Relief – October 15, 2026

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In that day they will say, “Surely this is our God; we trusted in him, and he saved us. This is the LORD, we trusted in him; let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.”
Isaiah 25:9

Relief

At the Johnson Space Center in Houston, you can see one of the most famous rooms of the 20th Century. “Mission Control” is the room where row after row of engineers and specialists worked day and night to support the Apollo moon landings. It’s also the site of one of the greatest moments of pure relief in American history.

On April 17, 1970, the three astronauts of Apollo 13 were about to re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere. Their spacecraft had suffered catastrophic damage four days earlier, and Mission Control worked around the clock to do what needed to be done to bring them home. Everyone in the room understood that there would be a four-and-a-half-minute blackout in communication with the astronauts during re-entry. Everyone also understood that if the astronauts did not respond after four and a half minutes, their spacecraft had probably burned up and they had perished.

The blackout began. One minute. Two minutes. Three and then four. Four and a half. Silence. Five minutes. Five and a half. Nothing. Six minutes. Then, crackling on the radio static, an astronaut’s cheerful voice. At the sound of that voice, all the pent-up anxiety and stress and grief and fear melted away in an explosion of relief and joy.

In Isaiah chapter 25, God’s people are hurting. Life has left them feeling bruised, broken, fearful, anxious—and guilt-ridden because of their sin. And so, God points them to his promises. He points them to t