livestock
    and plants for man to cultivate,
that he may bring forth food from the earth
¹⁵    and wine to gladden the heart of man,
oil to make his face shine
    and bread to strengthen man’s heart.¹⁶The trees of the Lord are watered abundantly,
    the cedars of Lebanon that he planted.
¹⁷In them the birds build their nests;
    the stork has her home in the fir trees.
¹⁸The high mountains are for the wild goats;
    the rocks are a refuge for the rock badgers.¹⁹He made the moon to mark the seasons;
    the sun knows its time for setting.
²⁰You make darkness, and it is night,
    when all the beasts of the forest creep about.²¹The young lions roar for their prey,
    seeking their food from God.
²²When the sun rises, they steal away
    and lie down in their dens.
²³Man goes out to his work
    and to his labor until the evening.²⁴O Lord, how manifold are your works!
    In wisdom have you made them all;
    the earth is full of your creatures.
²⁵Here is the sea, great and wide,
    which teems with creatures innumerable,
    living things both small and great.
²⁶There go the ships,
    and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it.²⁷These all look to you,
    to give them their food in due season.
²⁸When you give it to them, they gather it up;
    when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
²⁹When you hide your face, they are dismayed;
    when you take away their breath, they die
    and return to their dust.
³⁰When you send forth your Spirit,they are created,
    and you renew the face of the ground.³¹May the glory of the Lord endure forever;
    may the Lord rejoice in his works,
³²who looks on the earth and it trembles,
    who touches the mountains and they smoke!
³³I will sing to the Lord as long as I live;
    I will sing praise to my God while I have being.
³⁴May my meditation be pleasing to him,
    for I rejoice in the Lord.
³⁵Let sinners be consumed from the earth,
    and let the wicked be no more!
Bless the Lord, O my soul!
Praise the Lord!

Thoughts from Quarantine

Posted on March 25, 2020 by Laura Lindblom under Writing

I’m sitting here on my sofa looking out at a world ready for springtime, though covered with a light dusting of very wet snow. Outside is the sound of dripping and trickling, that wonderful music of the waking spring. My feet have been sandal-clad, ready to be done with the cold, and my face is just getting a touch of tan after a snowshoeing sunburn last week. The grass is greening, the sky is by turns overcast, then bluer than blue, the wind is wonderfully sweet, and the perfume of warm pine needles on south facing slopes is intoxicating. I’ve already found my first teeny baby pasque flower, just starting to poke up through the pine needles on one particular hill I always check this time of year.

Spring is coming, the same way it always does when the winter is winding down. The exact same way it always does.

And yet, this year is different.

Because of fear.

Nearly two weeks ago, panic came to rural Western South Dakota, and to our whole nation. Covid-19 is now a household world, as familiar as the common cold. This was definitely not something I ever anticipated, definitely not something I’d “planned” for, definitely not something I’d looked forward to. I never thought I’d be prepping to teach music lessons remotely because of “social distancing” recommendations. I never thought I’d be off work with the fire department for two weeks because of symptoms I wouldn’t normally give two thoughts about. I never thought I would be going on three weeks without meeting with my church family for our weekly service and Bible studies.

This time of year, my students are in the home stretch of their lessons, as we have the last five or so weeks of lessons before the end of the year recital. Very likely, we won’t have a recital this year. Fire department trainings should start gearing up for the wildland fire season, with pack testing and refresher courses. But pack testing has been put on hold, and trainings have been cancelled or modified for distance learning. Easter is right around the corner, with anticipated family get togethers and church family celebrations. But with groups of more than ten people forbidden, that will be very different this year. Everyone is itching to get outside, to enjoy being together. Seasonal restaurants should begin opening for business, tourists should start trickling in. The delight of springtime often involves other people. The delight of life itself so often is the togetherness. And that togetherness has been replaced by fear, mistrust, and isolation.

But national and international panic results in some pretty unimaginable things.

I can’t begin to imagine the number of people without work right now, who already are living paycheck to paycheck, with financial fears and health fears hanging over them. I have nothing to complain about, in the big scheme of things. I’ll feel it, but I’ll be alright. Not everyone is so fortunate.

I will abstain from making any political comments one way or the other about the nature of this crisis or how well it warrants the level of concern we’ve given it. We’ve had enough misinformation from the media and idiotic comments from armchair physicians who suddenly know everything about a pandemic. But please understand that I am concerned, particularly for those who are the most vulnerable. But what has struck me and continues to strike me is the level of fear, blame, panic, anger, selfishness, and fear-mongering I have been witnessing for the last two weeks. The fear is driving people to do irrational things (don’t even get me started on the toilet paper shortage).

People fear because they don’t know another option.

The way the world handles a crisis will be (should be) drastically different from how a Christian handles a crisis. Should there be a sense of urgency? Absolutely. Should there be concern, particularly for those who are most vulnerable? Absolutely. Should there be sorrow over the loss of life? Absolutely.

But if you study your Bible, you understand several things that should drive you away from the cliff edge panic and into the security of the arms of Jesus Christ.

First, we shouldn’t be surprised at sickness and famine and heartache. We live in a world that is wracked by the effects of the sin of mankind. All one needs to do is take a quick, cursory glance at history to see that sickness and famine and heartache are normal. Obviously, a global-scale pandemic causes more concern than other types of sickness, but at the end of the day, a pandemic is sickness. Sickness is a normal part of living in a fallen world. Jesus is recorded having told His disciples in all three of the Synoptic Gospels that famines, earthquakes, pestilence and war would wrack the end times, the time between His Resurrection and His Second Coming (Matt. 24, Mark 13, Luke 21). So in a sense we should be encouraged. We should be encouraged because events like this pandemic speak to the veracity of Scripture. Two thousand years may seem like a long time to wait for Jesus to come again, but these events of worldwide proportion speak to where we are in history: we are right on track, whether that track lasts another two minutes or another ten millennia. God keeps His promises. His Word is true.

Second, the Believer has no need to fear death. Paul expresses the exquisite tension that the Believer in Christ should feel, when it comes to facing death or the possibility of death: For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain….I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. (Philippians 1: 21, 23) For the Christian, not only should we not fear death or the possibility of death, but we should recognize that death is the final door that ushers us into eternity with Jesus. Obviously I am not advocating for a mindset that obsesses over death or flirts with death or is reckless, but we absolutely should not live in fear of death. For the Christian, we have nothing to lose and everything to gain by going to be with Jesus. If we are to fear, we should fear for those who may die without ever coming to Christ in repentance and faith. In Matthew 10:28, Jesus said, “and do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” There is something much worse than dying, much worse than financial hardship, much worse than world upheaval and economic collapse. That is not being right with God when we die.

Third, God is ultimately in control of all of this. Matthew 10:29 reads, “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father.” If the God of the universe sees and values even the life of a sparrow, how much more does He see us and value us, the pinnacle of His Creation! Romans 8:28-29 tells us, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son…” The difficulties a Believer experiences aren’t just unfortunate events that God will somehow figure out how to recycle. They are intended, brought about, to accomplish a greater purpose. That purpose may be as simple as causing us to trust Him more. Think of the story of Joseph in the Book of Genesis, sold in to slavery by his own brothers, who could later tell his brothers in Genesis 50:15-21 that the evil that they did to him was brought about by God to accomplish a greater purpose. Throughout the Bible, we see the pattern very clearly that God doesn’t just work with events and somehow figure out a way to make them work out for good. God isn’t taking lemons and making cosmic lemonade. We actually see that God is, in a way we can’t fully understand, the author even of calamity. Isaiah 45:7 reads: “I form light and create darkness; I make well-being and create calamity; I am the Lord, who does all these things.” God says this of Himself. If this gives you heartburn, consider this: either God is all powerful, or He isn’t. If He isn’t, He isn’t worth serving. If He is, there are two options. Either He evil and malicious and diabolically brings about evil things (not the God of the Bible), or He is so wonderfully good and perfect, He can state this truthfully:

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
    so are my ways higher than your ways
    and my thoughts than your thoughts. (Isaiah 55:8-9)

We may not understand why God allows or ordains horrific events. We can get down into the weeds of First Causes and Second Causes, and debates about how sovereign God actually is. But the way I understand it, either God is sovereign or He isn’t. I believe He is. Sovereign is sovereign. Not partially sovereign. Not selectively sovereign. Either of those would mean He isn’t truly sovereign. Either God is good or He isn’t. I believe He is. Not mostly good. Not usually good. Either of those would mean He isn’t truly good. And I can trust a good, sovereign God. And I can submit myself to Him, knowing that His ways and thoughts are much higher than my ways and thoughts.

Fourth, the world WILL END when God commands it to end; not a moment sooner, not a moment later. By that token, the world WILL CONTINUE for as long as God ordains it to continue. We can neither hasten the day, nor delay it. In Genesis 8, God made a promise to Noah that He would never again destroy the earth by a flood, and this beautiful verse is nestled in the midst of that promise: “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.” (Genesis 8:22) God will sustain the earth until the time that He sees fit to bring it to an end. And in a time like this, when the whole world is panicking, that should be immensely encouraging. God is in the Heavens. He is in control.

So if you are afraid, whether for yourself or your loved ones, weather the fears are financial, or health, or general fears related to a world gone crazy, whether you fear the shortages and what desperate people do when things truly get desperate…Please be encouraged. Be encouraged that there IS a God in the Heavens, and that He cares for this creation. Don’t fear Covid-19. Fear God. Seek Him. There are promises in Scripture of common grace extended to all mankind (every breath we take is evidence of common grace), but there are so many wonderful promises and encouragements that aren’t yours if you don’t know and love Jesus as your Savior.

I’m so excited that spring is here. God’s work is beautifully visible in something so taken for granted as the change of seasons. We don’t give the seasons much thought, unless we get tired of one and are eager for the next. But God Himself sustains those seasons. We don’t worry that winter will never end, because we know that winter will end. That’s how it works. That is how God made it to work. That is how God sustains it to work. There is comfort in that. If God can sustain the seasons, the planets, the solar systems and galaxies, the tides and the orbit of the moon, the tiny workings of our body’s cells…then He can sustain the world through a pandemic, however severe. And even the resulting financial hardship that many of us will feel with loss of work is yet another wonderful opportunity to trust in God’s goodness and mercy and providence. Any opportunity to trust God is a good thing.

If you want a psalm to read that will brighten your heart, read Psalm 104. I’ll post it in its entirety in another post, but it is a beautiful psalm praising God for His power over and visible in Creation, how He is the one who brings about the seasons, the growth of plant life, sustaining the animal life, and on and on. Read it, and be encouraged.

And one last verse…Romans 8:35, 37-39:

“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”