Peace

"...the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." - Jesus (John 14:26-27)

If there's anything I need right now, it's the peace of Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

I've felt so disjointed the last few weeks, as you may have noticed due to my less-than-frequent blogging here. Life is busy.

I know that everyone in Orange County is "Busy". If you don't believe me, just ask them. They'll tell you with a sigh that they are busy.

But for the last several years my wife and I have been, intentionally, living as simple and as stress free a life as we can manage.

A lot of our friends say we already do too much, but the truth is we normally only do the things we love doing and then we just do a whole lot of it. For instance, we love to serve the poor and to spend time with people so we do as much of that as we can with our kids and our house church. We also love our kids and so we spend as much time doing family stuff as we can. We also love our house church family and so any chance to be with them we take advantage of it and we do that.

Lately, however, we've been invaded by a series of time-stealing activities that have made me long for those days when we could spend more time doing what we love instead of what we have to do.

So, today at work, where I am buried under a never ending mountain of projects, I googled this verse and took a moment to meditate on what it means to lean on the Holy Spirit and to ask Jesus for his peace.

I need that peace right now. I need the joy of the Lord to be my strength.

Granted, these things that are stealing my time for the moment are passing. Soon enough my life will return to normal (in about six more weeks) and then I can stretch out and enjoy the luxury of a quiet moment with my family, or a fun time with my sons, or a warm cup of coffee with a good friend.

Until then, I am daily seeking Jesus for His peace and for the strength that God provides me through His joy.

Peace,
Keith