Safety In Tough Times: More Value Than Many Sparrows
Two baby birds living on our front porch fell from their nest and I worried for their safety. When a large thunderstorm unexpectedly hit our area, my worry only increased: Would the birds drown in a puddle? Would a cat get them? Would they find safety in tough times outside of their nest?
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Early the next morning, as I walked to my car on the way to work, I was unable to see the birds anywhere. Tears fell down my cheeks as I whispered the likely truth: “They are lost in the storm.“
Going through a personal storm of my own, my emotions were running particularly high that morning. The tears only increased as I put the car in reverse, then pulled out of the driveway.
Safety in Tough Times
Suddenly, something caught my eye. It was the two little birds dancing gaily on the sidewalk by our rosemary plant. “They survived the storm!” I cried out, through a mixture of laughter and tears.
“And so will you,” came an unexpected voice, silent but sure.
Little did I know that the calm for my storm lay just around the corner, that God would no sooner forget about me than He would a sparrow.
Life’s storms will not always end quickly. Some are less like brief thunderstorms and more like lengthy hurricanes that wreck tremendous temporary havoc, but with Christ by our side, all things will ultimately “be made new” (2 Cor 5:17).
Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.
Matthew 10:29-31 KJV
Encouraging Quotes and Books
Wilbur Wright
“No bird soars in a calm.”
Read about Wilber’s adventure with flying in David McCullough’s popular book, The Wright Brothers.
Virgil
“Take heart again; put your dismal fears away. One day, who knows? Even these hardships will be grand things to look back on.”
Unknown
“The greater the difficulty, the greater the glory.”
Russell M. Nelson
“Turbulent times are opportunities for us to thrive spiritually. ” (October 2020 Women’s Session)
Epictetus
“The trials you face will introduce you to your strengths.”
Read Art of Living: The Classical Manual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness by Epictetus
Orson F. Whitney
“No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, and humility…
“All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially as we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God…
“It is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we were meant to acquire.”
G.K. Chesterton
“And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without the rain, there would be no rainbow.”
Read G. K. Chesterton’s Spiritual Classics Collection: Orthodoxy, Heretics, The Everlasting Man
Stephen J. Bahr
“Great blessings come when the faithful endure adversity.” (BYU S speech, “Going Forward With Faith During Difficult Times”, 2009
Winston Churchill
“The darkest moments often lead to the brightest eventual victories.”
Thomas S. Monson
“There are times when we will experience heartbreaking sorrow, when we will grieve, and when we may be tested to our limits. However, such difficulties allow us to change for the better, to rebuild our lives in the way our Heavenly Father teaches us, and to become something different from what we were—better than we were, more empathetic than we were, with stronger testimonies than we had before.”
Read Churchill: Walking with Destiny by Andrew Roberts
The Ultimate Safety in Tough Times
In conclusion, let us keep our eyes on God, and on our Savior, Jesus Christ, as we weather the storms of life. For in Them is where the ultimate safety in tough times is found.
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Poetry
IF
by Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
Conclusion
If you are going through tough times, take heart. You are never alone and are more loved than you know.
Art Credit: John Gould
