Jeri's Journal

Have you ever read the verses in Luke 12 that address our tendency to worry? One of the encouragements given in verse 6 is that not one single sparrow is forgotten by God. Verse 7 then goes on to tells us that even the very hairs on our heads are numbered by Him. It is amazing to think about the extent of God’s ability to know and even care about the minute details of our lives, isn’t it?

These verses have often presented a problem to me in a very literal sense. I have struggled with thyroid problems for most of my life, which has resulted in several periods where I have struggled against exhaustion; and to make it worse, my hair would fall out! It has often distressed me to no end as I helplessly watched my hair fill the sink and grow visibly thinner. During those times, I have often thought about the fact that God knew the number of hairs on my head (and in the sink, for that matter)! How in the world could I wrap my head around such truths in the midst of the fallout?

The idea that He knew was somewhat of a comfort, but the why of what I was experiencing in reality would often leave me doubting that He really cared. Isaiah 40, verses 27 and 28 cut to the chase: “Why do you say, O Jacob, and complain, O Israel, ‘My way is hidden from the Lord; my cause is disregarded by my God?’ Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.” Then, the passage opens up into some of the most encouraging verses in all of Scripture: “He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.” The key to these promises is in verse 31: “…but those who hope in the Lord.”

How meaningful is hope when every day is a good hair day—when distress is only a far-away, abstract thought and when our own strength sustains us? What value would we place, then, on soaring and running and walking in the Lord’s strength? My bad-hair-days have become less frequent, largely owing to the fact that my hair has gone gray (nobody’s business, thanks to L’Oreal)! The gray hairs—wavy and full of body—have gradually replaced my thin, straight hair. Just as those lost hairs have been restored, the Lord has always met me in life’s trials, strengthening me, encouraging me and helping me to keep walking—even when my brush was full and it seemed like all was lost.

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