The fog had been lingering over the valley for what felt like an eternity. We woke up and fell asleep over and over to the same shade of gray on those cold winter days. When the fog first descended, I fully embraced the mystery of it. It felt romantic and spooky and maybe even a little bit dangerous. You didn’t know what was just beyond that hill or around that corner. As I drove to school, the kids would play a game of trying to see who could spot the building first as its shadowy outline slowly emerged. The trees looked ghostly with their branches outstretched like arms reaching toward us. For a time, I loved the coziness of it all. It felt like the perfect excuse to have another cup of coffee and stay in my sweats for as long as possible. But then it stopped being so fun. I’m pretty sure that the moment it stopped being fun is the day when we found out that we were experiencing something known as a temperature inversion. Along the coastline and up into the mountains they were enjoying beautiful sunny days. But where we live, the inversion was causing the fog to linger over us, wrapping around the valley like a very cold, damp blanket.
By the time I heard about this inversion and the glorious sunshine others were experiencing, the fog no longer felt mysterious and romantic. It just felt oppressive. Why should they be getting sunshine when I could barely see ten feet in front of me? It got so that I was no longer certain if my mood reflected the weather or if the weather reflected my mood. I began to wonder if the fog would ever leave. When would I get to feel the warmth of the sun on my face? Should I find a way out of it? Get in my car and drive to wherever the weatherman reported a sunshine sighting? But my life was here in this fog. No matter how much I wanted to escape it, I had to go on living in the fog.
Maybe the fog is actually where God does His best work on me. Because it’s there, with everything else faded away, that I’m able to see Him more clearly.
I do not do well living in the foggy seasons of life. I want to know what’s ahead of me and I really don’t like change. My husband would probably say that is a gross understatement. And he would be right! In my relationship with God, this has been and continues to be one of my biggest struggles. There have been so many times when I felt like I had a big question mark hanging over my head, following me around wherever I go. So often, the circumstances of my life leave me longing to see what is around that corner or over that hill, and yet I find myself completely hemmed in by the clouds. So many times my life has felt foggy. I know in my head that there is sunshine just beyond it and yet, in my heart, all I feel is the awareness of my inability to get out of the fog. But in life there is so much that remains a mystery. There are times when we are oppressed. There are times when we don’t get the answers we are longing for. There are times when we wonder if we will ever see clear skies again. And I believe that many times the fog is exactly where God wants me to be.
Is it enough for me to know that while I am in the fog, God is in control? Would I still trust Him even if I didn’t know that there was sunshine elsewhere? Can I stay with Him here, in the fog? Second Corinthians 4:16–18 says,
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. (ESV)
I’d like to get to the point in my faith where I’m not always looking for the easiest way out of the fog. If I could begin to embrace the transient nature of the things in my life that are seen and look beyond them to the unseen, then perhaps I would be more willing to embrace the times when life feels foggy. My past experiences have actually shown me it is in the darkness that I feel the closest to the Lord. I call out to Him out of desperation and He meets me in that moment and offers me peace and comfort. And then I can look past the fog, past what is visible right in front of me, and see beyond it to the sunshine that I cannot see but that I know is there. Maybe the fog is actually where God does His best work on me. Because it’s there, with everything else faded away, that I’m able to see Him more clearly. And see myself through His eyes. It’s as though I see myself sitting with Him in a field and all around us is fog but there, in that little space with just the two of us, just me and my God, there is sunshine.
There did finally come a day when the fog lifted. Granted, we traded it for rain. But there have also been pockets of sunshine. And with them comes the reminder that solid faith, trusting faith, doesn’t shift according to the weather. It may be challenged by the storms of sorrow or send us soaring into the blue sky of happiness. But if we believe that the Lord is sovereign over it all, we have the assurance of His never-failing love. The kind of love that can break through any weather pattern.