Finding Hope in Illness With Amy CarmichaelNäide

To one who had just had an operation

The loving Lord rest you now and refresh and strengthen you. I shut the doors of my mind when thoughts came about what the days just after the operation must have been. I can’t bear to think of them. I have never had a major operation in my life but have often nursed those who have had one, so I know what these days can be. I shall not be easy till I hear the next news.

These may be very tired days. It isn’t easy to pick up after such things. But take the resting verses such as Zephaniah 3:17 and John 15:9 (“Continue ye in My love,” abide there, like a child at home) and those psalms and verses in the Gospels which show that side of life. “Return unto thy rest, O my soul” (Ps. 116:7). “Come unto Me and I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28). “My God shall supply all your need” (Phil. 4:19). There are hundreds such; take them as yours in a special way just now, and don’t tire your spirit and inhibit your recovery by pressing against the limitations which for the present are your fence of feath­ers. “With His feathers has He made a fence for thee” is a lovely rendering of Psalm 91:4. Nestle under those feathers (He shall cover thee with His feathers), and when you are tempted to press against the fence, remember it is a fence of feathers—soft and downy, and yet strong as the feathers of great birds are.

May those feathers be very comforting to you through these days.