"I Know My Heavenly Father Knows"

Is it really so reassuring to know my heavenly Father knows? He’s God. Of course he knows. Our storms, frailties, wounds. Nothing we carry to him is a surprise. Nothing we keep from him escapes his notice, either. He’s not called omniscient for nothing. But if you’re like me, it’s not so much what he knows that concerns you, but what he’s doing about it.

Let’s not be like me.

It’s one thing to know my heavenly Father knows. It’s been an entirely different matter in my life to believe he cares. I’ve sought proof that he cares in what he does–in tangible miracles and seeable changes–because it seems like that’s where the real comfort would be. Not in the fact he knows the waves are tossing me but in his actually calming them. When he doesn’t–knowing doesn’t feel like caring.

If you know what it’s like when someone doesn’t know, though, you realize caring depends on knowing. And knowing facilitates much more caring than we think or could see even if we were looking for it.

A God who doesn’t know can’t care. But a God who knows does care. And he does prove it.

My Heavenly Father Knows There’s a Storm

My grandma told of a time when she wished she could break her leg so someone would know she was hurting. My trials aren’t what hers were, and given a choice between the two, I’d stick with mine. But I know that feeling. Broken legs are easy to see. Broken hearts aren’t.

No one expects someone with a broken leg to run a race in their cast or scale a flight of stairs on their crutches at the pace two healthy legs could climb. That giant, colorful hunk of hardened mesh graffitied with Sharpie signatures is an obvious sign it can’t be done.

But aching hearts aren’t wrapped in fluorescent mesh, which makes it difficult for people to understand that asking you to go about your life as though it’s not full of holes—attend celebrations, commit to responsibilities, maybe even go to church—is like asking that broken-limbed invalid to sprint.

Sometimes it just can’t be done. Not until the injury heals. It can’t heal if it isn’t allowed to rest. And it can’t rest if the only one who knows something’s broken is the one in pain. Because those who don’t know will keep demanding of it, however unintentionally, things it can’t handle.

That’s the comfort in knowing Heavenly Father knows. Because he always sees the storm, whatever form it takes, he never expects from you what you can’t give. He just wraps you in love when you come to him in tears, and quietly says, “I know.”

It might not blow the storm away, but sometimes that gentle acknowledgement that you’re not the only one who sees it is all you need to take a deep breath and walk on through the rain.

Sometimes God calms the storm. Sometimes he lets the storm rage and calms his child.

My Heavenly Father Knows the Balm I Need

Ask anyone what balm they think they need to soothe their woes, and they’ll probably tell you it’d feel pretty good if their woes vanished.

I wouldn’t complain if mine did.

But I’ve learned from well-intentioned efforts to help that happen that there’s more to healing than just fixing the problem.

A doctor may know exactly how to treat a broken leg, but if his entire focus is on the bone, he’ll miss the fact his patient is in pain. Of course, that patient wants their bone healed. But they also want the doctor to remember that bone is attached to a person. The bone isn’t in pain. The person is.

The most soothing balm I’ve ever received came from people who recognized that distinction. Who actually didn’t try to fix the problem at all–because they couldn’t–but just had compassion for its toll.

That is God’s balm. Not just to see your storm, but to validate what it’s put you through. Making the problem disappear without that suggests your turmoil was of no consequence. Had no purpose. “Here’s the answer to all your prayers. It’s just been waiting for you to get a clue. Honestly, if you’d figured it out sooner, you wouldn’t have had to break your heart over it all these years.”

That’s how some suggested fixes make me feel. But if God lets a storm rage, it isn’t always because you missed some tiny nuance that could have spared you the storm altogether. And even if your weakness did contribute to the pounding waves, he won’t diminish what they’ve done to you.

When you come to him in tears, he’ll wrap you in his love and quietly say, “I know.”

It may not close the wound, but it’ll take the edge off the sting.

He Tempers Every Wind

What God does with what he knows is more than we give him credit for. It’s not always the big miracle we want. But it is still what we need.

And it doesn’t mean that miracle isn’t coming.

It’s likely some have already happened.

The waves may appear fifty feet high as they come crashing down on you, but would you like to imagine that gale if Heavenly Father wasn’t tempering the wind?

I think we will fall at his feet in completely inadequate gratitude the day he shows us everything we didn’t know he spared us.

So, take heart and believe in a heavenly Father who knows. And cares. And proves it.

There are storms. He knows. He’ll drive the clouds away.

We are wounded. He knows. He’ll heal us.

We are frail. He knows. He’ll defend us.

And when the journey’s over—as Jesus told his disciples, “I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”

That’s what Heavenly Father wants us to know.

I hope these words will increase your faith in a God who knows you, and that you’ll share them with anyone you know who may be wondering whether he knows them. He does!