Mercies in Disguise
“We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
All the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love is way too much to give us lesser things”
I go along to the beat of the calm music. Reminiscing every phenomenon that we have been through this year of 2020. We are pleading for the blessings to come on our way. Everybody is longing for peace of mind. Many are asking for healing. The world is begging to ease the suffering that pump by this year. We want our anxieties to be heard.
“Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You’re near
What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise”
As the song keeps on playing, I remember Ulysses’ tragedy that leaves scars in the heart of every Filipino. It leaves a painful stabbed because of its disastrous impact that made every eye wet, every heart scream, every mouth mumble, and every ear shut. Truly enough that you can never stop a disaster; only you can do is to prepare for it to lessen its impact. Let us borrow the quotation “Prevention is better than cure.”
According to Reporter’s Notebook, Typhoon Ulysses almost subjugates the whole Luzon by flood due to its heavy rainfall. Ulysses’ whiplash was felt on November 11, 2020, at Quezon City and lashed the rest of Northern Luzon, especially Cagayan Province and Isabela, on November 13. It is a wide range flood that causes every house to shout for help because the flood is unbearable already. Almost all houses are soaked in mud, and the only safe are their roofs. This became a nightmare to every Cagayanos because it is the first time after how many decades they are pinned in a situation like this.
As I savor every lyrics of the song. The lyrics go like this.
“We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
We cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt Your goodness, we doubt Your love
As if every promise from Your word is not enough
All the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we’d have faith to believe”
Did you know why God let disasters to come on our way? Because it is the only time, we remember that there is God that serves as our refuge. It is the only time that we learn how to pray. God let this happen not because it is a curse, but a curse or punishment with a lesson. Why do people only remember God when they are in trouble? Why do people only remember God when they suffer? However, when we are happy, we tend to forget to thank him. In Job 2:10, “You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble? In all this, Job did not sin in what he said.” We are not worthy of receiving blessings if we refuse the challenges that God threw to us.
“When friends betray us.
When darkness seems to win.
We know that pain reminds this heart.
That this is not our home”
I sang with this part after reading the death toll of Ulysses that climbed to 73 as of November 17 based on the news of Cable News Network (CNN Philippines). This pain that we have been through this year is a reminder that we are strangers to this world because we belong to the Kingdom of God.
“What if my greatest disappointments or the aching of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy
What if trials of this life
The rains, the storms, the hardest nights are Your mercies in disguise”
All of the trials that we have overcome, all the trials that we will face are God’s mercies in disguise. We sail to the ocean of life not for seeking a way without waves; rather, we sail to the ocean to overcome the waves of life.
