Going back to school in a pandemic brings up all the feels, doesn’t it? Uncertain, weary, sad, hopeful, scared, excited, overwhelmed…simultaneously. We bravely want to transition well for our kids and health of all. On top of this, we continue to live with our financial, relational, and health challenges. We feel helpless and hopelessness looms. We agonize for the Lord’s help and hope.
Maybe as we emotionally look forward, we need to look backward as the Israelites did. In Deuteronomy 26, they actively remember the way the Lord brought them out of Egypt into the Promised Land and respond with worship and rejoicing. Could this be His method of help and hope in today’s challenges?
Look to His past help
In I Samuel 7:12, Samuel raises up an Ebenezer or Stone of Help, saying “Till now the Lord has helped us.” In the Hebrew, “help” includes words like “surround, protect, aid, especially in times of hardship or stress.”
What has He provided to you in your past times of hardship and stress? What has He done for you in the person and work of Christ, by His lavish grace and love? Let’s ponder that and then enter a praise interruption!
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy great help I’ve come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wandering from the fold of God;
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed His precious blood.
Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing (Robinson, R., 1758)
Sing of your living hope in Christ
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever (Heb. 13:8 ESV).
Come, Thou Fount of every blessing;
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Look forward, grounded in your hope in Christ
Oh, to grace how great a debtor
daily I’m constrained to be;
Let that grace now, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander —Lord, I feel it—
prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, oh, take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above;
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
mount of God’s unchanging love.
The Lord is my help and my hope
With overflowing grace and everlasting love, the Lord helped us yesterday, He is helping us today, and He promises to help us forever. We have Christ’s hope and the presence of the Holy Spirit, our Helper.
Will you join me in continually raising our Ebenezer, remembering his past help? Let’s set our hope fully on His assured grace of the gospel together, beloved in Christ!
Will you join me in praising Him when emotions threaten our hope? I am creating YouTube playlists for us to sing aloud with intention! Using my music therapy, music education, and church music director understanding, I’m praying these playlists become powerful gospel-centered tools to edify and encourage us as we set our hope on Jesus Christ, our living hope. Sign up here to receive the blog writing and weekly playlists in your email!
