Following in "Dark Disasters"

You may notice that I changed song quotes in the intro to this blog. Or not. :-) Either way....it's a Selah song I've liked for a long while. It's interesting how the circumstances of our lives can affect the way we hear or interpret things like songs, stories, email or scripture. Our situation can cause things to jump out that we might have otherwise glossed over. It was like that with this song. I heard it in the car the other day....and I wondered, "Do I do that? Am I doing that? CAN I do that?"
I have always found praise come easily in the "green pastures" of life--a sunny day, cooperating kids, the checkbook balancing the first time around. The simple pleasures that make life run more smoothly. What about during the valleys...the storms...the "dark disasters?" These past six months (it still hurts to even type that) have definitely been that; a disaster for sure, more so than anything I have previously endured in this life. Dark. What an appropriate word. Dark, because one of the little people who lit our lives so well is now gone. Dark because it can be all-consuming, like grief. And dark, because it leaves me feeling more than a little lost. Yet there are still so many things to be thankful for. Can I still praise God in this dark place? I can.
Why? Because as the song and so many more Psalms so aptly say He is worthy. When I'm not feeling overly thankful, when I can't find much light in my world that moment, when to me there is no other reason, He is holy, and He is worthy. How can I praise Him? Not on my own....that's for sure. On too many occasions I have been called all kinds of things (like strong) that on my own I am not. But "Because You are my help, I sing in the shadow of Your wings. My soul clings to You; Your right hand upholds me." (Psalm 64:7-8) That's how. Any praise from me, anything good, comes from under the shadow of His wings, where His hands hold me. I can follow during life's storms "because He is my help." From the "shadow of His wing" I can praise, because therein lie comfort, strength, peace, and HOPE...