Help from Heaven for When you Wake Up to Worries

We spotted him out the window, and immediately the debate began.

“That's not a bunny, that's a dog!”

“No, it's a rabbit.”

“It's too big to be a rabbit – it has to be a dog!” On and on the argument ensued, as family members crowded around the living room window of the small apartment and peered intently at the animal moving around in the enclosed courtyard beyond. 

When my in-laws first moved from their Oregon home into a nearby assisted living facility, they were told that a large rabbit by the name of Prince Charming, perhaps a donated pet, lived in and ruled the green space outside their windows. They hadn't yet caught a view of him. There to assist in their transition, my husband, eldest son, sister-in-law and I were busy moving in furniture when somebody suddenly caught a glimpse of the animal. All work stopped as we crowded around the window to get a look.

Sitting next to a stone fountain was surely the biggest rabbit I'd ever seen. A mass of gray and white fur, it clearly looked like a shaggy small dog, only the long ears and it's eventual hopping motion indicating its true species. We watched as it sat contentedly chewing a treat, unconcerned by the movement of residents walking past. Suddenly startled, however, it took off to the safety of some nearby bushes with a speed that belied its large size. Over the next couple of days we looked for it often in our comings and goings, always hoping to catch another glimpse.

God once likened the worries that kept me awake at night to the many bunnies that sit in our yard on a summer's day. And He compared my mind to the dogs lunging at those rabbits repeatedly from the living room window, the mental “barking” at what it couldn't reach keeping me from the rest I so desired. He showed me how to chase those worries away with the weapon of His Word, using specific scriptures to battle particular problems until I had run them off my property completely and once more could sleep in peace.

But sometimes we are faced with problems of such magnitude that we find ourselves unable to battle them on our own. The tools that were effective in previous fights seem only to chase that monster around and around in our minds like the bunny in the enclosed space of the courtyard. We're intimidated by the size of the problem and limited by the confines of our own thinking. We compare the bills to the size of our paycheck, our sickness to the doctor's prognosis, our grief to the number of days that lie ahead of us...and we see no way to victory in the situation.

What we've forgotten is that our battlefield lies under an open heaven. We simply need to look up. God is not bound by the limits of our understanding and can move in ways beyond our imaginings. He can do more than we can ask or think. What we can't do in our own power He can do through His love. He is simply waiting to be asked to intervene.

Prince Charming no longer roams at will in the courtyard at the facility. An attacker of some sort, a hawk perhaps, swooped down at him from the sky. While he survived the incident minus only a few fluffs of fur, his caretakers decided it was best for his safety to confine him once more.

While I considered that particular lapin a friend, not a foe, the enemy of our souls is not nearly so charming. We won't feel sorry for him when the true Prince does as the Bible foretells, similarly confining him until his eventual demise in the lake of fire. Until that day we're reminded that no matter the size of our problem, it's simply no match for God. The present-day peace He promised is ours if we simply believe we can receive it and ask Him to send it on its way.

“And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more...”

(Revelation 20:1-3 KJV)

Needing Neighbors

“We got the wrong butter,” the mother said to her daughter, flipping through the coupons in her hand while the girl unloaded their groceries from the shopping basket to the belt. “The other one would have been cheaper with the discount.”

“Do you want me to go back and exchange it?” the teenager asked.

Suddenly the elder of the two broke into a huge grin. “You know what? We’re getting it all for free anyway! It doesn’t matter!” she said, and the two of them laughed delightedly.

I looked at her expectantly for the explanation that was sure to follow.

“Somebody gave us a van yesterday, and $200 in grocery gift cards!” Noting my surprised look she went on to say, “I take care of severely handicapped kids - the kind on machines and in wheelchairs…the ones that need a lot of help. And my old van broke down recently. I haven’t had a vehicle in weeks! Yesterday a church donated one to me, and it’s wonderful!” She went on to tell me that although it was fourteen years old it ran great and had many features that their old vehicle lacked. It was an incredible blessing, and then there was the money to help with her food bill on top of it all. She was clearly over the moon about her good fortune.

When I hit the total button, usually a bad moment in the checkout line, she was overjoyed all over again. “Look at that! We have enough left for next week‘s bill, as well!” When her groceries were bagged she thanked me, her non-stop smile still in place, and started to push her loaded cart towards the door. Something had been stirring in my brain while we talked, however, and as she left I stopped her with a sudden question, asking if she lived on a certain street several miles out of town. When she answered in the affirmative, her eyes wide, I described a house and its location at the end of the road, where it meets the highway. Again she nodded.

“I’m your neighbor!” I told her, explaining that I lived a mile up the road on the other side. As we had been talking earlier I’d remembered a story I’d read in the paper about a family that welcomed disabled children into their home, despite the incredible amount of work involved in caring for them and the pain of losing them when they eventually succumbed to their medical challenges. In fact, it was the name of our road mentioned in the newspaper article that initially caught my eye, and I realized after reading about them that that we were living near some very special people indeed. She told me she was almost sixty years old, an age when most people start thinking of retirement and living for themselves for awhile, and yet she found she couldn’t stop taking these kids in. It delighted me to finally meet her and to hear that she who gives help had received the same from somebody else.

Despite the proximity of my house to hers, it was the people in the church who came alongside her and assisted her who were her true neighbors, a word that defines the position of a heart more than the location of a house. No matter where we live, we are all surrounded by very special people, gifted in different ways and unable to quit functioning in them. We move into their neighborhood spiritually speaking when our hearts are stirred with compassion for the things that move theirs and we find ways to help them get done what they’ve been called to do.

Some of us have been living in the same place for a long time. The good news is that it’s not too late to move. There’s surely a good neighborhood near you with people just waiting…needing…for you to notice the vacancy. Move on up today.

“Give, and it shall be given to you, good measure pressed down and shaken together and running over, they shall give into your bosom. For with the same measure that you measure, it shall be measured to you again.”
(Luke 6:38 MKJV)