My life has had a dramatic turnaround in the past few days. I have had several serious problems with which I have been dealing. Everyone has problems and I will not enumerate them, so as not to bore you, but these problems have been rather successfully working toward destroying the peace my wife and I normally enjoy. So, two days ago I sat my wife down and told her that we needed to let go of all the worldly concerns that we had been allowing to torment us. The Bible teaches in Phil. 4:6 “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God”. I then reminded her that God loves us and wants only good things for us, and we needed to keep that uppermost in our thoughts and our lives.
She had seemed down and out and full of angst and this talk was like a pep rally to her but make no mistake I was thinking out loud of my own attitude too. I told her that we both needed to put a smile on our faces and thank God for the abundant blessings that we enjoy and have enjoyed all our lives. We both trust Him with all our hearts, and people don’t show trust by getting stressed out about things. I suggested that we pray about it, and when I went to God in leading this prayer, I feel it was one of the most eloquent and effective prayers I have ever prayed and that is saying something. Sometimes when I pray, I feel clumsy and inept, but what I was feeling just flowed off my lips in this prayer and I got spiritual goosebumps when I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit while I was praying. I have no doubt He was praying for me simultaneously in the mysterious manner mentioned in the Bible with groanings that are unintelligible to anyone aside from God. When finished I had a huge smile on my face and felt spiritually and mentally refreshed. My wife felt similarly, and we decided that good, bad, or ugly we would smile away any problems we might encounter, no matter how serious they might seem
Miraculously beginning that day all the things that had been troubling us began melting away like crushed ice in a warm glass of sweet tea. It was remarkable. One of the things I did was make peace with the folks who had wronged me. I called and informed them that nothing had gone on between us that warranted burning a bridge over and I wanted to make peace. Essentially, I decided to ignore what they had done and told them I wanted to become lifelong friends. Amazingly beginning with the person who had caused us the most consternation, he began apologizing profusely for his behavior and told me he had not known a moment’s peace since he had wronged me. We buried the hatchet and made peace. He was so contrite and kept on and on with the apologies that I feared it would turn into a love fest and I finally asked him to just move on and I would do the same. LOL
As I think about this today, I am more convinced than ever that the faith my wife and I have in the Savior, and the realization that no problem is too big for Him played the vital role in restoring our peace. I also had to remind myself that He wants to help us and that was key in resolving the woes we faced. Next, we decided that we were pushing too hard on trying to make things happen right now vs waiting patiently. The world is after all built upon instant gratification and when we want something or want to get something done, we want it yesterday. Finally, we had to do our part in taking action of our own. In two cases I had to eat some crow and admit gulp, that I was wrong too.
You know what? It didn’t taste all that bad and a good old apology even when you don’t believe you have done anything wrong goes a long way in soothing those ruffled feathers.
God wants our faith, and we demonstrate that faith by being patient with the full realization that He wants us to be happy and He doesn’t want any of us to fail. He loves us. We must be willing to forgive and go the extra mile in trying to preserve relationships. We need compassion for people, and we need to look at things from their perspective. Yes, all of this is in the Bible. We can do all things if we have faith and do our part which begins with Scripture. If you don’t have the peace that you desire, why not open your Bible, and read what God has to say about it, or maybe even join a Bible study program today?
Phil. 4:13
I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me . . .
Have a great weekend and go to church this Sunday!