Is It Summer Yet?

It is May 2011...from dark, dreary, and cold to warm, summer like weather over night. I didn't think I was going to make it to that special day when we say, "Yes! Open all the windows!". It is momentous that we, here in the Mid-West, have made it through another winter. Though, I was thinking today about who we are during our stormy winters that matters more. Are we just holding out for the sun and warmth or can we find true rest in the middle of the storms of life?


I am challenged to want to take that sigh of relief, not after, but during the crisis at hand. I want to live in the rest that God says He gives to us if we turn our eyes to Him. I love the story of Peter in prison in Acts 12. James, the brother of John, had just been put to death and Peter was arrested and put into prison and guarded by four squads of four soldiers each. The night before he was going to be brought to trial he was said to have been sleeping between two soldiers. SLEEPING, yes, sleeping. He was not awake worrying about what was going to happen to him the next day or wringing his hands in disbelief that he was in this position to begin with. He was so at rest with the circumstances at hand that he was peacefully asleep. More so, he was at rest with who was in control of his circumstances.

Then, I love how he is woken to the angel. When we are willing to accept our circumstances and rest in His presence, God shows up. He is never on the "other side of the fence", He is always right where we are. Sometimes we are so busy trying to get out of the pain or crisis we are in that we miss that God could have given us the refreshment we needed during the wars we fight on the frozen cold battlefields of life. He is there...Psalm 27. When David is speaking of evil men advancing against him and his enemies attacking him; his desire is still this-"that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life." His desire to be in God's presence was at the forefront of his mind in spite of the enemies that were pursuing him.

I hope and pray that I can live in the presence of God and truly rest in Him, like these men did thousands of years ago.  I want to have the peace of God exuding from my soul as the wars around me wage on.  I want to put myself out there as a lightning rod in a storm so God's power can be seen in the dark not just when my life is sunny.  This challenge has been set before me that I might be able to continue in the work that God has given me.  That through whatever happens, I will BE at rest in Him who has sent me to love the widows and vulnerable women of Zambia.  Come what may....