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  • Writer's pictureKelly

Seeing things...

Updated: Mar 27, 2020

Global health crisis. Coronavirus. Pandemic. Covid-19. Whatever. Call it what you will. It has hit us — and hit us hard, like a thief in the night. It snuck up on us and just robbed us clean, stealing our social lives, our community, and our toilet paper.

And, as I consider the things that have been stolen away, the thing I notice the most – and, in fact, the thing that I grieve the most – is our freedom. We have lost that precious human right to walk through our days making our own choices; now, we are being told where not to be and where we can go – and how many people to take with us when we go there. I get it, but I also find it to be pretty 1984/Big Brother-ish. Sigh.

That’s on the exterior. On the inside, like everyone else, I am trying to find ways to cope with this weird anxiety created by an unseen enemy, and, as I fight as we fight we see clearly what all OCD hand-washers have known all along. Finally, we get them because, now, we are them. We all feel as if our hands can never be washed enough or be clean enough. We’re washing our palms and digits… All. The. Stinkin'. Time.

I am reminded of a dear friend of mine who has faced many hard, scary challenges in her life – challenges that would shatter faith for most of us. She has, somehow, held fast to God, and she has been able to do that – as she has told me so often – by reminding herself that “God is in the details.”

And so, as I am facing all the losses lately – all the frustrations, all the cancellations, and all the blasted Zoom meetings – I remember these holy words: “God is in the details.” I remember them, and I try to look for the sacred in the smallest of ways.

And, if I’m really careful, I can see it… I can see it when I spend time with the mama cardinal bird who greets me each day at dawn as she does her morning calisthenics, jumping from branch to branch.

And I feel it when I hear a 20-something tell me that she and her sister stood in the grocery store aisle and phoned stores all over town to help an elderly lady know where to go to find what she needed.

And I recognize it profoundly when a quiet, shy healthcare worker volunteers to visit the sick because he has easy access to the hospital.


And I grasp it entirely during evening walks – which are now daily rituals – with the two exceedingly non-take-a-walk-with-mom-type teenage boys at my house.

And I, for sure, recognize it deep down to my bones when I find a nine-pack of toilet paper secretly gifted to me by a dear, dear friend.

Even more than all of that, I know God is in the details when I see how his Kingdom isn’t shrinking in the midst of fear and disease – when I see worship continue, when I see inspired ministry continue, and when I see people with enormous hearts care and love and work, regardless of the obstacles, to make this world more like the other side of Heaven.


Many of you have heard me pray, and you might have noticed that, each time I pray off the cuff, I say to God, “Show me/us how you are at work in the midst” of whatever I’m praying about. (If I pray out loud and don’t say it on some rare occasion, please know that it’s implied.)

And so, as we face this crazy time in our history, I challenge you to look for yourself: How is God at work in the midst of your world? What details do you see him in clearly? Because he’s there if we will only pay attention.


Y'all stay safe out there...

“God blesses those whose hearts are pure, for they will see God.”

Matthew 5:8 (NLT)

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