Family "Peace"

These last 24 hours have been ‘breathtaking’. Yesterday afternoon a friend whom I have been assisting in various ways called me. She had had some encounters earlier in the day that may have possible legal ramifications. We prayed over the phone asking God to give her His protection and His heart peace – which I believe He did.

Later in the day she called again. She knows I don’t ‘work’ on Sabbath but I sensed that what she really wanted was not so much my ‘work’ but more peace – which is what the Sabbath is all about - so I offered to come over with my music keyboard. Last evening my husband, his brother and I went to her place where we sang, ate and prayed, as God’s Spirit brought peace and joy in His fellowship. In short we experienced a ‘love feast’ together.

Sabbath morning a co-teacher called and we prayed together for our students and our church family and the Lord did bless in Sabbath School. Following their classes the children got together to practice a song they were going to sing for special music and asked me to play the piano for them, which to me was another real blessing.

In the worship service the speaker for today was our new Potomac Conference president, William Miller. One could almost ‘feel’ a variety of ‘expectations’ or maybe I should say, ‘questions’ waiting to be answered as to what he is like. To put it simply, my husband said it well. “That is the best sermon I have heard here”. Jesus centered? YES! Now, if that sounds good, add to it the fact that the main theme of the ‘sermon’ was “The fifth gospel”. After sharing his background – on his mother’s side Sabbath keepers back for quite a few generations - he began to share about ‘relationships’. In closing he reviewed each ‘gospel’ and its purpose and then shared God’s search for the gospel according to ‘me’. I can’t express in words adequately the ‘joy’ I experienced as I listened and agreed with the message.

Some months ago a very unfortunate experience had taken place between 3 teachers (myself included) and another family in the church. I had prayed about going to talk with the family but it had not seemed the right time. Today I felt impressed to ‘try’. To make a long story short, they had come to the same ‘attitude’ and in our time talking together God ‘brought down walls’ between myself and them this afternoon.

Last year I had agreed to head up VBS 2007 but due in part to the above mentioned incident and some other circumstances I had ‘resigned’. I was asked to reconsider and I said I would pray about it. A few weeks ago I had talked to another Sabbath School teacher friend and she expressed desires similar to what I had ‘dreamed’ of in relation to the VBS experience. After prayerfully considering a request on my part to ‘VBS team lead’, she agreed to join a ‘team’ for VBS leadership. I agreed to re-accept VBS responsibilities as a ‘team leader’ when a third lady agreed to join the team.

To me these events are opening doors in spiritual family relationships, Praise the Lord.

So what does all of the above have to do with peace as I have been learning about it?

God's plan for family was also His plan for where a person was to 'grow up' and to experience the 'joy/peace' cycle that 'grows' a person's capacity to cope with stress of all kinds.

"I'm so glad I'm a part of the family of God. Almost everything I shared above, as far as I could ascertain, had to do with relationships in God's family.

I know there may be more 'rough' bumps along the way but I also believe that God is working in me.

May you experience more peace today too.

Bringer of Peace