Jehovah-Sabaoth

Protection is never something I understood, at least not from the God side of things. I wasn't wondering in the desert, enslaved, or had armies coming down on me. There was no need for protection. Until I found my self sitting in a stark white room on a very uncomfortable hospital chair, being denied my child, my barely a day old child.

Sitting there wondering why.

Why can't I see my child.

I pray, pray that I can't do this. I can't handle this, I can't do this on my own.

This can not be my life. This. I can't do this...

They say that God shows up in the stillness.

The stillness of a desperate un-cohesiveness prayer of a mom. The still stillness of a nnicu, with the beeps, the sounds of machines breathing for little people. Tiny, oh so tiny people.

There was God, covering. hiding.

Protecting.

Captivating.

Holding my thoughts in His hands. Keeping them on small things, things that we see as meaningless. Coffee. Clothing. Food. Drive. Park. Walk. Holding a oh so small hand. Prayer.

Prayer. We forget how powerful prayer is. We call out prayers, not always believing they will be answered. Do we even think they are heard?

In the stillness, the small places where there is nothing else to be heard but your small whispered weak prayers, there it is. That moment where, for a second you remember He hears, He's there, and He protects. He keeps your thoughts on Him, on life, on your son, on the fact that he is breathing and alive. Never running to the facts. That there was a tube in his chest because his lung collapsed, that he couldn't breath on his own, that you couldn't hold him, nurse him, that you had to leave him sitting in that hospital every day and try to go home and sleep. You never realize that your child, so perfect, could have died.

Now that is protection.