God Goes Before Us
And the Lord, He is the One who goes before you. He will be with you, He will not leave you nor forsake you; do not fear nor be dismayed. -Deuteronomy 31:8
In June of 2020, the CDC’s survey of 5,412 people revealed nearly 1/3 of them had symptoms of anxiety or depression. Even more worrisome, about 25% of young adults 18-24 yo said they had considered suicide because of the pandemic. Over 13% of those surveyed admitted using alcohol, prescription and/or illegal drugs to cope with their stress and anxiety. (https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackkelly/2020/08/18/the-pandemic-has-caused-an-increase-in-anxiety-stress-depression-and-suicides/?sh=58ff74d55863)
2020 was the year not only of a worldwide pandemic and global shutdowns, but also political, social and economic upheavals—not to mention the locust plagues in Africa, floods in Asia, and record wildfires in CA. Churches were suddenly shuttered without warning and some have yet to reopen more than a year later. Fear was constantly broadcast on the news and the internet.
Looking back at 2020, my family can truly say that it was a year of unprecedented uncertainty but also of growth in faith. In fact, it ended up being one of the most peace-filled, calm years we have ever had as a family.
When the reality of the pandemic hit America last March, things began shutting down left and right. The kids’ school closed, my office went from an office of 5 doctors to 1 doctor a day and minimal patients, and my husband’s office closed. He was asked to work from home and then had his job hours and salary cut in half. Everyone in my state was instructed to “shelter in.”
When my husband’s job got cut in half and my own office was almost entirely shut down, initially there was a rush of fear. What would happen to us? Our future? Our children? My father was also dying of cancer in another state. But at that moment, my husband and I looked at each other and vowed we would trust God entirely with everything. We would leave our kids, our jobs, and even our safety/health to God. It was a defining moment. We said, “Let’s trust God! Let’s get excited about what He is going to do!”.
I wrote an entry in my prayer journal entitled, “COVID situation—God’s blessings and workings revealed.” We didn’t know how God was going to work in our lives but we were certain He would and excited to find out. And by the end of 2020, I ran out of lines recording God’s workings and had to spill onto the spaces of other entries. Here I will be sharing some of those workings.
My husband’s job was initially cut in half but 3 weeks later, it was restored to full with back pay! God also worked miracles for my job as well. During the pandemic, I began to read articles of how physicians in private practices were facing huge financial losses from the plummeting number of patients and office closures. For two months our office had only one doctor working at a time and not seeing any new or routine patients. Even when we reopened more, we all saw less patients than before. My partners and I agreed to keep paying all the employees their regular salaries even if their hours were cut. I prayed for God to keep our practice afloat somehow and as I continued praying over the months, I even told Him, “Lord, You can make us end with a surplus! I don’t know how but I know you can.” Miraculously, our practice ended 2020 with a surplus. I still don’t know how.
Another major question was our children’s schooling. Our kids go to an SDA church school. All schools went remote in March 2020 but our youngest was really struggling academically with the online work and desperately needed someone supervising him every day. Due to our governor extending the “stay at home” order, my husband was able to continue staying home, and it benefitted our youngest child tremendously.
After seeing the challenges of online schooling for our 3 kids, we felt that online school was not the right option for them. We prayed about their education and asked God to lead our family. My husband decided that he was willing to quit his job and homeschool all 3 kids if their school stayed remote in the fall. He is strong in all the STEM subjects and he became willing to surrender his career to educate the kids. The school didn’t announce their decision until 1 week prior to opening, but they decided to open in-person classes and we were so thankful to God—my husband most of all! Their school has remained open since, our children have stayed healthy and no cases of COVID transmission have resulted from the school. The kids have never been so happy and thankful to go to school every day. In fact, our daughter says she is sad the school ends one hour early every Friday.
There have been blessings from online interactions as well. God opened the way for me to start bible studies with two of my friends and one who was a Muslim, accepted Christ into her heart! When my church shut down and my primary class went online, I felt a great burden to teach lessons that were biblically rooted, with a deeper spiritual emphasis. After earnestly praying and asking God, I was led to the “Children’s Century Classics”—a series of books for children based on the Conflict of the Ages series. It goes from Genesis to Revelation. I began to base my lessons each week on the chapters and include a mini Bible study, where the kids would look up Old and New Testament verses relating to the lesson. We close with prayer time and many kids are now eager to pray.
God also gave me a recurring Sabbath miracle. As an OB GYN, I am “on call” every 3rd-4th weekend and prior to the pandemic, I had a substitute teacher who would prepare the lesson and teach during my Sabbath on-call days. Periodically, I would even miss Sabbath school entirely due to a patient’s delivery or some other on-call issue. After the church closed and I began teaching the new lessons, I decided to no longer have a substitute teacher. I told God, “I’m going to prepare to teach the lesson every week and if you want me to teach it, you’re going to have to make it so I can.” And He did. I have not missed teaching single lesson for over a year despite my calls. This is a recurring miracle.
There were many other providences of God revealed but another big one was with my dad’s metastatic cancer. The pandemic closures became a great blessing to our family because we were then able to go and see him more than we could’ve before. The family gathered frequently and spent time with our dad. We prayed earnestly for God’s protection over our gatherings because we knew dad’s time was short and we wanted to spend time with him.
And God was with dad to the very end. Our family saw miracles big and small during his illness. God knew dad’s physical and emotional limits. I have never known a single metastatic cancer patient who had no pain. Dad was very uncomfortable from the fluid that built up in his abdomen, but he had no pain. Only the evening before he died, he had 2 tiny doses of pain meds and that was it. This was God’s unmistakable, special miracle for my dad.
And when dad passed, it was sudden and peaceful. God awakened our family, as we were sleeping in dad’s room. He tried to say something and suddenly we could see he was dying. Someone began singing, “All to Jesus I surrender” and dad stopped breathing at the last line. No agonal breathing, no struggle, just peace. My mom, my sisters and I all knelt around his bed after he passed and we thanked God for His love and mercy towards dad. We knew God’s mercy surrounded him even to his last breath. Through dad’s cancer, my family learned that in every situation, no matter how uncertain or insurmountable, God is ever faithful--a sure refuge, strength and Guide.
A devotional reading that changed how I live my life, is written by Oswald Chambers, entitled “Gracious Uncertainty.” He wrote, “Our natural inclination is to be so precise—trying to always forecast accurately what will happen next—that we look upon uncertainty as a bad thing… The nature of the spiritual life is that we are certain in our uncertainty… Certainty is the mark of the commonsense life—gracious uncertainty is the mark of the spiritual life. To be certain of God means that we are uncertain in all our ways, not knowing what tomorrow may bring. This is generally expressed with a sigh of sadness, but it should be an expression of breathless expectation. We are uncertain of the next step, but we are certain of God… The spiritual life is the life of a child. We are not uncertain of God, just uncertain of what He is going to do next… Leave everything to Him and it will be gloriously and graciously uncertain how He will come in—but you can be certain that He will come. Remain faithful to Him.”
So regardless of what 2021 or the future may bring, we as Christians need not be anxious and filled with worry. We are certain in our uncertainty, confident amid chaos because our certainty and confidence is in God. Right now is an unprecedented opportunity for every Christian to exercise faith and experience miracles personally. The gospel work and the Holy Spirit should not pause while God’s people “shelter in place.” God already knew the pandemic was coming, even when we didn’t and as we trust Him, He will surely lead us through. There is urgent work for us to do. 2 Timothy 1:7 says, “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” May we each obtain this power, love and sound mind from God as we carry on His work to the end!
Gloria Kim writes from Westmont, IL where she lives with her husband Chris and their 3 children.