We're back in northwest Ohio. We'll be spending the next two days here, then five days in Canton, and then returning here for another three days or so. It kind've feels like we're on very long ride, but we've only just started.
I hope to debrief a bit about the conference in the next day or two, but I have one thing going through my mind/heart currently, and that is a desire for rest.
I was reading through the beginning of Romans this morning and was struck by the typical greeting from Paul. "Grace and peace to you..." is a greeting Paul gives in almost of his letters, but it hit me this morning probably because of how desperate I am for those things currently; and how desperately I will need to cling to them over the course of the next month or so.
We were hoping that simply upon arrival back into Ohio we would be replenished. Not openly, of course, because that would be just silly, but at some deepl level we find a desire for rest and peace. And grace. Probably mostly grace.
Our lives have been a whirlwind recently and will continue to be for this stage of our lives. Transitions are never easy, especially ones across continents! So how can we slow down? How does one find rest and peace amidst craziness? My guess, and what the bible seems to affirm, is that it is only found in the gospel.
It is the gospel that affirms our rest is in Christ. It is the gospel that tells of God wrapping his arms around us, carrying us through. It is the gospel which affirms Gods kingship and dominion over everything on earth, in the USA or in Venezuela. It is the gospel which alerts us to the realities that our fatigue, our anxieties, indeed all our weakness and frailty are a result of both a fallen and broken world and our fallen and broken part of it. Then the gospel takes those weakness and frailties, it takes all our brokenness and that of the world, and brings it before the one that can mend all pain and make all things right. We go to the one in whom we find our true desires met and the worlds true pain erased. We go home. As God looks on lovingly, tearfully - no rather as he runs out of his home to embrace us who are his wayward, tired, and broken children, we find all our unrest and our pain cease. We find, indeed, grace and peace.
So to that we cling for this next stage.
1 comment:
Praise the Lord for those, "Grace and Peace to you" greetings. We have a brother at our church who often greets everyone with that when he sees you and it is a real encouragement in the Lord.
Remember that no matter where we are our home is in Christ. We are His dwelling and we are found in Him also. I don't get it totally, but it is a great thing to trust!
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