Our Peace and Overcomer

     "If you want to make God laugh, tell Him your plans."
     I have no earthly idea where or when I first heard that, but it came to my mind today, and I thought, "hmm, I'm just thinking God has had a good chuckle over my 'plans' only five and a half weeks ago."     Needless to day, these past weeks were nothing we could have possibly planned for or wanted or even imagined.  We just take so much for granted and live by faith in more ways than we can begin to realize.  
     We believe the sun will rise and set as always.  We make plans for tomorrow assuming we will be here and will enjoy continued good health and strength to carry out those plans.  We assume and believe we will see our loved ones again at the end of the day. We implicitly discount any possibility of accidents or disease or foul play when it comes to the lives of those close to us.  We believe we will always have more time to tell people we love them, to show them how much they mean to us, and to do whatever God may be prompting us to do... even if it is tomorrow or next week or next month.
     But I've learned none of us is guaranteed next year or next week or tomorrow or even the next hour.  We are not promised a lifetime free of struggle and strain--in fact we are assured just the opposite.  "In this world you will have trouble..." (John 16:33a)
     Yes, we will absolutely have trouble... but that's not the end of the story or the verse:
         "... But take heart, I have overcome the world." (John 16:33b)
     And earlier in the very same verse He tells us that "I have said these things to you, that in Me, you may have peace." (John 16:33, again!  What a verse!)
     What a promise, what a Promisor!  We will have trouble in this world.  But we need never be discouraged or distraught for our Savior has overcome the world and whatever might befall us in this world.  He is greater still than any crisis, any challenge, any disease, any accident, any evil, anything this world can throw at us or against us--He is not only greater, but He has already understood it, undertaken it, and overcome it.  And if He is with us and for us, then we too can withstand and persevere and overcome as well.
     And not only that, in the midst of it all, right in the middle of the fiercest storms, the most impossible problems, He has promised that He is our peace and will give us peace.  Like so many of His promises, I used to just read that and think, how nice, He is our peace.  But I never knew how inconceivably wonderful that could be until we endured a long, fierce storm.  The kind of storm that was utterly unexpected, unanticipated, unexplainable, unendurable... apart from the supernatural peace and presence of the Lord Jesus.
     But it was there!  Unbelievably, incredibly, His peace--the peace that truly, that literally, passes all understanding--was there.  We felt His peace.  We were sustained by His peace.  We were carried from day to day, hour to hour, by His peace.  And just as He overcame the cross, He overcame our fears and moments of despair every single time.  We would just keep handing the fear and sorrow and uncertainty over to Him, moment by moment.  Just as soon as we handed it to Him, He gave us His peace and His overcoming power and presence.
     That's not to say we didn't fear--we did.  Or that we didn't cry or experience great sorrow--we did.  But they didn't overwhelm or overcome us.  Never.  He was our Overcomer.  He was our Victor.  And in Him, we enjoyed His peace in the midst of the battle... the battle that He was waging and fighting and winning with us and for us.
      I say all this just to remind myself--HE IS ABLE!  See, sometimes I forget.  Sometimes I forget what it was to stand by the bedside of an unconscious child day after day with nothing but the Savior and His Word and His beautiful body of Christ to sustain us... and that was always always always enough.
     I forget about His grace.  I forget about His love. I forget about His power--available to each of us every hour of every day.  I forget in my busyness and preoccupation about how graciously and miraculously far He has brought us.  Like I said the other day, I tend to forget about our chains... and that because of Christ, our chains are gone.  So I start making my own plans, formulating my own agenda, all the time forgetting to seek His plan, His way for me this week, this day, this hour.  Forgive me Father.  Forgive me for always thinking my ways and plans and ideas are best.  When they aren't.  Never were.  Never will be.
      Thank You for Your promises, Lord.  Thank You for Your Word that reminds us of Your faithfulness and power to overcome.  And thank You that You don't just give us Your peace... You are our Peace.  And in You, we will overcome whatever the world may throw at us.  By the blood of the Lamb.  By the Word made flesh.  By the Prince of Peace.  By the Way, the Truth, and the Life--whose way is always the best.
      Help us to remember, Lord.  Thank You for overcoming for us and in us.  And thank You, our Peace.  To God be the glory.