Caught

Many years ago, when my youngest son was a toddler, he fell down the stairs. The stairway was a short one, only seven steps, but a long and dangerous enough way for a little one. When it happened, I was standing at the bottom talking to someone with my back turned but, as he teetered over the edge, I turned around just in time to see him, reached out both arms, and scooped him up in mid-air, before he had a chance to hurt himself. I have thought of this often since then, as an allegory for my relationship to You, and am thinking about it again today.

Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?--Psalm 139:6

Listen to me, O house of Jacob, all you who remain in the house of Israel, you whom I have upheld since your were conceived, and have carried you since your birth.--Isaiah 46:3

You have carried me since my birth, and even before. You, who are mighty, created me, and before I was flesh, created the idea of me. You, who know the end from the beginning, declared men good, and watched as our ruin unfolded, carry us as children and catch us before we hit bottom.

Remember the former things, the things from long ago. I am God and there is no other. I am God and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times what is still to come. I say, my purpose will stand and I will do all that I please.--Isaiah 46:9-10

Yes, you catch me. In fact you have always caught me, still catch me, will always catch me. I am simultaneously falling through mid-air and lying safe in your arms because time, the linear progression of events, occurs for me but not for You. You live in eternity, where time has no meaning, where events exist side-by-side, all equally in the present. You have always created. You have always declared yourself God. You have always provided rescue. You always return in glory. The beginning and the end occur simultaneous in Your sight.

This is one of the ways I know You are God. Your timelessness is incomprehensible to me. For me, life unfolds, but for You, it is always full present as seed, as emergent plant, in bud, in full-blown flower, and as withered remains. I sometimes express this as faithfulness, but this concept infers that you wait for some event, then act. For You, the precursor, the event, Your action, and its result occur at once without beginning or end. In reality, Your actions, from before creation until after your return full of glory, exist eternally beside all Your deeds through what we know as history, above, around, and through time. You will do all you please because You have already done it.

This is how I can rest in You. My future already exists in Your hands. For good or ill, You already know it, have worked it into your plan. Since You either will or allow all events, You surround me like air. You not only catch, but propel. I can close my eyes, pretend You are not there, and leap into the frightful darkness, but why? You own that wilderness, too. I am never outside your sovereign power.

Yes, I am caught, caught in the only place I can rest.