Covid-19 recently visited our house and I should’ve checked its pockets before it left. Apparently it took a lot of my brain cells with it. My every attempt at creativity has proven futile.
“Why don’t you just use an old column?” my husband suggested.
“Because that feels like cheating,” I replied.
But as my deadline drew near, I prayed one of those very desperate prayers and almost immediately, clear as a bell, a column came to mind that I wrote about 20 years ago. When I found it and read it, I understood why.
So with some minor tweaks, here is that piece, titled, “God is Bigger Than the Boogeyman.” Maybe you’ll find it, as I did, more relevant now than at any time in our lifetimes …
She’s all grown up now, but when a friend of mine, Sarah, was just three years old, she had a chance to remind her mother and two strangers how very big God is as they huddled together in a hotel bathtub during a tornado in Myrtle Beach.
Sarah and her mom, Michelle, were out and about in Myrtle Beach when they realized a tornado was coming. With nowhere else to take cover, Michelle knocked on the door of a random hotel room and asked the people staying there if she and Sarah could take refuge in their bathtub.
They were welcomed in, so Sarah, Michelle and two strangers all crouched in the bathtub together, waiting for the tornado to blow through. Sarah was understandably scared, so Michelle asked her, “What does God want us to do when we’re afraid?” To her surprise, Sarah burst forth in song, and here’s what she sang: “God is bigger than the boogey man. He’s bigger than Godzilla or the monsters on TV. Oh, God is bigger than the boogey man and He’s watching out for you and me … .”
Sarah had learned that song from a Veggie Tales video called, “Where’s God When I’m Scared?” I bet there were times when her parents thought they’d pull out their hair if they heard that video playing one more time. We all know how mind-numbingly relentless children can be about their favorite videos.
But as little Sarah sang words of profound and simple truth in that hotel bathtub during a tornado, all the hours spent watching Veggie Tales cartoons suddenly bore real fruit. The silly song became the voice of God, reminding not just one, but four, of His children that He’s big, He’s in control and He loves us.
What’s your boogey man look like today? Like Covid-19? Cancer? Financial troubles? Addiction? A rebellious child? A broken relationship?
If the winds of life are howling around you, pause and hear little Sarah sing these words to you:
“You were lying in your bed, you were feeling kind of sleepy, but you couldn’t close your eyes because the room was getting creepy.
Were those eyeballs in the closet? Was that Godzilla down the hall? There was something big and hairy casting shadows on the wall.
Now your heart is beating like a drum, your skin is getting clammy, there’s a hundred tiny monsters jumping right into your jammies.
What are you going to do? You don’t have to do anything, because God is bigger than the boogey man — He’s bigger than Godzilla or the monsters on TV.
Oh, God is bigger than the boogey man and He’s watching out for you and me.”
Thanks again, Sarah, for the reminder. We need it as never before.
“Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.” – Isaiah 41:10