Our Smallness is a Gift

You only have to visit the ocean for a short span of time to experience its wild unpredictability. In a few hours the water can completely change from a serene, lake-like surface to white-capping waves of foaming beauty. 

It is a thing of wonder

Shimmering, crystal clear water that is home to many other marvels of the deep. 

We are so small in comparison.

It is also a thing to be revered.


The ocean is completely outside of our control. We honor its currents and riptides and destructive surges.

The ocean is a great teacher inside the Lord’s hand. He tutors me with every trip. I never know what I will get, only that it will be breathtaking and different every single time. 

Here is the key: I get to choose whether I will be thrilled by it or afraid of it. 

I am writing all this today because we do well to remember our smallness is a gift. 

Here we stand at a political shoreline. 

We have all made our well-considered, educated, prayerful choices. Now we choose whether our peace depends on the condition of the ocean, or the Maker of the ocean.

We tend to rejoice or lament in four year increments as the political waters are moved by unseen currents and winds. But our trust is not in a man, a woman, or a party. It is in the Maker of heaven and earth.

We were never meant to carry the weight of the world. We see in part. We understand in part. We make choices based on the part of the story we like — or don’t like. 

Our smallness is a gift. It reminds us that we need Someone bigger, mightier than a political ocean that can excite or destroy us.

Let me be direct. 

I have participated in many, many elections. Some results thrilled me and some I feared. Yet whether my candidate was voted in or not, my prayer has been the same: Lord bless and protect our nation for Your glory. Lead and guide your people like a Good Shepherd. Deliver us from evil and ourselves. Give us hearts to live like You.

God Almighty makes the nations rise and fall, just like He makes the oceans rise and fall. We are small, but He is not. 

I exhort you to keep our hearts and heads free of accusation and insult. He alone is enthroned forever and ever.  We can enjoy and endure  the adventures of the political ocean because we know the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. 

The king’s heart is like a stream of water directed by the Lord; he guides it wherever he pleases.”

 Proverbs 21: 1