Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Don’t let your heart be troubled or fearful.
John 14:27 (CSB)
Peace on Earth, War and Peace. Intellectually I thought I understood what peace was…until I experienced the unbelievable peace that surpasses all understanding. Since then, I’ve not been the same.
In 2004, I was expecting my second child, a son, due mid-January. On Halloween, I went to the hospital with complications for placenta abruption and was put on medication to stop contractions. Two weeks later, it happened again. This time, I was sent home on bed rest. On the night of December 3, I began hemorrhaging. Unfortunately, there was a Medevac helicopter landing on Highway 17 due to a terrible wreck, and traffic was at a stand-still. I called my mother to tell her I loved her. I wasn’t sure I would see her again. When we finally arrived at the hospital, I was going into shock.
Lying on the operating table, I should have been worried about my unborn son. He was five and a half weeks early. I should have worried about my 19-month-old daughter and my husband. I should have worried about my own life. But in that moment, I felt a peace come over me that I have never experienced before or after. And I heard the words in my spirit, Everything is going to be all right. I knew at that moment that it was okay if I lived and okay if I died. I knew I was right with God.
My son turned eighteen this month. He’s 6’3”, smart, athletic and loves the Lord. And I have to believe he heard it, too, that Cole experienced that same peace that I did on the night he was born. I once thought that peace meant the absence of trauma, of war. Peace was a time of rest. But now I know it to be the presence of the Lord through the Holy Spirit. Whatever you are facing this Christmas, whatever threatens your peacefulness, turn to the One who holds the key to true peace. Jesus tells us in John 14:27, “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Don’t let your heart be troubled or fearful.”
The peace Jesus gives us doesn’t remotely resemble the peace the world gives. Lean into that peace as you end this year and begin a new one. Let go of your worry as you walk with the Prince of Peace.
