Immovable as Mount Zion

by Katherine Carberry

Most days, there isn’t much else I can hold to besides the trustworthiness of God. He is what remains solid when everything else cracks, or even dissolves in my grasp. I read in my devotional this morning that the ones who trust in the Lord “are like Mount Zion. It cannot be shaken; it remains forever. The mountains surround Jerusalem and the Lord surrounds his people, both now and forever.” (Psalm 125:1-2) The writer, Nancy Guthrie, reflecting on these verses, pointed out that those who trust in the Lord and Mount Zion share the same likelihood of collapse. Read: impossible.

How can this be? There’s a whole lot of crumbling going on wherever I look, so much that could and does go wrong for so many that I love, and for billions more I’ve never met. That’s because in the act of choosing to trust the Lord, I am actually trusting him who was shaken in my place. And, as Guthrie so stunningly observes, he is the one who experienced the removal of the Father’s surrounding presence so that I might be surrounded “both now and forever.” This reassurance I had heard before, but it’s the kind of old news that is still new—entirely fresh every day. Today, I drank it in like I had gone days without water.

I cannot presume to know the whys and the whens of all that we carry and all we will meet. But I can scan my life for the outlines of his kindness to me, and soon my eyes are drawn in to see the dimension and the color and the absolute wealth of it. There are smiles for today and laughs for tomorrow.

Jess Ray has a song called “Days to Come” that expresses what so many of us long for, based on that line in Proverbs 31 that says that the woman of noble character “can laugh at the time to come.” (v. 25) “It must be tiring/ Bracing yourself for everything/ Oh won’t you come and laugh with me,/ Laugh at the days to come?/ What if I told you that you’re standing/ On a rock when it’s raining/ You have a friend in the fire/ And a vision in the valley/ …I know that you hate to be surprised/ I can’t tell you that you won’t be caught off guard/ But I promise that you’ll never be alone/ And the end will always be good.”

How many of us feel weight and worry when we look ahead? This woman in Proverbs is so secure, she has the lightness of heart to be able to laugh. We are this secure, too. We have this friend, this promise, this absolute certainty—that whatever surprises may come, God is with us, and he is unsurprised. And the end of the story will be nothing but good.

I need this, because the days often leave me clinging. My parenting life is hard and I usually am feeling like I’m messing it all up, or completely alone in my family’s unique struggles, or just battling fears of what is to come for my children. But the Lord is the stability of my times, and also the times of my children. (Isaiah 33:6) I am not the stability, as much as I like to think of myself that way. It is a mercy to be brought to that place of feeling my sharp need, because that is where I get to receive the abundant supply of the Lord, who sees and knows our needs through and through.

And he surely does know. He knows what I need before I ask him. He knows the most earnest desires of my heart. He knows what my children need and why they do what they do. And as far deep as he knows, so deep does he love. There is not a corner that escapes him, not a turn that catches him off-guard. So there is no place in my life that his steadfast love does not fill. The knowing and the loving are always there together, always more wonderful than I thought.

This is how we can rise in the morning with joy, how we can roll away those warm blankets and move our muscles toward the others we are called to live with and love today. The Lord is the ground beneath our feet that will never give way. His mercy holds up under whatever weight the day brings, even if we end up pounding upon it in questions and tears. His goodness is not so unreliable as to give way under our pain and our deepest anguish of the soul. It meets us there, it cradles us there. It pierces the dark and sings over us when we can’t bear to open our eyes or sing a note of praise. The goodness and the grace under all of this is Christ, and he was swallowed up so that I’d be forever secure, sure-footed on level ground. He rose again so that I’d never see evil take the victory. I am just as immovable as his eternal dwelling place, the place where he dwells with us, Mt. Zion which he loves. (Psalm 78:68)