Ancient Whispers
God’s Word is filled with rich promises for His children. How do these “precious and very great promises” inform and direct your grief? How does keeping your eyes fixed on these truths anchor your hope in the Lord? In this series, we write about how God, through the promises in His Word, comforts and strengthens us in our sorrow.
I imagine Eve taking her daily walk, carelessly strolling through the stunning paradise of the garden. No fearful thoughts crowded her mind, no worries filled her heart. She was perfect and whole and happy. Then she heard the whisper.
We all know how the story goes. Eve gives into the devil’s temptation and her and Adam’s bites of the forbidden fruit permanently poisoned mankind with sin. The piece of this story that became very real to me years ago was how the serpent tempted Eve. I love Sally Lloyd-Jones’s description of that moment in the Jesus Storybook Bible, “As soon as the snake saw his chance, he slithered silently up to Eve. ‘Does God really love you?’ the serpent whispered. ‘If he does, why won’t he let you eat the nice, juicy, delicious fruit? Poor you, perhaps God doesn’t want you to be happy.’ The snake’s words hissed into her ears and sunk down deep into her heart, like poison. Does God love me? Eve wondered. Suddenly she didn’t know anymore.”
More than anything during my years of infertility and miscarriage I was tempted, just like Eve, to believe the ancient whisper of the devil, asking me to doubt God’s love. Why was God continually silent to my prayers for children? Why did He allow so many others to conceive with ease and leave me childless? Why would He then allow me to conceive after years of trying only to take that baby home a short nine weeks later?
These lies and doubts murmured in my heart and threatened to damage my faith. The goal of the devil’s whispers was to deaden my soul to God and cause me to mistrust His heart. John 8 says of the devil, “when he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). Sinclair Ferguson writes, “Satan cannot ultimately destroy a Christian believer. But he is well able to destroy our assurance and our joy—our pleasure in the gospel. So we need to find in the grace of God a defense against those fiery darts of the Evil One… The most sinister thoughts Satan insinuates into our minds are not enticements to sin but suspicions about God Himself… He seeks to distort our view of God and our understanding of His gracious character… Satan’s plan is to blind us to God’s grace and to diminish our trust in Him, crushing our love for Him and destroying all the pleasures of grace.”
During this time I learned in a unique way what it meant to, “Take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God” (Ephesians 6:26-27). God promises that in the midst of our darkest moments to give us the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, to wield against such lies.
And because He is the Faithful One, the promise of Ephesians 6 was true for me in my little world and my fight for faith. I couldn’t talk myself out of how I felt in my sadness and discouragement. I couldn’t rely on the care and love of friends to be enough to get me through. I needed a shield and a sword because it truly was a battle in my soul. The “very great and precious promises” of 1 Peter became the armor I needed.
The more I grabbed hold of truth, the more I felt the protection of the Spirit. As I grew weary, and the flaming darts flew at me telling me that God didn’t care, I’d hold up the promise of Isaiah 40:27-31.
“Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, ‘My way is hidden from the Lord, and my right is disregarded by my God’? Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not grow faint or weary, His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to Him who has no might he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”
When I heard that another friend was pregnant yet again, and I was tempted to doubt God’s love, I’d wield my sword and remember Lamentations 3.
“But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness! The Lord is my portion’, says my soul, ‘therefore I will put my hope in him.’ The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him. For the Lord will not cast off forever, but though He cause grief, He will have compassion according to the abundance of His steadfast love; for He does not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men.” Lamentations 3:21-24, 31-37
When I found myself walking into an operating room after my miscarriage, the truth of Psalm 119: 49 surrounded me like a shield, “Remember your word to your servant, in which you have made me hope. This is my comfort in my affliction, that your promise gives me life.”
Looking back at that season of my life, where the whispers of the devil were constant and threatening, I praise the Lord for the strength He gave me to wield the shield of faith and sword of the Spirit by believing the promises of my Father. For while whispers may tempt and discourage, they’re nothing compared to the mighty voice of the Lord as Psalm 29 describes, “The voice of the LORD is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the LORD over many waters. The voice of the LORD is full of majesty” (Psalm 29:3-4).
If you are in a season where all you can hear are doubts and accusations, the only way to tune them out is to listen to something louder. Listen to what God says about Himself and about His infinite love and care for you in His Word. Pick up your sword and shield by opening the pages of the precious Bible. It promises, “The Lord is faithful. He will establish you and guard you against the evil one” (2 Thessalonians 3:3). Don’t listen to the whispers, friends. Trust Him and His many great and precious promises to see you through even your darkest days.
- Lauren
Hope Mom to Baby Rohwer
Lauren is an undeserving and grateful follower of Jesus, wife to her beloved Paul, adoptive and biological mom of four (+ 1 glory baby), suburban housewife turned farmer’s wife and COO of her family’s farming enterprise. She’s currently homeschooling three of her children and in her free time loves to read, write, and hang with her girlfriends.
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