My Path is Hidden from Me but not from Him

I turned seven the week my Aunt Sally got married. She was the heroin of all my childhood dreams. Soon after she married she left to be a missionary and live with a primitive tribe of Indians on a tributary of the Amazon River. My grandmother would read long letters about her adventures written on paper as thin as the peel of an onion. It was through the stories written in those letters I began to learn what it looks like to trust the Lord.

While with the Indians Aunt Sally's baby,Margret,developed cerebral malaria. In an effort to save her baby's life she needed to get her to Belem. The only way to get there was by canoe. Holding her feverish baby in a canoe on a tributary of the Amazon River she was invited by God to a deeper level of trust. She was reminded of these words,"Never doubt in the dark what God has revealed in the light."

While in Belem she received two letters from Margret's grandmothers. Each grandmother told how they had been awaken in the middle of the night with an urgent need to pray for Margret. In retrospect Aunt Sally realized they were praying at the very time Margret's fever was raging.

Trust in the Lord is not perfected in times of ease. It is perfected when the way is hidden from us. When we choose to trust God with all our hearts even when He takes us or those we love on paths we do not understand.

When you are a child the direction of your life is dictated by adults who have authority over you. My childhood perspective was that one day I would be in charge of my own destiny and like my Aunt Sally. I would chart my own course. But what I learned from the letters written on onion skin paper is that our life is directed by the Lord when we trust him with all our hearts.

Lord Jesus, thank you for the example of those who have gone before me who taught me by their lives what it looks like to trust you. A grandmother who trusted you to direct the lives of her daughter and granddaughter in a foreign land. A young mother who chose not to doubt in the dark what you revealed in the light. Oh Lord, let my life be an example of one who trusts in you not leaning on my own understanding. Truely my path is hidden from me but not from you,therefore,let me trust you with my whole heart