The Tide

Probably the best book that I have read during my grief process is a book called All Things Are Possible Through Prayer by Charles Allen. Chapter 8 is called "The Tide Will Come In". I have read this particular chapter many times since Addison's death and have found great comfort in it.

A month after Addison's death, my family decided to take our annual trip to Destin, Florida. We needed the get away as a family and the normalcy of it. Most of that week I spent sitting on the beach gazing at the ocean. The ocean and all its mass. My grief was so new at that time and I found comfort by looking at something so enormous and something so much larger than my grief. The idea that you get while gazing at it is that God is larger than that ocean. He made that ocean and He can command it. When you are staring at something so large it is almost overwhelming to think about. But in my experience it was comforting.

Months after our beach trip, I found the book referenced above. In reading Chapter 8 of it I found much comfort and still do. It parallels low and high tides with times in our lives. When the tide is low we, like a large boat, cannot move forward nor back with ease. The low tide blocks us from moving on, like a boat stuck on a sandbar.

My very lowest tide has been grief. Grief makes you feel stuck because the tide is so low there is nowhere you can go. But what Allen writes is "If the tide is low, there are times when all we can do is wait for the tide to come in." I found that statement brilliant. Grief is eased by time, it is a healer, albeit a slow one. But if you watch the ocean you see that the tide always comes in. At our lowest points in life, whether it is death, job loss, or any situation you have to remember the high tide will eventually come in and your boat will have enough water to move off of that sandbar. We have to learn to wait with patience. Wait for the high tide to come in. And as Allen sums up Chapter 8, "But in the waiting, we are certain the tide will rise, and because of that certainty we have faith and hope."

Wait for the tide to come in. God will bring it. Time and God will bring the tide and you will be able to move forward and sail your ship wherever He points it. Psalm 55:22 Cast your cares on the Lord.

And I would like to add to verse 22 and wait for the tide.