One morning, out of blue I started thinking about Ruby Bridges. I believe God placed her on my heart that morning encouraging me to stand strong. He knew I tend to struggle with anxiety issues especially with what’s happening around us nowadays. God continues to be faithful to me, despite my weakness and anxious thoughts by reassuring me so many times. He knows I needed many reassurance to help calm me down. Like I mentioned earlier, I tend to put up a confident front to others, but deep inside I know I struggle with this from time to time. It’s important to remember that God is in control and only HE can give us peace. My previous blog entry on anxiety & OCD (link to blog post), I talked about how we must keep our focus on God and not see things with natural eyes. I realize that it’s easier said than done and hard to focus when you are in full-on anxiety mode. I learned that it helps to stop train of thought and sit still if you can, focus on God, pray to Him, mediate on His promises and verses, even when bad thoughts keep on coming on like storm waves battering against rock and God is our rock. We just stay on that rock! And not to be floating in water, swayed back and forth by the storms.
Anyways, back to Ruby Bridges. I am inspired by how God created her to be such a shining example of confidence and faith to others. So I went on to read more about her and learned a lot about her (https://www.biography.com/activist/ruby-bridges).
She was such a small child! Surrounded by angry and hateful mob much bigger than her, yet every day she walked to school. Surrounded by protection. Peace amidst chaos around her. And now I see that she is alive and well as an adult. What an amazing testimony of God’s love in her life! God’s strong protection over her! It shows that despite how bad and dismal it looks in the natural, God can see His children through hard times. I feel that it’s amazing how God carried her through all these years by placing the right people, challenges, opportunities in her life to help her grow and thrive in all she can be! This verse below also came up on my heart.
James 1:2-4 (AMP) – 2 Consider it nothing but joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you fall into various trials. 3 Be assured that the testing of your faith [through experience] produces endurance [leading to spiritual maturity, and inner peace]. 4 And let endurance have its perfect result and do a thorough work, so that you may be perfect and completely developed [in your faith], lacking in nothing.
James 1:2-4 (ESV) – 2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
As I read more about her life, I saw how God watched over her in many ways.
- National Guards escorting her safely so she can learn in school
- A special teacher named Barbara Henry tenderly giving her heart and dedication to Ruby, taking the time to make sure she get good education (YouTube video about Barbara Henry)
- Supportive mother who told her to be brave and pray which Ruby said helped with crowd yelling
- Psychologist who helped Ruby cope with being rejected and hated
- And probably many more folks in her life that we don’t know about
And Ruby Bridges did her part
- Walked every day to school
- And learning in school
- Praying and leaning on God
- Forgiving others!
- Not letting others stop her from living a life
As I dug a bit deeper in Ruby’s life – I saw that she was a woman of faith, that her mother taught her about God. Ruby testified that God personally had a hand in her life. And her quotes reflected her faith in God –
Throughout my life, my prayers have actively sustained me – held me up, carried me through.
My mother said to me, ‘Ruby, if I’m not with you and you’re afraid, then always say your prayers.’
My mother had taught me that the only thing you could depend on was your faith, and I had that.
I felt God’s immense love for her, just as God has immense love for me, making sure I get support and care to be able to thrive in this world from when I was young. God loves each of His children immensely, therefore PRAISE GOD for being so good to us. Remember, He didn’t promise that life will be easy for us, but He did promise that He will see His children through good and bad times!
Check out YouTube video about Ruby Bridge
Below are more quotes from Ruby Bridges. She allowed the light of God to shine brightly from her heart unto dark world that we live in.
Somehow, it always worked. Kneeling at the side of my bed and talking to the Lord made everything okay.
Every day, I would show up, and there were no kids, just me and my teacher in my classroom. Every day, I would be escorted by marshals past a mob of people protesting and boycotting the school. This went on for a whole year.
The people I passed every morning as I walked up the school’s steps were full of hate. They were white, but so was my teacher, who couldn’t have been more different from them. She was one of the most loving people I had ever known.
The more faith is tested, the stronger it gets.
The greatest lesson I learned that year in Mrs. Henry’s class was the lesson Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to teach us all: Never judge people by the color of their skin. God makes each of us unique in ways that go much deeper.
Though I did not know it then, nor would I come to realize it for many years, what transpired in the fall of 1960 in New Orleans would forever change my life and help shape a nation. When I think back on that time and all that has occurred since, I realize a lot has changed. I also know there is much more to be done. That fateful walk to school began a journey, and we all must work together to continue moving forward.””
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