All this week my thoughts have taken up residence down the street with my newly-widowed neighbor, Betty. She has begun her adjustment to life as a no-longer-married woman and realizes it’ll be a change unequalled by any other in her life.
Thankfully she knows many women who’ve already walked this route, myself included, and we are ready, willing, and able to hold her as close as needed.
As I’ve prayed for Betty, my mind has been flooded with examples from my early days of widowhood when God let me see him afresh. Though I ‘d loved him dearly before Nate died, I came to love him more personally afterwards.
In particular I remember a morning standing in front of my closet, trying to decide what to wear. Looking back and forth across the hanging clothes, I felt powerless to choose. I’d been bombarded with decisions for a couple of weeks, some small, some large, and hadn’t done very well in making any of them.
Friends and family had moved in to assist, but choosing an outfit that morning was all up to me. I felt sad and very much alone standing in front of my closet and asked myself if I should just go back to bed. I could keep my ‘jammies on and escape the clothing decision altogether.
Starting to weep, I knew the only thing to do was pray, and the only prayer that came to mind was, “Help me, God.” I’d prayed that prayer a thousand times in my few weeks as a widow, but never over choosing clothes.
Such a request seemed beneath God, but I had no other option. “Lord, what should I wear?” And then I just stood there, not expecting him to answer me.
Suddenly my eyes fell on a shirt I hadn’t “seen” in a while, and as I stared at it without moving, God put a thought into my head. “How about that one? It would go good with those pants over there, and why don’t you add that sweatshirt from the shelf above?”
Most people would laugh at this, since praying that way seems like a dumbing-down of our almighty God. But after a wife has leaned on a husband for decades, her first dilemma is wondering how she’ll stay standing without him. That’s the moment when God offers to be her supportive other-half. He is practical, knowing each need and delivering flawless advice to any widow who wants it.
That’s why, when I dressed in the clothes God chose for me that day, I knew no crisis would be too small for his involvement. And because he was willing to choose my clothes back then, I know he’ll answer Betty’s needs in the weeks and months ahead, no matter how large…. or small.
“The widow who is really in need…. continues night and day to pray and to ask God for help.” (1 Timothy 5:5)