“You are good, good, oh-oh.” I was humming the song on Sunday morning as I rushed dirty dishes into the dishwasher to be run as we left for church. I wanted in that moment to turn to our little Google Home Mini (that one that aggravates me so, because we have communication issues) to ask him to play the song, but I didn’t have the time to listen to him telling me “That song is only available for Google Play Music subscribers,” so I finished my task and rushed out the door.

And then, as it happens, a couple hours later, after teaching the fifth-grade girls Sunday School, and participating in a grown-up Sunday School, and finally settling into the worship service, the familiar notes began, “Let the King of my heart be the mountain where I run, the fountain I drink from. Oh, He is my song . . .” and I was so grateful for a God who creates little miracles just as beauitfully as he orchestrates the big ones. My soul needed this moment, this moment to get lost in the declaration that our God is good. And I don’t have to be who I once was. Because He is good. And I don’t even have to be who I was just yesterday or the day before. Because He is good.

And the God who created a good work in me is carrying it into completion, but sometimes that good work gets torn apart by human nature, and it feels like we’re back at the beginning. And then we get to move forward again.

Because He is good.

And then the song begins to close with one simple refrain, “When the night is holding on to me, God is holding on.”

And I know how that feels. A night that’s holding on. I know it on so many levels, but in that precise moment, I can feel it physically.

See, for awhile now my gallbladder (what a lovely word, isn’t it?) has been attacking my body, and with it, my peace of mind and my comfort, because when a sharp pain radiates through your body and makes you feel like your body might separate from itself at any moment, it’s hard not to feel like this is the end, and it’s all going to crash down around you right then and there. It’s hard to focus on anything in that moment, or for those hours, as these attacks have been known to last. And I know I’m not the first to suffer under such attacks and I know there are worse, more chronic conditions out there, but when you feel a pain so intense it doesn’t matter much that it could be worse or that others have experienced it, as well – right then, in that moment, it’s your pain. And you feel it. And having that other head knowledge doesn’t make the pain any less real for you.

And, though still not a regular occurance, this particular form of attack only tends to occur at night. Generally not long before I was hoping to settle into my pillow and gather some much needed rest. Instead, I find myself breathing slowly, in and out, any effort to create an illusion of control over the pain. It doesn’t help the pain, but it helps to make me remember I’m going to survive. And I sit for minutes, hours, waiting for the pain to pass. And everyone in my house is asleep (because I can’t have my husband losing sleep, as well – someone will need to deal with those four children after Mommy has lost her sleep to the pain).

And I’m alone. In pain. With the darkness surrounding, despite the best efforts of the lamp I keep ablaze. And there’s something about the darkness, about the night, that just makes everything feel so much worse. There is comfort in the day. In light streaming in my windows. There is hope in the sunrise.

But the darkness breeds despair. And I can feel it.

Yet this last time I suffered such an attack, just a week before I found myself worshiping to this very song, I had been curled up, praying for God to take my pain away, and I was reminded of yet another song by a favorite artist. It begins, “I have unanswered prayers. I have trouble I wish wasn’t there. And I have asked a thousand ways that you would take my pain away” and I began to sing. And skipping the next few bars, I continued straight to the chorus: “When my world is shaking, heaven stands. When my heart is breaking, I never leave your hands. . .  Your hands that shaped the world are holding me. They hold me still.”

I may have been singing them all kinds of out of order and out of tune and with the most weak of voices, because even talking is a chore in these moments, but the choice to worship in the moment and rely on my Creator, that choice washed over me and the pain dissipated. And for two more hours I had no pain. Of course, it’s not magic, and the attack resumed after that small break, and I continued to sing in my mind into the wee hours of the morning before the pain dissolved for good and I finally drifted to sleep, but what was most comforting in that moment was the truth in the words. The hands that shaped the world were holding me. They hold me still.

And when the night is holding on to me, God is holding on. Even when it’s still hurting. Even when we don’t know when the pain will ease. Even when the despair of darkness continues to surround. God is holding on.