Psalm 61

Hear my cry, O God;
Attend to my prayer.
² From the end of the earth I will cry to You,
When my heart is overwhelmed;
Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.

³ For You have been a shelter for me,
A strong tower from the enemy.
⁴ I will abide in Your tabernacle forever;
I will trust in the shelter of Your wings. Selah

⁵ For You, O God, have heard my vows;
You have given me the heritage of those who fear Your name.
⁶ You will prolong the king’s life,
His years as many generations.
⁷ He shall abide before God forever.
Oh, prepare mercy and truth, which may preserve him!

⁸ So I will sing praise to Your name forever,
That I may daily perform my vows.

When my heart is overwhelmed

I feel like this a lot lately. I’ll probably feel like this on and off until May. These past few weeks have been especially bad for me. I’ve been trying to get bibliography for my thesis, dealing with a ridiculous amount of Latin to translate, teaching a class every day, trying to get prepared to apply for phd programs, seeing doctors because my infection still isn’t responding to antibiotics, and studying for the French reading exam I took today. “Overwhelmed” is a bit of an understatement.

Lead me to the rock that is higher than I

I was so on edge today waiting to take my French exam that I actually cried over my coffee. I knew I needed to step away from everything for a few minutes, so I headed outside and called my mom, ‘cause what else are moms for? While I was sitting out there, I looked up at the side of the building and saw a dove sitting at one of the windows. Now, I never liked doves much before today. Probably because I hate the big hullabaloo people make about them, especially connected to weddings. (P.S. if you release/ have released doves at your wedding, I’m probably going to be super judgey—you know you were about Vampire Diaries, so we’re even). But this dove was all by himself not being stupid. He was just hanging out, watching everybody. I felt so much better for having seen him. I knew that everything was going to go well on my test. And half-way through Latin when I started to freak out again, I looked out the window and saw Freddie (apparently he gets around enough that the professors have named him). Thank God that He is good about leading us when we need it, for reassuring us when we’re lost, and for helping us when we’re overwhelmed.