Is your God too small?

 Who is this that even the wind and waves obey him?

Last week we went on holiday to the Suffolk coast. Usually one half term of dealing with Alice's poor sleep and Harry's need for order is enough and by the time a school holiday comes around I am ready to retreat (usually to my parents' house) and recuperate. By the time we arrived at our holiday cottage I had tied my heart up in knots of weariness and anxiety. Harry relaxes almost immediately at the seaside, but Alice was coughing and not sleeping well and not eating, and those knots were getting pulled tighter.

I had taken with me a book called 'Grace People' by Michael Baughen, a really wonderful book which goes through God's promises and shows how the whole Bible ties together into one story. I reached chapter three, all about God's 'creation covenant', the promise he makes after the flood:

As long as the earth endures, seed time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.

  (Genesis 8:22)

At home in my kitchen I have a verse from Isaiah pinned to the wall. When I first read it, it struck me as so beautiful. Recently, I have to admit, my eyes have skimmed it but my heart hasn't responded. I have been too busy carrying worry around.

Even to your old age and grey hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.

Isaiah 46:3-5

As I read Michael Baughen's explanation of God's promise to sustain creation, of the magnitude and power and merciful, faithful love behind that promise, my heart began to lighten. He goes on to talk about other parts of the Bible that show God as the creator and sustainer of the world and all it contains. Then he comes to the New Testament and shows how this theme continues:

Through him [Jesus] were all things made... he is sustaining all things by his powerful word. 

John 1 and Hebrews 1

Hang on, he is sustaining- he's doing it right now. The waves are crashing on the beach, the sun is rising and setting, the blossom is out on the trees. Jesus is sustaining me and my family even as I am busy doubting it. He is sustaining the whole world, of course he knows my little girl needs to eat, and how easy for him to help.

And once again I experienced that peace that Jesus not only promises but actually delivers, that comes to me when I open his words in the Bible and open my heart.  It surprises me and delights me every time. Suddenly it was easy to trust. I just need to keep going back every time those knots begin to form.