It is humbling. It is frantic. It is bewildering. It is also unifying because we all have felt it at one time or another. This week it has slapped me in the face four difference times. It is only four words, but you have been there and you know exactly what I am talking about.

          I feel so helpless.

          Monday started like Monday. Routine can be mind numbing, but there are worse things than routine. Like, sometimes, a phone call. This phone call went way beyond routine.

          Keith and I met when we were three. We became best buds. We grew up together. We did everything together. He has a brother, but Keith and I were closer than he and his brother. Went hunting, fishing, swimming down at the river. We worked together. Almost died together on an ill timed rabbit hunting expedition. He was somewhat small and frail, not sickly, just very slight in build. There were times I protected him. On the other hand, I would have never gotten through algebra if it hadn’t been for him. We never thought anything of it. It was just how we got through childhood.

          The phone call informed me that Keith was in Cleveland Clinic. He has pulmonary fibrosis. This is a severe scarring of the lungs. Less than one tenth of one percent of the population ever gets it. Oddly, Keith is the third person I have known to contract this disease. They don’t really know what causes it. Keith never smoked. Never worked around noxious chemicals, nothing like that. The scarring prevents the lungs from expanding and it hinders the passing of oxygen to the blood. Basically, it gradually chokes you to death. There is no cure. It is not common enough for much research to be done. Sometimes the symptoms can be managed, but it will eventually take your life. Cleveland Clinic is the best place for him to be.

          The call ended. I have to go to Cleveland for a few days! Gotta see Keith! Tell him again about Jesus! I have to….Wait. Hold on. You can’t even enter the building, much less go up and see him. This is COVID time, and Ohio is more stringent than Indiana. I could sit in the parking lot and call him, but I could do that from home. I have to go see him! But I cannot.

          I feel so helpless.

          So I call him. “Larry! Oh my gosh! They tell me I’m going to die, man! Larry, I am so scared!” I used to protect him. Can’t this time. I grew up and surprised everyone by going into the ministry. I did the funerals for Keith’s Dad first, and then his Mom. I was always the guy with answers. Not this time. No help from the old friend. “Larry, I feel so helpless.”

          Tuesday I get another call. I didn’t want any more calls. I had enough to deal with emotionally. But there are some people who have a special place in my life. This lady had been in my Youth group years ago. She still has a chunk of my heart. I needed a friend and I welcomed this call. However, she needed me more than I needed her. Her daughter has done something remarkably foolish. No, that isn’t right. Her daughter has done something beyond that. What this former Youth told me so shocked me that it took me a bit to recover. She, my former Youth, is so devastated she can hardly think. She went from everything being normal to suddenly everything being ripped apart. So, when these things happen, you call the one person who has always helped you make sense of things. Only this time it doesn’t work. In a small voice that was breaking I hear her say, “I feel so helpless.”

          Now there are two places I want to be in. I want to go and sit next to a hospital bed and tell my old bud about Jesus. I also want to go and take this special Youth out to dinner and try to walk her through her emotions. These are things I can do. God has given me a skill not everyone has. But I can’t do anything. All I can do is just a phone call.

          And then, another call.

          Tuesday afternoon. Phone goes off. It startles me. I look at it.

          You grow up in a small town, you know everything about everyone. But there are some who are just great friends, male and female. This was one of the female variety. Such a good friend as we grew up. We have a history, and most of it involves laughter. Obviously, she would be calling. Going to tell me about Keith.

          I answer. Small voice. Family member dying. Shouldn’t be this way. What am I going to do? “Good night, Larry, I feel so helpless.”

          But it was this third call where I found my answer. Keith came to Christ at his mother’s funeral when I encouraged anyone there who didn’t know if they would go to heaven when they died, to settle that right then. My former Youth had been saved before I ever met her, but during Youth group she began to see how Christ can really be a part of your daily life. And this woman whom I have known since, well, almost as long as I have known Keith, came to Christ at a tent revival I dragged her off to way back when. Not only did each of them feel helpless over their current situation, but I did, as well. I couldn’t help them! But as this strong and independent woman told me, in that lost, little girl voice, that she felt helpless, the answer came to me.

          “You know, my sweetheart, we never think to bring out the big gun until we try everything else we can think of.” “Uh, what?” “What I am talking about is that the most amazing thing we have is prayer, but you haven’t even said anything about that. Tell you what. Right now we are going to pray over this and I promise you that I am going to keep this in prayer. OK?”

          COVID has made us feel helpless. Circumstances make us feel helpless. The inability to fix a problem makes us feel helpless. Coy, Paxton, Max, Orville, Dan, Dean, Lois, Esther, Doris…..well, the list goes on. Add any name. Someone we love with an illness or foolish decisions or living a life away from Christ. So many things we cannot overcome. But we have an answer. I seriously wonder how people get by without the Lord.

          I feel so helpless.

          Bring out the big gun.