“Life is not a cakewalk…." “It's no bed of roses…” “If I didn't have bad luck, I'd have no luck at all…” “The sky is falling!” In the world that we find ourselves in, all too often, these cliches take on more of a palpable punch than we wish they did. Whether it is the overcrowded schedules many of us find ourselves seemingly locked into, the divisiveness of so many current events that serve as landmines we are trying to avoid stepping on, or the global unrest that threatens national security and world peace, we as a people abide in what many would call “troubled times.” I have been listening to commentary from people older than me, people who lived in other eras that were punctuated with wars and rumors of wars, civil division and unrest, and what can be described as a transformation of what is perceived as “normal" and I find some comfort in knowing that in those situations, many of them felt that the world might never emerge from that chaos or that their lives might never recover from the collateral effects of the trauma of those days. In the 1960's there were riots in the streets of America. People were being dragged out of restaurants and bars and beaten in the streets for being the “wrong color” or for loving the “wrong person”. During the Great Depression, people were literally starving to death and jumping off of buildings in despair, believing that they would never recover from the devastation of the economic crash on Wall Street. In the 80s, as millions of people perished from AIDS, our government seemed either unwilling or unable to address this monster that was taking the lives of those we loved. In the midst of all of those seasons of America's history, people were still living and dying, being born and getting married. Divorcing (at ever-increasing rates) and suffering from illness and loss.
It is easy in the middle of a hurricane or heartbreak to imagine that there has never been another like this one. That no one has ever survived this kind of a “storm of the century,” and that this might be the one that does us in. The truth is that people did survive. We have survived many storms, atrocities, heartbreaks, setbacks, and failures. The most likely scenario is that “this too shall pass” (to borrow another cliche). That is not to minimize whatever current storm we find ourselves in, but to help us keep perspective. Storms come and storms go. We get wet and windblown. Things get knocked down. Eventually, it passes on and we dry off, rebuild, and get on with living.
Jesus famously predicted that we would have trouble in this world, and He followed it up by encouraging us not to let our hearts be troubled. The Apostle Paul encourages us not to be anxious about anything but to bring all of our needs to God with prayer and thanksgiving, knowing that He has the power to guard our heart and mind in Christ Jesus with peace that surpasses even our ability to understand. The problem I sometimes have is that I do not take them to God as soon as I could. It is human nature to sort of “sit and stew on it awhile". Many times, we only bring it to God after we have begun to feel overwhelmed. Jesus said that's ok too when He invited all who have heavy and overwhelmed hearts to come to Him and find rest and peace. It is also OK and I would say advisable to come to Jesus before we are feeling on the verge of losing it. Either way, He will prove to be faithful. Today, I remind myself and you, the reader, to ask the Holy Spirit to help us recognize our need for His peace in matters great and small, and to bring our needs to Him “early and often”. You might not understand your circumstance or the great problems of the world, but you can have peace nonetheless, and Jesus can give you that peace. Let's go to Him today and let Him fill us with supernatural peace that surpasses understanding, knowing that even in the worst storms of life, He is with us, always. -Charlie Ash