When adversity confronts us

We’ve all felt overwhelmed at some point. Sometimes it’s many things all at once. Sometimes it’s just one major upheaval. And in those moments, it’s tempting to feel disconnected from God’s presence and power and care – from all that is good and enduring.

Adversity can shake people’s faith, and that’s a subject the biblical story of Job explores. After the sudden destruction of his fortunes, his family, and finally his health, Job tries to understand why this has happened to him. Three friends offer various theological reasons for his suffering, all of which Job angrily rejects. Then a fourth encourages Job to go straight to God for the inspiration he needs. And God speaks to Job.

As a new sense of God’s infinite wisdom, goodness, and power dawns on Job, his bitterness yields to heartfelt humility and awe. And we’re told the latter part of Job’s life was blessed twice as much as the first.

This outcome points to one of the fundamental teachings of Christian Science: that evil isn’t a part of God’s creation, which is entirely good. So evil doesn’t have any of the reality and severity it claims. There isn’t a justification for it. Just a need to be mentally and spiritually lifted out of it – and the divine promise that this is indeed possible.

Sometimes, like Job, we may need a reminder to let God speak these truths to us when we most need them.

Years ago, we adopted an older collie from a kennel. Tess hadn’t ever lived with people and wasn’t terribly engaged with us. We also discovered she had a tremendous fear of any loud noises – a clap of the hands or clatter of dishes would send her scampering. And stairs were an unwelcome new challenge for her.

Then, during an unprecedented stretch of rain, the river near us overflowed its banks. Water began flooding our home.

My husband and I took turns with a heavy-duty water vacuum. For all the hours we spent removing the water, more kept coming in. After several days of almost constant effort, I felt exhausted and discouraged. I couldn’t even form the beginning of a prayer.

Something began pressing against my leg. It was Tess. I turned off the vacuum, patted her, and gently led her back up the stairs, where she’d be away from the chaos. And I went back to vacuuming. But Tess turned around, awkwardly descended back down, waded through the water, and again pressed herself against me. I tried pushing her away. She simply sat down with a splash.

“What?” I asked out loud.

The thought that came was quiet but penetrating: “She’s a shepherd dog. She’s braved both noise and stairs to remind you that you’re not alone. You’re being shepherded through this.” And on the heels of that unexpected inspiration, part of a verse from the King James Bible came to me: “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee” (Isaiah 43:2).

I recognized it as a timeless reassurance straight from God, who is infinite Spirit and inexhaustible Love. It’s in God that all true power lies, and nothing can oppose God’s eternal, unwavering care. God is always present with us, because as His children – as spiritual expressions of the divine nature – we are inseparable from Him.

I wholeheartedly acknowledged this spiritual fact and instantly felt buoyed with hope, calm, and an expectation that our family would have what it needed – whatever that meant.

As Tess stood up, shook off the water, and headed to a quieter part of the house, I felt so grateful for how she’d helped open my heart directly to God.

Shortly after that, the flooding began to recede. In the coming weeks, we found ways to prevent a future incursion of water and the unexpected resources to do so. Above all, it’s been an enduring lesson to let God speak to us whenever we feel overwhelmed.

Instead of becoming hypnotized into helplessness by our circumstances, each of us can feel how God reaches us with a wholly different message of restoration and grace. We begin to see that home, health, family, work, and resources are not defined or confined by human conditions but are eternal ideas, safe in God. As we turn to God, we find new, expansive ways to experience these ideas.

We’re never alone or doomed to suffer. God lets us know that.