Wilbur fainted away.1
As the crickets lament the passing of summer, melancholy settles over the farm. Mrs. Zuckerman, the crickets, Wilbur, and the maple tree all sense an angst of changing seasons moving from warm to cold, easy to structured.
Change can rouse up anxiety. It also nests in that sense of inadequacy, as when Wilbur hears that big Uncle won the blue ribbon. Webster’s defines anxiety as “an apprehensive uneasiness or nervousness usually over an impending or anticipated ill” or “an abnormal and overwhelming sense of apprehension and fear often marked by physical signs, by doubt concerning the reality and nature of the threat, and by self-doubt about one’s capacity to cope with it.”
God’s promise is that His grace is enough: “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness’” (2 Cor. 12:9). And we know His presence is always with us, that He will never leave us nor forsake us (Heb. 13:5). Focusing on God’s greatness and presence will bring peace.
The sky in its power of cloud and wind, the ocean in its agitation, the towering mountains in their hues of blue and green and brown—all these are but mere shadows of God’s greatness. The lion’s majesty, the whale’s colossal size, man’s unstoppable technology are less than a midget aphid compared to God’s all- encompassing Being. As He is the passport to everything good and eternal, we can confidently put our hope and trust in Him.
God calls us to cast all our anxieties onto His immense shoulders (see Isa. 9:6), for they uphold not only our own lives, but the government of the entire world with its changing fortunes and power structures and the unreliability of human bonds. To Him we must cling as our anchor in life, our peace in death, our hope for eternity.
Prayer: Help me to fix my eyes on You. I acknowledge You to be my faithful partner in life. I ask that peace, not anxiety, will rule my heart (Phil. 4:6–7).
Amanda Chambers
Owner, Alabaster's Ink Well