A Little Peace and Chaos

"It was the biggest crisis of my life and I had peace.  It was incredible."  That was the statement I heard from a young man this week who was recounting how God worked in his situation. His premature, new born baby was in a neonatal ICU - struggling.  The young man's father had come to visit and he had a major health crisis and ended up in the ICU in another part of the hospital.  Crises do not usually crash into our lives alone.

So how do we get peace when your child and your father are both in ICU?  The interesting thing about where God teaches us peace (as well as patience, kindness, love and pretty much every fruit of the Spirit) is that it comes in the places where it is hardest for them to naturally exist.  In the places where it seems life takes peace, God teaches peace.  He takes us beyond the natural to grow the supernatural. 

Think about that in your life.  Have you ever learned patience without actually being in a place where you have to wait?  I haven't.  Peace is the same way; God teaches it to us in the crisis and the chaos.  If we learn it there, peace will be there when the crisis and chaos go away.  And the peace will be stronger.

This Sunday we are going to be learning about God's peace.  I have a sneaking suspicion that many of us are in a place to learn it  - right now.

for the journey...

Tim

Joy Full

Some of the most joyful people I have known have been the people most unlikely to have it.  In my days of doing ministry in prison, I can recount some men who taught me a lot about having joy.  They did not talk to me about it, they simply showed it to me while living in some pretty dire circumstances - un-air conditioned, crowded, dreary dorms living among the desperate and dangerous.

I remember one young black man from Colorado; he was one of the best worship leaders I have ever been around.  We sang everything with out any instruments except for our clapping hands.  Every time he lead us, I always experienced a very real sense of worship, largely because he seemed to express so much joy in leading us.  He was miles away from any family.  He was in prison for a very serious crime, yet he was full of joy.  What he and others taught me is that joy is a choice.  I can choose joy wherever I may be circumstantially because I have a relationship with Jesus.

Joy, like many great spiritual experiences, is more likely to be caught before it can ever be taught.  Much like C. S. Lewis said about peace, joy is also something that cannot be had and does not exist apart from God himself.  If we really follow God long enough and close enough, he will lead us to joy.  It comes second in order only to love as a fruit of the spirit in Paul's list in Galatians.

Dallas Willard said, God is, "the most joyous being in the universe."  So how much joy rubbed off on you today?  How much got shared with others?  How do we grow in it?  These are some of the things we will look at on Sunday and beyond as we look at the joy of Paul in the book of Philippians.  I would enjoy your company in it.

for the journey...

Tim