Peace in Every Circumstance
Like you, we are doing things differently this week from what we had planned to do. Today Ray and I, along with our team member Josh, were supposed to be on our way to the Homeschoolers of Maine convention scheduled for this coming weekend. However, that convention was cancelled, as was the GHC St. Charles convention Ray and I planned to attend the weekend after that.
Our small congregation had church as usual yesterday morning. Ray centered his sermon on prayer and the current health crisis in the world. As President Trump asked us to do, Ray led us in a congregational prayer.
While Ray sat with me before time to preach the sermon, he whispered to me, “Things seem so normal here.” In his sermon, he told our congregation, “You are so normal.” Ray was contrasting the worshipful, friendly calm at church with the whirl of news we’ve been following online and the schedule changes affecting us personally.
This week I want to live a “normal” life while making wise choices in light of current realities. I’m sure you want to do that, too. Through it all, we need to remember that the coronavirus is not the only reality. A normal church service with normal people was a reality on Sunday. With the new CDC recommendations yesterday that no organizations have events with more than 50 people, we may not be able to experience that next Sunday.
However, other realities are still true:
- God is God and He is for us.
If God is for us, who is against us?
Romans 8:31b
- God is holding tight to His children.
But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer
through Him who loved us.
For I am convinced that neither death, nor life,
nor angels, nor principalities,
nor things present, nor things to come,
nor powers, nor height, nor depth,
nor any other created thing,
will be able to separate us from the love of God,
which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 8:37-39
- God really does have the whole world in His hands.
By awesome deeds You answer us in righteousness,
O God of our salvation,
You who are the trust of all the ends of the earth
and of the farthest sea;
Who establishes the mountains by His strength,
Being girded with might;
Who stills the roaring of the seas,
The roaring of their waves,
And the tumult of the peoples.
They who dwell in the ends of the earth stand in awe of Your signs;
You make the dawn and the sunset shout for joy.
Psalm 65:5
- God cares about our “normal” life and wants us to pray for it.
First of all, then,
I urge that entreaties and prayers,
petitions and thanksgivings,
be made on behalf of all men,
for kings and all who are in authority,
so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life
in all godliness and dignity.
2 Timothy 2:1-2
Today many parents of children in public and private schools will have the opportunity that you have every day as a homeschooling family–to live life all day with their children.
This week, as you read to your children, play with them, teach them, hold them tight, comfort them, protect them, and tuck them in at night, this is my prayer for you.
Now may the Lord of peace Himself
continually grant you peace
in every circumstance.
The Lord be with you all!
2 Thessalonians 3:16