When I first met Katie Davis Majors, she was a single twenty-three-year-old mother of thirteen daughters. Katie warmly welcomed me to the front porch of her home in Uganda, where she had moved a few years earlier to create an organization that cares for vulnerable children and their families. What struck me most in that first encounter was Katie’s exuberant, radical love for Jesus and people. In the years since, I have seen that love displayed in action and words again and again as Katie continues to pour her life into God, her family, and her community both in Nashville and overseas. It’s a grace to welcome Katie back to the farm’s table today…

Guest Post by Katie Davis Majors

Our family stood on the banks of the Nile River, one of our favorite places to be.

The rush of the rapids, the breeze off the water, the laughter, and an occasional shriek from one of our children carried up the riverbank, and I stood in awe, deeply grateful for all that God had carried us through over the past two years.

He sees all that He is doing in each situation, working all things for good.

My husband, Benji, and I had sent seven children to college on a different continent, where they were navigating new cultures and foreign lifestyles. We had added another baby to our crew, which now totaled fifteen children, teens, and young adults. We had faced more than one medical emergency that left every member of our family reeling and had us spending more time apart than together.

Like many other people, we had endured months of our country being fully locked down due to a global pandemic.

And really, these are only a few of the things that were going on, added to the daily grind of just being humans trying to love each other and our neighbors well, trying to navigate online schooling and Zoom meetings and how to get groceries while not being allowed to drive a car due to pandemic restrictions in Uganda.

And now, for the first time in more than a year, we were together.

Benji and one of our teenage daughters strapped on life jackets and jumped into the water. They swam around and then let the circular tide bring them right back in to where the rest of us were standing.

Looks easy enough, I thought, and I convinced our daughter to go again with me.

But here’s the thing about rivers: They aren’t exactly predictable.

About halfway around the bend, the water shifted. We found ourselves fighting the current, swimming with all our strength toward the shore but instead being pushed farther away.

When I finally grabbed hold of a branch, I turned to reach for my daughter. But she was too far away, her arms outstretched, her head barely visible over the white foam of the rapids. 

I’m not quite sure now if I was yelling it or only crying out in my mind: “Jesus, Jesus, save her!”

I had no idea what was around that bend in the river. Benji had mentioned falls up ahead, but I didn’t know how far, and all I could do was imagine the worst. 

I realized the tree branch might not support my weight much longer.

Slowly, I pulled myself up onto a boulder in the beating sun. I don’t know how long I sat there. My mind filled with thoughts of having to search the river for a body.

Then a set of footsteps came running from a path on my right.

I caught a glimpse of her yellow swimsuit. I heard her voice. There she was!

She ran toward me and I shouted her name as she stumbled into my arms.

“Are you okay?” I yelled, even though my face was right next to hers. “I thought I’d lost you. I thought you were gone!”

The same phrase kept dropping into my mind as I looked out at what I had once thought to be perilous: we were safe all along.

“Yeah, I’m okay!” she chuckled nonchalantly. “Some fishermen came and pulled me out. They put me on the shore just over there.” And she bounded off, laughing with her sisters, joking that they were done swimming for the day.

Fishermen? People don’t fish in water this fast.

I hadn’t seen any fishermen or fishing boats on this stretch of the water our entire trip (and I didn’t see any after that day either).

I held it together for another minute before heading back to camp. But when I got midway up the hill and found my husband’s embrace, I let myself fall apart.

“I couldn’t reach her,” I sobbed. “I couldn’t get to her. I lost her. I thought I lost her.”

“It’s all right. She’s okay. You’re okay,” he whispered.

We stood like that for a long time while my breathing slowed and I let my panic fade. Then, ever gentle and kind, Benji took my hand.

“Come on. Let me show you something.”

He led me to the top of the riverbank, where I could see, way down below, my life-saving little tree sticking out just before the river opened up into all its glory—roaring, wide and expansive.

We walked farther up, to a place I couldn’t have seen when I was in the water.

As we stood looking out, Benji pointed to all the additional places our daughter would have been able to get out had the fishermen not pulled her to safety.

There was a tiny island she might have been able to swim over to. There was a break in the current where she could have headed toward the next little bay. Long before the falls, which turned out to be more than half a mile away, there were several calm places where someone could have gotten out of the current and to safety.

The fishermen were behind our miraculous rescue that day, and I will forever believe that God sent them specifically for us.

But from the top, looking out at the whole picture, it was clear that even if He hadn’t sent those fishermen, He had also provided many other paths to rescue.

The same phrase kept dropping into my mind as I looked out at what I had once thought to be perilous: we were safe all along.

What if, even as the waters of life rise around us and our loved ones, we could live in the confidence that I’d known that day on the bank—that we were, indeed, safe all along?

For many weeks after that, I kept reliving my fear as the water crashed around me, as I watched my beloved child swept around the river bend out of my sight. Then I’d remember my relief when I changed perspectives and could see the river from above, the whole picture.

I realized it isn’t so different for the difficult seasons that we pass through in this life. Caught up in the storms and rapids of challenging circumstances, with the waves at eye level, our uncertain situations often seem impossible to escape. From inside the current, we can see only a very small piece of the river, and it is scary.

But God sees the whole picture: all the twists and turns, the places where the rapids swirl, the places of calm where we could swim lazily, the islands and tree branches that provide a place to rest, the people along the way who provide encouragement.

He sees all that He is doing in each situation, working all things for good.

At eye level, the circumstances of your life may feel overwhelming right now.

But what peace could be ours if we went through life having first seen the view from above, the entire plan? If we could see all the ways that hard things would grow us and strengthen our faith? If we could be certain that at the end we really would all be okay?

What if, even as the waters of life rise around us and our loved ones, we could live in the confidence that I’d known that day on the bank—that we were, indeed, safe all along?

[ Our humble thanks to Multnomah for their partnership in today’s devotional. ]