Coping With The Vicissitudes Of Life

Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” James 4:13-15

There is a saying: “If you want to hear God laugh, tell Him your plans.” That’s a powerful truth. The vicissitudes of life strike us all, often when least expected. Sometimes it is financial turmoil. At other times a breakdown in relationships between friends or family members. But the one that often hits us the hardest is illness, for it most often comes with little or no warning, and even when we think we are prepared for such things--we still find ourselves taken by surprise.

I’m into my second week of the worst bronchitis I’ve ever experienced. That is trying enough with all my other health issues. But just days after my bronchitis diagnosis, my wife has gotten covid. By some miracle we have missed out on the terrible covid surges that first arrived with the virus, and even the delta variant surge that struck over the summer. But as the virus appears to be winding down, my wife is hit hard by the bug.

After two covid tests I am still clear of the virus. Yet the bronchitis has stubbornly clung to my right lung. In the midst of it all I have been to the hospital and urgent care to be checked and tested for covid just to make sure my bronchitis is not “covid in disguise”. Meanwhile, I grieve over my wife suffering with the virus and finding ourselves in the situation where she is now among those afflicted by the terrible bug. She is unused to being the ill one. I told her jokingly that I am the sick one of the house and she is not allowed to be ill. 

Of course we will both survive and get through to the other side of our afflictions. For me it is an old familiar procession. For my wife it is more of a new, and horrible experience.

Covid has been ginned up by the news media milking it for ratings and preying on our already substantial fears of the novel bug. So just the mention of the word “Covid” ignites fears and worries that are amplified with each day’s news stories. Of course the news media does not focus upon the many millions of people in all age groups who have survived the virus, but upon each and every tragedy associated with it. So you find yourself not only having to cope with the virus, which is bad enough, but driving back your own fears which have been stoked for more than a year with Covid.

In all our fears and the troubling vicissitudes of life we must be ready to adjust ourselves and strengthen our faith through whatever trials await us. Remembering all the time that we are not alone. Jesus resides within every believer through the Holy Spirit. We have power from above. And the Word of God to strengthen us. As well as the very angels of God watching over every step in our life.

Do not fear. Do not doubt. And do not dread. We are not as those who have no hope in this world but our hopes are fixed in the very real Person of Jesus, Our Savior lives! And we live by His Spirit and Power at work within us!

Prayer: Dear Lord, life throws many roadblocks in our path. Help us to never get so focused upon the roadblocks that we fail to see You are our guide through, around, and over the roadblocks that come our way. Amen.