Footprints

Fear not, for I am with you.

Isaiah 43:5

While stranded on a deserted island, Daniel Defoe’s character Robinson Crusoe salvaged a Bible from the shipwreck, read it, and was converted. He grew into a devout Christian. His life, though missing human companionship, was peaceful and prayerful.

But one day he found a footprint in the sand and realized he wasn’t alone. Knowing the cannibalism of the local tribes, he grew into a fearful man, looking over his shoulder with every step. He no longer slept peacefully. He altered his habits. He visualized himself being captured and devoured. “That former confidence in God . . . now vanished, as if He that had fed me by miracle hitherto could not preserve, by His power, the provision which He had made for me by His goodness.”

Crusoe had to go back to his Bible, repent of anxiety, and be strengthened again in his faith. He eventually learned the great lesson of faltering Christians: the things we most fear are likely, in the providence of God, to be most used for our good. In the end, those footprints led to his deliverance.

God has planned out our future from eternity past and guaranteed it with His promises. We can trust Him.