The Gift of Everlasting Comfort
Years ago, when I was just becoming a believer, my son Chad, who was 18 years old at the time, started using drugs.
At one point, Chad disappeared for a month. He happened to leave me a message in the middle of that month, saying, “Mom, I’m okay. I’m coming home tomorrow,” but tomorrow came, and my son did not come home.
I frequently woke up in the middle of the night with a sense of anxiety for my son. I would listen to the voicemail again and tell myself that he was okay and go back to sleep because it gave me temporary comfort. But one day, it didn’t work. I’d listened to it three times, and in a moment of absolute anxiety, I almost ran out the door in my pajamas, looking for my son. Just as I got to the door, I realized, “Where am I going to go? I don’t know where he is!” I fell right there in front of the door and sobbed for my son. As I picked up my head, the light from the street shone through our front door’s window, and on my kitchen cabinet was a perfect cross of light.
That got me thinking of God, and in my heart, I sensed God telling me, “I have him. I love him more than you do. I know where he is. Give him to me. Trust me with your pain.”
At that moment, I surrendered.
I said, “God, okay. You know where he is. Be with him. Protect my son.” At that moment, I felt a sense of comfort. It was a lasting comfort.
For seven years, my son struggled with drugs, but through that time, I had peace in my heart that God had him even when I did not know if he would ever recover. That comfort lasted. Today my son is drug-free, is a believer, a father of two beautiful sons, and is doing great. I didn’t know that would happen, and it didn’t have to end this way for that comfort to last for me.
I still have comfort because I now understand that God loves my family and friends more than I do. In any challenging moment, I can choose to go towards false comfort, or I can choose to accept God’s comfort given to me long ago.
I am not the one who’s going to solve all the world’s problems. God is. This gives me reason to rejoice.
In Romans 8:31, Paul says, “What, then, are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us?”
“Shout for joy, you heavens! Earth, rejoice! Mountain break into joyful shouts! For the LORD has comforted his people, and will have compassion on his afflicted ones.” Isaiah 49:13
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