We drove out of the parking lot of our church building and there he was.  A little inchworm clinging to our mammoth 15 passenger van window.  He was hanging on for dear life as we started driving down the road.  How it would manage to survive the 35 minute drive on the highway was not on this tiny inchworm’s  radar.  But, he didn’t know it.  For the moment he was hunkered down just for the next 30 seconds.

So I was a hero mom that day.  As my children clamored for me to rescue this helpless little creature. I opened the window and reached my hand out to gently lift this little green being off of the windshield and out of the way of danger.  I brought him inside and held him- placing him on a stray paper plate that earlier that morning had carried breakfast on it.  And little Inchy cringed.  He became a bundle of fear and froze.  No longer crawling confidently he thrashed and wiggled as my hand led him to safety.

I carried him that way all the way home.  And as he grew confident he started to crawl again across my fingers and across the paper plate over the toast crumbs.  Mile after mile he was being hurled to another area of town at 60 miles per hour.  But, he didn’t know it, all he knew was the strange fear and dread of harm.

Then it happened again.  As I opened the van door and carried little Inchy over to the dirt in our mulch bed — he froze and then he wiggled and thrashed and did all he could to get away.  He did not realize what was scaring him was actually saving him.  This fearful unknown was actually a place of safety.  I put him down and he inched away—having no concept that I was a hero to my kids that day and had saved his little life.

And the analogy struck me.  How often are we like that little inchworm in the hand of Almighty God?  How often is He working out His perfect will in us and doing that which is for our growth? He is doing all things well and for our good and for our soul’s safety.

But we are thrashing.

We are wriggling – seeking to escape.

We are trembling in fear and fighting against His providence.

And through it all He is bringing us to bigger and better places.  Preparing green pastures for us.

He is keeping us from harm we did not know was there, surrounding us in the safety of His presence and all the while we are resisting. We are sure that all is fearful around us, sure that all is lost.  When He is carrying us to a richer experience of knowledge of Him.

I am reminded of Jacob declaring “All these things are against me!” When God was actually bringing about the saving of a nation!

Charles Spurgeon says:

“There may be peculiarities in our case which look as if the Master had treated us with the harshness of a cruel one. There may be thorns of unusual sharpness in our pillow, but we must not dream that anger placed them there. We may be pining under a grief which we could not tell into another’s ear, but which makes our lot appear to be singled out and separated for peculiar misery, and hence it may seem just to conclude, “God has forsaken me; he has turned upon me in his fierce anger, and his loving kindnesses have failed forevermore;” but rest assured, my brethren, that the most plausible is not always the most true, and the most natural is not the most sure. God is and ever must be love to his people; let nothing disturb you in this belief: believe not the clearest inferences from his providence, but believe him, let outward circumstances say what they may.So today, do you tremble?  Do you have forebodings of dread over what God is doing in your life?  Do you question His goodness in the midst of trials?  …

Our best days have been those which we thought our worst. Probably we are never so much in prosperity as when plunged in adversity. No summer days contribute so much to the healthy growth of our souls as those sharp wintry nights, which are so trying to us. We fear that we are being destroyed, and our inner life is at that moment being most effectually preserved. Oh, if we read them aright, all things are for us! We are a thousand fools in one to be caviling at the divine dispensation, and saying, “All these things are against me.”Jacob was wrong in every jot and tittle of what he said, and so usually are we.” Grace Gems

Remember little Inchy and the lesson he portrayed for us that day.  Trust your Savior, the One who is your tender Shepherd and leave all in His hands.  

He is faithful, He is worthy.  He is good to His children. And He does ALL THINGS well!