God Sees Our Wanderings

We are all the result of the wandering and the coming together of many people, immigrants who packed their worldly wares into trunks and their dreams into their hearts.  My great-great grandparents left Germany in 1870 with dreams of a new home in America, sailing aboard a ship called Leipzig for six weeks before landing in Maryland. From there they traveled to Minnesota, where my great-great grandmother gave birth to the daughter she was carrying when she left her homeland. After working in St. Paul as a bartender and then a railroad worker for several years, my great-great grandfather moved his family again, this time to Illinois where they would become citizens of America and put down roots. They raised twelve children and were grandparents to thirty-three when they passed away. Today, I live just outside the city they settled in during the spring of 1877. Wanderers, unsettled peoples who left not only family, friends, and spiritual leaders behind in the old countries, but also a piece of their hearts, to make new lives in far away places.

Life can make us feel like wanderers without ever leaving our borders, and God’s Heart is tender toward our wanderings. He sees our turmoil, frustration, and hurt, and He loves us so much that He even keeps every tear we cry in His bottle. And someday He will wipe the last one away…

You have taken account of my wanderings; Put my tears in Your bottle. Are they not recorded in Your book? Psalm 56:8

You may find yourself wandering like the immigrants of old, not yet settled in a permanent place, or you may feel like you are adrift in the circumstances that life brings. Whatever you face that brings uncertainty, you are never lost with God.