God: A Very Present Help

I woke up this morning, and I was back in the intensive care room of St. Augustine Hospital in Durban, South Africa. Not literally, but in my mind I was sitting by the side of my late wife telling her how much I loved her. It was so real I could see the rough rock walls of that basement room and all the tubes and instruments connected to Eleanor.

Don’t ask me why I was back in that room. I do not know.  It was not an anniversary date of any significant event connected with her death. I had not talked about the experience recently. It just happened.

Life is like that sometimes. For no explainable reason, experiences from the past suddenly overwhelm our senses. When they do, it is more than a trick of the mind. We can see the places with vivid detail.  All the emotions of the moment come flooding back. We can even smell the aromas associated with the incident.

This morning there was another emotion I remembered — the feeling of God’s nearness. I remembered feeling that God was with us as we both lay in the hospital following the automobile accident that took Eleanor’s life. I remember my prayers begging for Eleanor’s recovery. And I remember the nearness of God when it became clear she would not survive.

In ways I had not known before, I learned that “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble” (Ps. 46:1).

You have probably had experiences like that, too. In the darkest hours of life, you have found God a very present help. When the solid ground on which you lived was dramatically transformed into shifting sand (v. 2), when those mountains that marked the path of your life suddenly slipped into the sea and disappeared (v. 2), when all around you roared and threatened to consume you (v. 3), God was a very present help.

It may be that in those moments when we are utterly helpless, we are most open to God. Perhaps that is why we experience the reality of God in such times.

In the months and years that followed, I desperately needed God to be a very present help. I needed strength that only He could provide. I needed guidance. I needed forgiveness. I know I taxed His patience at times, but God was always merciful and loving. He never left me alone.
God never leaves any of His children alone. His mercy is everlasting to those who love Him. That includes you.

Today life has its anxious moments, but life is not fearful.  The psalmist said that because God is a very present help we will not fear. That does not mean one never feels anxiety. Anxiety is a part of the natural reaction to change and to other life situations.

What it does mean is that one is not paralyzed by fear. We can live in the midst of anxiety and uncertainty because “God is our strength and refuge.” He is our very present help in trouble. Experience has taught us that God will strengthen us, that He will guide us, that He will have mercy upon us and grant us forgiveness for our sin, that He will never leave us alone.

The apostle Paul picked up on this theme in Romans 8. He asked, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” (v. 35). Then, answering his own question, Paul declared, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (vv. 38–39).

This promise, this comfort, upheld us in those dark hours of the past. This promise, this comfort, will uphold us in the dark hours through which we yet will walk.

The apostle Paul offers another insight into God’s comfort. He wrote in the opening verses of 2 Corinthians that those of us who have been comforted by God during our afflictions are to “comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”

God is our present help. We are to be a present help to those going through their own affliction. God is our strength. We are to offer strength to others. As God does for us, we are to do for others.  We offer guidance and forgiveness. We live with them patiently, mercifully and lovingly.

Comforting others with the comfort we have received from God is not a magical formula that guarantees all will work out as we want it to. After all, we disappointed God along the way. Why should we be surprised if we experience disappointment?

Comforting others with the comfort we have received from God is a certain way of helping people know that God is a very present help. He is a help in the midst of trouble. He is a help when memories overwhelm us. He is a help always.