Pastor Don Schatz

Hope for the Soul

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

“Why are you downcast, O my soul?  Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.”
Psalm 44:5 New International Version

My dear wife died November 2020.  Due to restrictions relating to the pandemic and distance that separates us as a family, we were finally able to all be together this past Thanksgiving.  We gathered the day after for her Interment.  It is a strange thing to preside at your own spouse’s Interment.    We had a bouquet of red roses, her favorite flower.

One week later, I returned with a bouquet of another favorite flower—daisies.  To my surprise, after a very soggy Pacific Northwest week, the roses still looked great.

We have a wonderful God.  He gives us little reminders of the freshness of our life, even in and through death.  I can tell you my soul has been downcast more than once this past year.  Disturbed even, especially those first few months.  How faithful God is.  What a treasure his Word is.  Faith is sustained through the Word of God, feeding on it as food for the soul.  I had lots of reasons to be downcast.

Yet.  Sometimes it’s the little things.  For me, it is often the little words in Scripture that capture my attention.  Yet.  I will yet praise him.  Because my hope is in him.  By his grace, that yet is already now!

The fresh flowers remind me that my wife is ‘already yet’ praising her Savior and God.  And ‘already yet’ I join her.  I know it’s January but look at a flower today.  Draw one if you have to.  Will you hope in our Savior and God with me?  Yet!

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado