Today was a good day. A few weeks ago, I wrote a status update on Facebook, something to the effect that, “Life is hard, but there’s always a tomorrow.” However that day, I hadn’t experienced a yesterday.

Yesterday was the darkest day of my life. The worship pastor today said, “We can’t even begin to understand what life without Christ would be like.”

Oh… yes, ‘we’ can.

Two days ago, my husband and I went for a ride. We drove down Redwood Highway in the upper most tip of Northern California. You know what is along the Redwood Highway? Redwoods. What are redwoods? They are some of the biggest, most majestic trees in the world. At one point along this stretch of road, you can get off at a scenic viewpoint and get out of your car to take in the beauty of one of the largest trees in the universe. This particular redwood tree stands over 300 feet tall and some crazy measurement in diameter (I’d tell you, but I don’t remember). Let’s just say, it is, humongous.

I grew up around redwood trees. Some quite large, I might add. However, not any that surrounded our house compared to this one. Not one. Anyhow, we got home late Friday. Then there was tomorrow – Saturday. About ten o’clock it started. Hopelessness. Despair. Doubt. A desire to give up.

Have you ever felt like – believed – God was not only not listening – He just didn’t care? That was my day. That was the place I was in.

I remember reading a few years ago about someone who experienced a dark day, after honestly wondering what it would have felt like when Jesus hung on the cross and God turned away. God showed that person that dark place. Imagine my surprise when I didn’t even care to go there, to know what that would be like (because, after all, who would wish to go through that?), and yet God, in His infinite wisdom, took me there anyway?

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, David said. Walk? Yesterday I was running – sprinting – desperate for an exit out of that horrid valley. I could literally feel the enemy breathing down my neck. The shadow was as heavy and pressing down upon me as real as death itself. I would close my eyes and see myself holding on to the edge of a high cliff, frantically looking around and screaming, “God, where did You go?!?”

All my questions – no answers. All my tears – no bottle to catch them in. All my confusion – no one to make sense of it. All my hope – grew darker and darker by the second. My faith? It was like it was there, but I couldn’t grasp it. It dangled in front of me like a child playing with a ball of yarn in front of a cat.

It was like a cruel joke – a test that was rigged. And I fell for the joke and failed the test. The darkness overpowered me and I lost my grip on that ledge and plundered to the pit of hell. I lost my faith and my hope went along with it.

That place – is a dark place to be, to say the least. I cried tears I thought were gone. Tears that wouldn’t stop. My husband was beside himself. Yet, in the darkness, there is no encouragement. There is no affirmation. There only remains discouragement and condemnation. In that kind of darkness, there is no hope and faith is non-existent.

I thought my tears would never end. I asked my husband, “Do you believe in God?” I knew his answer, but somewhere, somehow, for some reason, I desperately needed to hear it, the way you need to know the truth and have something worthy to believe in.

His ‘yes’ resounded with the utmost surety.

“Why?” was the next question.

“Because of the redwood trees.”

I can’t tell you why, but I felt like at that moment, though silent still, God picked me up off of the ground and stood me on my feet. I’d like to be able to tell you that He pulled me up out of that pit and stood me on a green pasture. Instead, He made me climb out of that hole, one rocky ledge at a time.

The first ledge was that redwood tree. Tell me a big bang did that. I hardly think so. The second was my granddaughter. Her smile. Her giggle. Her eyes. The way she grabs my legs when she runs up to me. Okay – that may have been five ledges up. But, I was beginning to see light and my tears weren’t coming as steadily.

I could tell you that I pulled myself out of that pit, but I’d be lying. The only possible way I got out was because, though I couldn’t see Him, or hear Him, or even ‘feel’ Him, He was there. He wasn’t pulling me out, He was down there – in the darkness with me – pushing me up.

One last push and I crumbled to the ground above, literally exhausted. I laid there. Barely audible, I told my husband, “I’ve been trusting the wrong people.”

He asked what I meant.

I’m writing a book and in it, ‘Emma’ is the main character. “I’m like Emma. She trusted all the wrong people – everyone but God.”

I trusted myself to get us out of this place we were in, so much so that I was resigned to stop medication I need every day. I trusted in others to pray. I trusted in my husband to get a job. These things weren’t bad, but I trusted in everyone but God. I was relying on Him to provide in all these things, but I wasn’t trusting Him to work everything for good – His good. I had my own agenda.

“You’ve got to take your hands off and let go,” my husband said.

Sounds like another problem Emma has. That Emma girl – she’s more like me than I realized.

When it hit me, that I’ve been so far off base, I said out loud (my husband was listening), “I’m letting go – putting the baggage down and letting go. Everything I’ve done hasn’t worked. There’s nothing left but to let God do it His way.”

A peace washed over me and the darkness that enveloped me only moments before melted before the light. I honestly thought I was letting God do it His way. Problem was, I was telling Him my way in my prayers and just assumed it was His way.

And so I let go. A smile returned and so did my hope.

That was yesterday. Today we woke and went to a new church and I think we may have found ‘home’. We met the pastor (not knowing it was the pastor) who grew up in Scotts Valley, our home town. He gave a message of salvation like none I had ever heard before and immediately following the message, baptized four brand new believers – all in their Sunday clothes. It was the most awesome thing. Except for maybe the song that we sang…

My times are in Your hands
I know I’ll never understand
But I’ll trust in You…
I’m sorry when I take control
How I’m needing You
Even when I fall You help me stand
Even when I’m lost You take my hand

I will hold on
I will hold on
I will hold on
Yes, I will trust in You

My life is in Your hands
You hold the key to who I am
And I’ll trust in You…
How I’m needing You

You will hold on
You will hold on
You will hold on
I am trusting You.

That’s my song – He’s in control, not me. And He’s holding on… to me and you can be that I’m holding on to Him. And when others ask why I believe what I do – that He is there, seen or unseen, through the dark or in the light, I’ll say – “Because of the redwoods.”