Trouble is not shy, so it has no problem announcing itself loudly. It's like an aggravating visitor that doesn’t knock. It barges in uninvited and then tries to take over.
I'm sure you know what this looks like. It's when bills stack up or a diagnoses changes your life. Or maybe trouble fractures your relationships.
The psalmist writing Psalm 34 would understand all that. He doesn't pretend trouble isn’t real. Instead, he says, “This poor soul cried and was heard by the Lord and was saved from every trouble." I'm sure you noticed that he didn't say trouble didn’t come. What he said was that trouble didn’t get the best of him.
There’s a difference between trouble showing up and trouble taking control. One is unavoidable. The other is a surrender we don't have to make.
The psalmist writes as someone who knew fear in his bones. He had enemies, uncertainty, and moments where making it through every day felt like a daily miracle. And yet, he cries out as an act of trust. The cry is part trust in God's goodness and part refusal to let trouble define him.
We often assume peace means the absence of conflict. Scripture suggests something else. That peace is the presence of God within conflict. God doesn’t always remove the storm immediately, but God does anchor us so the storm doesn’t carry us away. Trouble may speak loudly, but it is not sovereign. God is.
You don’t have to manage everything before you cry out. You don’t have to tidy up your faith or sound confident. You can come poor in spirit, honest, and exhausted, and still be heard. Still be held. Still be delivered. Maybe not from the situation, but certainly from its power over your soul.
Trouble may come to you. That much is almost guaranteed. But control belongs to God.
Stay blessed...john
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