Battling Beasts (Week 2)

​In 2019, we found ourselves in the NICU with our first born daughter. The second she was born, I realized that this whole “parenting thing” was out of my control.
 
I had given thought to what we would need.
We took the hospital tour. 
My carefully typed-up birth plan was carefully packed into my hospital bag.
 
Too bad that well-thought-out birth plan didn’t include bullet points for “emergency c-section” or “NICU stay”.
 
Whether you’ve spent time in the hospital with your child or not, I think every mother can say that parenting is unpredictable. Situations arise in every parent’s life that can make you feel out of control, scared, desperate, or hopeless. It’s almost like the Lord put out of control, scared, desperate, hopeless people in the Bible for a reason...

Take Job, for example. In the first chapter of the book named after him, we watch Job lose everything: his animals, servants, andhis children. I’d say “out of control, scared, desperate, and hopeless” would apply to his situation.
 
While talking to Job, later in the book, the Lord references a beast called a leviathan (Job 41:15). While we don’t know much about this animal, we know it was fearsome. As parents, we may not have to deal with giant beasts with gnashing teeth, but we do have to deal with situations that scare us half to death. Like Job, one of my “beasts” was child loss.
 
Maybe your beast is simply feeling overwhelmed with everyday responsibilities.
Maybe your beasts also include watching your child suffer through an illness.
Maybe it’s a child who’s taken an undesirable path.
 
So how do we beat these beasts? For the leviathan, the Lord says that nothing on this earth was it’s equal (Genesis 41:33). Man-made items such as a sword, spear, dart, javelin, etc. were powerless against it— it seems that taking matters into our own hands won’t do the trick.
 
Remember Abraham? He tried defeating his “beast” of infertility by having a child with another woman (Genesis 16:4). His man-made solution only messed it up further. Fortunately for him, his blunder could not stop the Lord from fulfilling the ultimate purpose that He had for Abraham and Sarah’s lives by giving them a miracle son of their own (Genesis 17:19). 
 
We see Job fighting his own mental beasts in chapters 3-37, before the Lord finally answers in chapter 38. He begins ministering to Job by asking Job fifteen different questions (v. 1-20). These questions weren’t meant to belittle Job, or even reprove his grief. They were questions the Lord knew Job already had the answers to, that pointed to Hispower over the beasts of this earth. This moment of reflection taught Job that the key to defeating his “beasts” was to take his mind off of his feelings, and fix his trust in the Lord.
 
No matter what “beast” you are facing, there is nothing outside of the Lord’s control. The Bible doesn’t give us specific answers on how to do this “mom thing,” but it does tell us to TRUST. Trust in the One who is powerful to perform miracles. Trust in the One who can restore our lives. Trust in the One who can change our feelings from out of control, scared, desperate, and hopeless to, under the Lord’s control, brave, confident, and hopeful.

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About the Author

Danielle Biddy is a wife and occupational therapist who works with special needs children. She and her husband live with their two bulldogs in North Georgia, and are expecting their rainbow baby in March 2021.

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