God is in the Storm

“I will be with you. I will not fail you or forsake you. Be strong and of good courage.” Joshua 1:6

I have been listening to the “Bible in a Year” podcast with Father Mike Schmitz. I started listening to it last year, and I’m only up to day 81. At this rate, it’s going to take me about ten years to finish it, but my goal this year is to persevere, so I’m not giving up.

Day 81 had a strong message for me because this has been a particularly rough year for my family because of multiple health issues. All this has resulted in having to rearrange schedules, waking up frightened in the middle of the night, and having to cancel four separate trips. This was definitely not how I had planned to spend my retirement. There have been days when I feel like I’m drowning, and I need to remind myself to focus on the positives, not on the negatives.

On day 81, Father Mike began to read from the book of Joshua. Moses had just died, and Joshua was leading the people of Israel towards the Promised Land. The main message on this day is “Be strong and of good courage” (Joshua 1:6). I felt like God was talking directly to me. He was telling me not to be afraid, that He is with me, and He will not abandon me.

“Be not frightened, neither be dismayed; for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9). Dismayed, anxious, scared… that is how I have been feeling. Therefore, when I listened to the podcast of day 81, I felt a peace that I knew could only come from God. I realized that He was with me and with my family in the midst of this storm. And with Him, we don’t need to be frightened. We can “be strong and of good courage.” In the words of Father Mike, “Because the Lord is the God of our hearts. And to have courage, the word courage comes from the Latin word cor, which means heart. And so to be discouraged is to lose heart, but to be encouraged is to be given strength at heart. So to be of good courage is to let our hearts not be afraid, let our hearts not be weary, let our hearts not be discouraged. But to know that God is with us, again, in the midst of trials, in the midst of struggles, in the midst of battle, and even in the midst of failure, we can be those people like Joshua, like the people of Israel who are called to be very strong and of good courage.” (1)

This is not the first time that I have found myself in the midst of a storm, but when I look back, I can see that God was in the middle of those storms manning the ship. It’s just that when I am drowning, I have the tendency to forget all the blessings that He has given me in the past. And even in the midst of the storm, He is blessing me. Father Mike reminded me of this: “We are often tempted to forget in the dark what we knew was true in the light. We are often tempted to forget in the new trial what we learned in the old trial. We are often tempted to forget that God is fighting for us when we are in the midst of the battle.” (1)

If you are also in the midst of a storm, remember that God is in the storm with you. You are not alone; therefore, “be strong and of good courage.”

Copyright © 2025 Christy Romero. All rights reserved.

References:

1. From The Bible in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz): Day 81: Israel Crosses the Jordan (2025), Mar 22, 2025 (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-bible-in-a-year-with-fr-mike-schmitz/id1539568321?i=1000700361156&r=1050)