by Pastor Douglas Brauner

Making It to the Other Side

By the time you read this devotion, I will have undergone a back fusion. However, at this moment, the operation is still a week away.

This crosswalk speaks to me as I anticipate this surgery, a surgery that is a long time in coming. I’m standing looking across to the other side and wondering if I really want to set foot in the crosswalk and travel to the other side.

I know what this side of the crosswalk is like. I know that if I take certain pills and stretch on a regular basis the pain will not be as bad as it could be, but it will not go away.

I don’t know if the surgery will be successful. I don’t know if I will be better or worse on the other side of the operating table. Nobody can guarantee me it will be 100% successful.

The crosswalk itself is a picture of the operation. I must pass over the procedure to get to the other side and begin this new adventure. I must once again enter the operating room and go to sleep only to wake up in recovery and say something amazing like, “Have you started yet?” (Yes, I said that one time.)

I have taken great comfort in this passage from the psalms:

“My help comes from Yahweh [the Lord], the Maker of heaven and earth.”
Psalm 121:2

I like to use the name God gave himself when it’s written in the psalms. “The Lord” doesn’t sound like a name. Yahweh is personal. He is the Great He Is. The Great He Is will be with me no matter how the surgery goes. Yahweh is the God who made all things and holds them together. Is it too small of thing that he would be with me?

I am confident of his presence because he is the Great He Is who is with me to the end of the ages in Jesus.

It will be interesting when I read this devotion today, July 24, ten days after my surgery and reflect on how he was with me.

Copyright Family of Christ Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado