I’ll never forget the first real conversation I had with one of our newest participants. We were in the Walmart parking lot waiting for her peers to finish with their shopping. She had been really leaning in to our Christ-centered programming and asking a lot of faith questions. She was a deep thinker and wanted to experience God in a way that was more tangible than cognition. During this particular conversation, we were discussing God’s omnipresence and I explained, “We, as humans, can only be in one place at one time because we have physical bodies that limit us. But God is not limited to time and space. He is fully here now, in the present, and He is fully in the future, and He is fully in the past, with you in your trauma, right now, working those things for good.”
Tears sprang to her eyes and she said, “I don’t know what just happened, but what you said struck a chord in me and something within me feels like it’s saying ‘YES!’” And I immediately thought of Romans 8:15 and excitedly said, “That’s the spirit within you!” Romans 8:15 says “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons and daughters, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” In that moment, in a now sacred place in the Walmart parking lot, I believe this woman felt the relationship between the Spirit within her and the Father who loves her and is for her. I believe she felt the Spirit cry out “Abba! Father!” in her heart.
She settled into the back seat when the others returned and opened a book that she brought along to read. And wouldn’t you know it, she opened up to a page that stated almost word for word what I had just said about God and his dynamics with space and time. She took that “coincidence” as even more confirmation of what she had just experienced and was elated to get that confirmation so quickly. I was elated with her - based on her experiences, she needed to know that she had a Father who was with her in her darkest hour and is working it all for good. She needed to know that she had a Father who protects and adores her. She needed to know that she could hope for a better tomorrow. So in His own mysterious way, God told her.
“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28
No matter who you are, all of these truths from Scripture are true for you too. If you love God and have been called according to His purpose, He is fully present in your darkest hour, whether you are in that dark hour right now or walked through it in the past or maybe it’s yet to come, and He is working all things for good.
By: Kelly Butcher
Care Coach and Development Assistant
