The amount of change we have been living with truly feels astronomical. As a parent of a kindergartner and first-grader, my heart and my brain have been experiencing some whiplash. Anyone else?

I’ll never forget a moment this summer, while vacationing with my husband’s family at the beach. My son and his cousin are a mere seven months apart, and they are besties. For seven days in a row, the moment their little feet touched the sand, they bee-lined it to the water and floated on their boogey boards for as many hours as we would let them. After years of experiencing the beach with little babies who required so much supervision, this was like a dream come true. They were independent, and having the most amazing time. But there was one afternoon where the tide was coming in instead of going out. The waves were steady and strong. We gave the kids rules about how far to go in, and they were obeying. But in just a moment, the pull of the tide was too strong, and it pulled my nephew far enough away that he couldn’t stand and he couldn’t reach us. It was only a few seconds, and we were able to grab him quickly because we were standing at the water’s edge, but it still felt so scary! The wild thing about the ocean is that although it seems predictable, there is so much more working underneath the surface. The currents are moving and changing constantly.

This is how I would describe the madness of this season. From March until now, we have all been hanging out in the same ocean of water, but the tide goes in and out. Sometimes the waves are stronger than they seem, and even though we’re standing in what we thought was a safe space, the pull underneath the surface takes us by surprise. The force and the frequency of change is astounding.

This season is forcing all of us to readjust over and over again before we ever truly settle. We don’t have time to learn about the previous wave before the next one crashes, trying to take us down.

But the truth about God is that He never changes. And the problem is – we glaze over these words because we’ve heard them before.

Yes, God works in seasons. Yes, He creates brand new creations out of dust – but this doesn’t mean that He is unstable. His words and motives are always aligned with how He’s moved throughout history. Somehow, He is simultaneously surprising and at the same time – so predictable.

When we feel stuck in life or thought processes, psychology tells us to create new pathways of thought in our minds. Our minds get used to the way we think, and they create comfortable routes each time we think the same thought. This season, nothing has been stable enough for us to create any kind of routine thinking. Nothing has remained steady. Nothing has seemed stable.

Except. Jesus.

While the world and even science at times asks us to ground ourselves in what we can see, hear and feel, Jesus is calling us to shift our eyes just a little bit higher. He’s lifting our eyes to meet His. If we find our steady ground in the changing reality around us, we will never find stability. We will never find peace or strength.

As your thoughts, your surroundings, your reality rocks back and forth like a wild ocean, please grab hold of this truth that so often slips out of our grasp:

God never changes.

It feels so simple, doesn’t it? If we could grab hold of this truth, we would not be rocked by the shifting political unrest and hatred. We would not fear our future or the children’s future.

Don’t misunderstand me: we are not immune to the heartache and pain of this life. But when we are tethered to the anchor which is fastened to the mercy seat, it doesn’t define us. Instead, we are defined by a Living Hope and we are held by the great High Priest.

We are not hopeless and we are not helpless. No matter what kind of waves come, or how often they crash, we are held steady. Today, shift your thoughts to the truth that has remained throughout time, rather than the shaky realities of the current culture.

“So it is impossible for God to lie for we know that his promise and his vow will never change! And now we have run into his heart to hide ourselves in His faithfulness. This is where we find His strength and comfort, for He empowers us to seize what has already been established ahead of time – an unshakeable hope!

We have this hope like a strong, unbreakable anchor holding our souls to God Himself. Our anchor of hope is fastened to the mercy seat which sits in the heavenly realm beyond the sacred threshold, and where Jesus, our forerunner, has gone in before us.” [Hebrews 6:18-19 TPT]