“Fear not, for I am with you and will bless you and multiply your offspring for my servant Abraham’s sake.” – Genesis 26:24

I put my arms around the young teenager sitting next to me on the couch as sobs shook their body. I had woken up to a phone call in the middle of the night from a worried mom who couldn’t calm their teenager down after a particularly brutal heartbreak. I offered to come over and now found myself wondering what to say that could soothe such a hurting heart.

It’s easy to assume teenagers are more emotional than the rest of us, but I believe they’re just a little more upfront about their emotions. No one makes it through this broken world unscathed. Heartbreak often leaves us feeling forgotten, ignored, or even unloved by a God who says He wants good for His people, but doesn’t always provide what seems good to us.

If you’ve struggled with feeling that God isn’t answering your prayers, know you’re not alone. In our reading we stumble upon a broken and lost Isaac. Isaac had put his wife in danger to protect himself and been kicked out of the land he made his home because of the envy of others. He fled from place to place, but everywhere he went was filled with conflict. Isaac’s life had lost all stability, and I have to think there were nights when he questioned if God was still working all things for the good of His people.

But then God did what God always does: He showed up. He reminded Isaac that He has always kept His promises and He always will. And the best news of this story? God does the same thing for you. God shows up in the Sacraments, where His real presence delivers us forgiveness. God shows up in His Living Word which points us continually to the Cross. God shows up in our Christian community, where our brothers and sisters faithfully preach Christ crucified and bear burdens with us.

That’s real stability. Not a life easy to live or understand, but a God who shows up in the messy, the complicated, and the overwhelming. May we, like Isaac, be daily reminded of God’s faithfulness.

Prayer: Lord, Your servant Isaac built an altar to remind himself of Your unending goodness. Let me daily worship You as I am reminded that You always show up.

Daily Reading: Galatians 6

– Contributed by Hannah Hayden