Question: What’s worse than losing your keys?
Answer: Not knowing that you had them in the first place!
I remember the weekend when we went out to our camper…minus the keys. Since we'd left one of the hatches unlocked, and since that hatch opened into the trailer, we shoved one of our little kids in that hatch (well, in a nice way) and coached them on how to unlock the door.
Recently, four-year-old Sade listened as her mother read about China missionary Gladys Aylward. In one tense scene, Gladys was summoned to a prison and asked to stop the fighting between inmates. These were big burly men, and Gladys stood just under five feet tall. You can understand her fear.
Sadie did. That's when she exclaimed, "But mom! She doesn't have to be afraid. GOD HAS THE KEYS! Like Paul, who was locked up. God had the keys, and they escaped. So if she ‘gots locked up,’ God Has the keys to help her.”
A four-year-old is connecting Paul's fears with Glady's fears–and God’s extraordinary provision. Do we?
Newman hall writes, “How unreasonable is it for a disciple of Jesus to worry!… Would Jesus have done so much for you already—would He have called you by His grace, renewed you by His Spirit, comforted you by His love, and preserved you to this day, if He intended now to abandon you? If He sought you when a stranger, will He not take care of you now that you are a child? If the foe was loved, how much more the friend! ‘If, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, how much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life!’ (Rom 5:10).
Sadie is right. God has the keys.
(Note to self—Relax!)