How do you keep moving forward when your life suddenly changes and everything you thought you knew turns out to be a lie? Join us as Celeste looks at how to find peace in the unknown through the lens of the first episode of Daemons of the Shadow Realm.

Blog Version

As soon as I heard that the incredible creator behind Fullmetal Alchemist was making a brand-new anime, I knew exactly what I wanted my first devotion for “Anime April” to be about. It was just perfect!

In the very first episode of Daemons of the Shadow Realm, we are introduced to Yuru. At first glance, he’s just a normal, upbeat young man. He’s eager to help his village, he clearly loves his sister and his granny, and all around, he’s just a good kid.

For the majority of the episode, you get used to his world—a very traditional, rural life in Japan. We watch Yuru hunting with a bow and arrows and people tending to the fields. But within the last 15 minutes of the premiere, the entire world flips on its head for both the audience and Yuru.

It turns out that it’s actually the modern day! The whole village has been lying to Yuru to protect him. They’ve been living behind a barrier that has suddenly fallen. Now, what exactly they are protecting him from, we don’t know yet, they didn’t share that in the first episode, so we’ll definitely be watching episode two to find out!

Provision Before the Problem

The fact that the entire village was protecting Yuru from someone, or something, before he even realized he was in danger got Dallas and me thinking. God provides us with exactly what we need, whether that be protection, preparation, or provision, long before we even know we need it.

This directly parallels the life of Joseph, whose story you can find in Genesis 37 through 50. (That’s a lot of chapters, so I highly recommend going back and reading it yourself, it’s a fascinating story!).

To give a quick summary: as a kid, Joseph had some prophetic dreams. He shared those dreams with his brothers—which he probably should have just pondered in his heart instead of bragging about—and it made them incredibly angry. They were so angry that they sold him to slavers, who then took him to Egypt.

In Egypt, Joseph worked his way up through his master’s house, only to be falsely accused and thrown into prison for something he didn’t do.

Positioned for Purpose

Sitting where we are today, we know for a fact that Joseph being thrown into prison, and later being pulled out of it, was the exact chain of events needed to place him in a position of ultimate influence. That specific positioning allowed him to save not only his own people but the people of Egypt from a massive famine.

What looked like a really, really bad couple of years ended up being the very means God used to position Joseph to save two different groups of people.

In our own lives, we don’t know the future. We don’t know what’s coming. Sometimes, things look incredibly grim. Everything around you might look like it doesn’t make sense, and you just don’t understand why certain things are happening to you.

But we know, because of Romans 8:28, that even if the things happening to you are not God’s “perfect” plan, He will still work them out for your good according to His purposes. Does He want bad things to happen to us? No. But He will use those difficult circumstances to show His glory and His provision through our lives.

So, no matter what you are going through right now, no matter how hard it is or how confusing your situation might be, pray that God will use you and your circumstances for His glory. He has provision that you can’t even see right now. It is coming. It may not work out exactly how you want it to, but it will work out exactly how it is supposed to.