Christian recording artist and song writer Laura Story knows what it means to suffer. Shortly after she was married, her husband kept falling asleep. Doctors could not figure out why. Then came the meaningless well-wishers; some said he was lazy and she should divorce him. Others said they should commit to less. Eventually, the doctors found out the real cause: her husband had a brain tumor.
Perhaps because of this, Laura Story wrote this song: Blessings which has over 43 million hits on Spotify alone.
We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
And all the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love is way too much to give us lesser things
Is it any wonder that even Christians are unhappy simply because we settle for less? Peace, family, a mate, a steady job, health, but for Jesus, those are the lesser things.
‘Cause what if your blessings come through raindrops?
What if Your healing comes through tears?
What if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near?
And what if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise?
When was the last time when you cried? Really cried? Despite all my trips to the dentist and oral surgeons in 2019 and early 2020 after I fractured my molar, I never cried. It wasn’t a case of “Men don’t cry.” Yet, there is something cathartic and healing when we cry. It is a way to release the sorrow and hurt. I’ve cried over the death of Christian martyrs and yes even for my own brokenness and sin. There are nights when I could not sleep because of my sin and conscience were at war. The healing came when I clung to God’s mercy.
We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
And we cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt Your goodness, we doubt Your love
As if every promise from Your Word is not enough
And all the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we’d have faith to believe
Isn’t that what we Christians want the most? More than earthly blessings? To hear God’s voice and to know He is near? We declare Him as Immanuel at Christmas – God is near, but what about the other 11 months of the year? You might have heard this quote: “I seek the Giver, not just the gifts.” If so, the Giver can be hard to find at times.
When friends betray us
And when darkness seems to win
We know that pain reminds this heart
That this is not, this is not our home
It’s not our home
What if my greatest disappointments
Or the aching of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy
And what if trials of this life
The rain, the storms, the hardest nights
Are Your mercies in disguise?
The great Christian apologist C.S. Lewis wrote: “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.” Ms. Story must have this quote in mind when she penned these two stanzas. Pain or pleasure, it does not matter in this world since Christians were meant for heaven. We have an upward call, not just terms of higher morals, but a desire to be with Jesus face to face one day.
When I think about my job insecurities for the last two years, I often despair over my ability to pay the bills and have food on the table. I despair to think that I have hit a rut in the career path and there is no turning back, no chance to adjust course.
This is when I put this song on repeat on Spotify and listen to it several times and remind myself of the key truths: 1) There will be pain and suffering in this life; 2) this is when God draws near. 3) God then reorients me again: his Kingdom, now and not yet.
I leave with another Lewis quote: “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.“
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