Turbulence. Everyone who has flown in an airplane has experienced it. It’s accompanied by a sinking sensation in the pit of your stomach, the sudden jostling of the craft as you grip the arm rest, and a prayer as you realize there is nothing you can do about it.
You are not the pilot. You’re not even the mechanic who prepared the plane for flight. When turbulence comes, all you can do is trust God.
Have you noticed that we don’t offer the same desperate prayers for God’s guidance at the baggage claim or on the drive home? We don’t clutch the car steering wheel, pleading for God to rescue us. Once the turbulence is over, we happily forget what utterly dependent creatures we really we are.
As much as I hate to say it, turbulence can be the best thing to ever happen to us.
We invest a lot of energy in avoiding life’s turbulence. Many of our thoughts are consumed with ways to make our lives more comfortable. We buy books claiming to reveal the secrets of an easier life. We enlist therapy sessions or take medication to minimize the discomfort that life’s turbulence brings.
It’s not that reading books to make our lives better or therapy aren’t sometimes helpful in dealing with the tough stuff in life. God can and does use various means to guide us through turbulence to our destination of greater strength described in 1 Peter 5:10.
And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you (emphasis mine).
Although we will never enjoy the turbulence of discomfort and suffering, God uses it to strip us of our vain self-reliance so He can guide us to a better, more secure destination. Trouble moves us to cast our every care on Him. And isn’t it just like God to use that which causes so much discomfort to move us to a place of indescribable comfort in Him?
We don’t have to like suffering to know that God is working through it to bring us safely to our destination, a place where we can be settled and strengthened with feet firmly planted on solid ground.
Growth requires turbulence. We can avoid it entirely by not flying. But then we wouldn’t get anywhere. What if, instead of running from adversity, we embraced it as part of God’s process of moving us to a better place? How would that change our perspective on life’s turbulence?
This post was written by Bill Blankschaen
