Photo by Nicholas Barbaros
In our storms, God is with us. Though he doesn’t always calm the storm, he can calm us to be able to bear the storm.
Have you ever felt like a sailor lost at sea in the middle of a storm, like your life is chaotic and frightening and lonely? I certainly have. In the article “Peace, Be Still: Calming Our Storms,” Brother Stephen Turcotte illustrates that even though God has the power to calm the storms of our lives, sometimes he calms us, the “sailors,” instead.
When I was 11 years old, one of my aunts was rushed back to the hospital just a few days after she gave birth. I wasn’t that worried about her: she was young, just 33 years old, and this was her third baby. Besides, she was the most perfect person I’d ever met; nothing bad could happen to her! Still, as the days went by and she didn’t come home, my extended family and other members of our church began to fast and pray for her. Surely God would see the situation and intervene!
After a week in the hospital, my aunt passed away. My extended family was devastated. I was so confused about how God could have allowed this to happen—didn’t he hear our prayers?
In our situation, God didn’t take away the storm; he didn’t keep my aunt from passing. But that doesn’t mean that he was absent in the midst of that fierce storm. Rather than calming the storm, he strengthened us during that difficult time. My family learned to trust God and rely on our belief that we would see my aunt again. We were comforted, and that was enough.
To learn more about how God can calm your storms, read “Peace, Be Still: Calming Our Storms” by Stephen Turcotte.
Source: Liahona
—Susanna Bergeson, Latter-day Saint Insights
FEATURE IMAGE BY KELI BLACK
Find more insights
To learn more about enduring difficulties, read “Stormy Days and Mountain Waves: Finding Strength,” a Latter-day Saint Insight article by Ashlyn Pells.