Disability and snow    

The snow makes everything look so beautiful, but it can’t get rid of the brokenness. What a delight to have the day off school, but how hard when you can’t go outside to enjoy the snow because you have a disability.  You can see and hear others throwing snowballs, sledging, making snowmen and having fun, but you can’t join in.  What pain hides under the surface beauty.

On Sunday evening we sang the words from Psalm 13 “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?”  There are times when we may feel forgotten by God, we wonder how long it will go on.  As we sing this beautiful Psalm we can be reassured that our Saviour knew and experienced these words.  He was surrounded by brokenness, faced intense temptation, hostile unbelief, betrayal, abandonment and even silence from heaven as he faced the darkest hour.  Yet, wonderfully God heard his prayer “Consider and answer me, O LORD my God, light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death.” He did sleep the sleep of death for us, but God raised him from the grave, and he then rejoiced in God’s salvation (Psalm 13:5). 

The salvation Jesus achieved includes our rescue.  Rescue from our rebellion against God, washed to be whiter than snow, and one day rescue from all our trials, and new bodies that will get to enjoy His new creation without limits.

The Psalm that began “How long O LORD?” ends with “I will sing to the LORD because he has dealt bountifully with me.”   The Psalmist’s circumstances have not changed, but his perspective has.  As we look up beyond the snow capped hills to the Lord who created them, we too can rejoice, and trust in His steadfast love. Our rejoicing now is dampened by the brokenness, but how good it will be on that day when the LORD makes all things new.

“The eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy” (Isaiah 35:5-6)