Wings Like A Dove

Wings like a Dove

Please listen and answer me, for I am overwhelmed by my troubles. . . . Oh, that I had wings like a dove; then I would fly away and rest! Psalm 55:2, 6

At some point each of us has troubles so overwhelming, so burdensome and heavy, that we, like the psalmist, wish we had wings and could fly away and rest. The burden that drags us down may be an impossible schedule or strain and turmoil in our marriage. Maybe a dear, prickly teenager is acting out and driving us crazy instead of cooperating. Perhaps our job keeps us up late at night with extra paperwork, or we worry about losing our job entirely through downsizing. We may imagine a getaway place far from stress and problems. Perhaps we dream of a dramatic turnaround in pressing situations so we won’t have to be anxious anymore. We long to escape from the difficulty so we can rest and recover. But God offers a kind of rest different from what our minds would conceive—a rest in the midst of our distress. It is the only true rest—an inner rest that comes from abandoning ourselves to the Lord and entrusting to him whatever troubles or problems overwhelm us.

Instead of trying to fly away from your situation, I encourage you to run straight into the arms of God, where you can rest in his care and love for you today. Know that he keeps whatever you entrust to him and that he will faithfully weave all the pieces into a pattern that is good and thus reveal his power to the watching world. —CHERI

O Lord, I want my problems solved and my troubles removed, but from beneath the crushing weight of this burden, I lift my eyes to you. I entrust this perplexity to you. Enable me to find my rest in you, to discover a place of deeper abandonment and peaceful security in your everlasting love. You are my only rock. You are my only rest.

How shall we rest in God? By giving ourselves wholly to him.

—JEAN NICOLAS GROU (1731–1803), JESUIT WRITER