Rockin'

This morning, I looked in the change holder in my car, and saw this little rock that I picked up on the beach in Malaga, Spain in February of 2007. I had lost my passport while traveling the previous week and had made three frantic trips to Madrid to the U.S. Embassy there to get emergency papers, etc. so that I could get back into Russia. Everything had worked out, and I was sitting on the beach just thanking God for his faithfulness and sustaining grace, when I remembered that he told the people of Israel, after they crossed the Jordan River into the Promised Land, to take stones and make an altar of rememberance so that they could tell future generations of God's goodness and faithfulness. So, I picked up this little rock, stuck it in my pocket, and everytime I felt it, it reminded me that God had been so faithful and merciful to help me in what was at that time, the hardest situation I'd ever found myself in.

Here's the thing: I've decided to start carrying it again. Right now I just need to be reminded that God has been so faithful and merciful to me in the past, there's no reason to think he's going to stop now. I am so thankful that I have 30 years worth of memory and track record with God. I mean, not only do I have his Word, which I firmly believe to be true, but I also have experience after experience, of him proving himself faithful to me over and over again. What a blessing, and what a comfort. Like the hymn says, "When darkness seems to hide his face, I rest on his unchanging grace. In every high and stormy gale, my anchor holds within the veil." The ship might get beat up, and maybe even damaged, but ultimately it won't be moved. Not because it's strong, but because of the certainty and strength of the rock in which it's anchored.