Pastor Caroline - In Peace

 

In Peace

 

Psalm 4 Verse 8 Good News Bible.

When I lie down, I go to sleep in peace;

you alone, O Lord, keep me perfectly safe.

 

How beautiful is this statement. When I lie down – I go to sleep in peace.

How many people lie awake at night for hours with a busy mind and a heavy heart? Their thoughts race with anxiousness over things they cannot change, prevent, or secure. Their hearts are heavy because of some actions, hurts, and / or sorrows they’ve had over their lifetime. Peace is the farthest thing from their mind.

 

You alone, O Lord, keep me perfectly safe.

When we repeat this statement over a few times it just seems to calm the soul. Only God, in His great wisdom, power and strength can keep us perfectly safe. In the wildest storm, in the most hostile attack, in your deepest sorrow and your greatest fear, only God can give you peace and keep you safe – perfectly safe.

 

Our peace is not found in possessions, money or success, I have learned over the years.  As we see right now especially in the war between Ukraine and Russia (please continue your prayers over this war and all the people it affects) all of these things, and life itself, can be stripped away in a moment. The banks can be shut down, grocery stores can have bare shelves, your money and success are totally useless. The older I get the more I realize every day that the peace of God is the one and only possession I have that I can really keep here on earth until I am called home, and then my peace will increase.

 

Today’s world is full of disaster, pain, sorrow, illness, war and whatever else can draw our attention away from God. However, in His infinite wisdom He gave us the Bible and all it contains concerning life here and life eternal. When the television has no good news turn it off and pick up your Bible because it is filled with Good News. Yes it tells stories of disaster, pain, sorrow, illness and war, but it also tells us how God supplied the needs of those who obeyed His word.

Those who chose to be attentive to His instruction were kept in His care. He then, took “to glory, in His timing”, those who were sheltered under His wing. Oh how He covered them and kept them perfectly safe.

In Verse 3 of Chapter 4 here in Psalms, we read:

(3) Remember that the Lord has chosen the righteous for his own,

and he hears me when I call to him. (GNB)

Where do we draw our peace? From the Lord and His word.

 

When we are faced with uncertainty, calamity, destruction and peril it is then we need to find our peace in Him. Read your Bible daily, be in prayer daily so that your mind and heart are set on the things of Heaven and the things of earth will grow strangely dim, as the old song says.

 

Just imagine if every night, all over the world, people laid their head to bed in peace because they were perfectly safe in the Lord. What a beautiful world it would be.

When I lie down, I go to sleep in peace; you alone, O Lord, keep me perfectly safe.

Enjoy your day in the peace and presence of the Lord.