Some years ago I went through a very difficult time. I felt as if the very foundations on which I had built my security and identity were crumbling away. In my desperation I reached out to things that I thought would help me, only to find that they sank with me. In the end I discovered the truth of some words written by King David in the Old Testament. He had learned in his youth as a shepherd boy that with God on his side he was able to withstand attacks from lions and bears, and it stood him in good stead for the trials that were to come. In one of his psalms he asks, ‘When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?’ The answer comes immediately, ‘The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lord is on his heavenly throne.’ In other words when the bottom seems to be falling out of your world, you can be sure that God is still God and will be there for you if you look to him.
And so I survived that most painful season of my life by choosing to believe that God is God, and that if I trust in him he will never let me down.