I love watching clouds from the window of an airplane.  Big, billowy, lofty, oversized cotton ball-like clouds and even dark, gray, speckled-with-lightning clouds.  I just don’t like flying through them.  I always have fleeting thoughts of the pilot being as freaked out as I am upon the realization that we can’t see anything out that window anymore except a lot of white – or black if it’s a storm cloud.  But then, of course, reason sets in and I remember that the pilot has instruments to show him where we are and which way to go.  He doesn’t have to rely on what he sees outside.  He relies on what he sees on the instrument panel.

How many times have you been enjoying the view out your life window and suddenly you find yourself in the middle of the cloud instead of watching it as a bystander from a distance?  How many times have you found your plans and your destination obscured and muddled instead of having the clarity you had at the start of your journey?

So here’s the question: How do you find your way when you can’t see?

First, know that God is in the clouds.  In every storm, in every fog – the Bible reminds us that God’s faithfulness, truth and strength are in the clouds (Ps. 36:5, 108:4, 68:34).  That means that He’s right there in the middle of whatever is going on in our lives. We are never alone in a cloud.  Second, know that God wants to be your guide through the cloud.  “I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go.  I will guide you with my eye” (Ps 32:8).  When we can’t see ahead of us, we can trust the One who can. 

I recently heard of a man who is blind in one eye, and who has only 50% vision in the other due to a degenerative eye disease.  He enjoyed flying airplanes before his vision loss and probably thought he would never fly again.  But thanks to a pilot friend who acted as his seeing-eye guide, he went up in a plane, took over the controls, listened to the verbal clues of his friend and flew that aircraft!  What a lesson for us.  May we be just as quick to listen to the voice of our Pilot when we can’t see what’s happening around us  – and trust Him to give us the ride of our lives!