Do you ever have a moment when a scripture or a hymn that is just so familiar to you strikes you in a new way?

This happened to me recently. I was stressing out about a whole bunch of things, a list too long and gruesome to remember now, and in sacrament meeting that week we sang "We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet." If EVER there were a hymn that I could sing in my sleep, it would be that one. I still get a little shiver when we sing it in the presence of the living prophet, but it doesn't do all that much for me in other contexts anymore.

Except that day, when one line just LEAPT out at me:

"We doubt not the Lord nor His goodness; we've proved Him in days that are past."

What a powerful reminder that was to me that I had been so blessed, in the very areas about which I was worrying, for so many years - why would the Lord abandon me now? The simple answer was that He wouldn't. He didn't.

Is that why the prophets all through the scriptures are always reminding people of the events of their history, like Moses parting the Red Sea or Lehi being led out of Jerusalem? Maybe that's just another way of saying, "Why are you doubting the Lord or His goodness; haven't you already proved Him?"

Anyway, it's enough to keep me going to church and singing all those familiar hymns and listening to familiar lessons on familiar topics. I never know when the Spirit might have a particular message for me!

I was struck with panic today when I turned the page over on my week-at-a-glance calendar to realize that MAY STARTS THIS WEEK! How could we possibly be headed into May, when there is so much I have to get done in April?

So I did what I always do when it seems like I might have too much to do--I made a list. I'm not going to show it to you, because it's just too plain depressing, but the truth is that even if I stayed up all night every night for the rest of the week there is simply no way I could accomplish everything I'm committed to do before Saturday.

This is what I call a Gideon Moment. You remember Gideon, the servant of the Lord who was to lead an army of the Israelites against the Midianites (see Judges 6-8). The Lord looked over his army of 32,000 and said there were too many--if they won, Israel would take the credit themselves and not acknowledge the Lord's hand. So He told Gideon to send away anyone who was afraid, and two-thirds of them left. Still not good enough. Eventually Gideon's army was whittled down to 300 men.

Can 300 men defeat a host "like grasshoppers for multitude"? Not if you're calculating by the world's arithmetic. But they trusted in the Lord, and they did exactly what He told them to do, and they won. Or, rather, He won--and they knew the victory was His because it would have been impossible without Him.

There are regularly times in my life when I can see that it would be utterly impossible for me to do everything I need to. That's when I have to set aside the world's arithmetic and turn it over to the Lord. Whether it's 300 men or 300 minutes, He can make it adequate. I know He helps me--whether it's to enlarge my capacities or to shift circumstances so that deadlines are moved or just to show me what to work on first this day or even this moment. I'm still alive, employed, and married, so I guess I haven't messed up irrevocably yet! That's a victory that belongs to Him, and I'm grateful every day for the mercy it represents.