When Peace is Hard to Come By

Norma L. Brumbaugh — Thu, 21 Feb 2019 00:35:27 +0000

Peace at the Center

Written on a Sunday morning, at an earlier time.

Have you a heartache?

I do.

It happened four days ago, and I’m not over it yet. But I’m trying. One other person is involved and took the major hit more than I. It happened so fast that it was all over and done before the thing could be stopped. I was stunned, shocked, and fully impacted. So much so that my thinking went fuzzy.

But something good happened too, today, and that’s why I’m writing a post about it.

You’re never quite prepared for the unpleasant thing when it happens, just saying. It is easy to blame when you’re hurting. Now I can see that a lack of communication and lack of understanding were more at fault than anything else. And missteps were made by more than one person. That being said, the emotional and spiritual side of things will be shared to get to my problem and the way God saw fit to answer it.

The other person’s immediate response to the unsettling event was merciful, kind, and loving. The disappointing circumstance was accepted without complaint or bitterness. As the two of us commiserated with tears flowing the next day, the other person’s response was with an open heart, a pure visage, a belief in the honorable way, with love and acceptance, and with a humility that is rarely seen.

This reaction amazed me. I felt ashamed of my less than noble reaction. The following day I realized that I’d seen Christ in the other person’s unselfish, kindly acceptance of what had happened.

Pain and Struggle

For me, relief would not come. I was devastated, thought it unfair, felt betrayed, disappointed, and I felt the other person was treated with disregard, that kind of self-pitying, reactive thinking. Pain removed my smile and awakened in me an unvoiced numbing discouragement.

Bleak thoughts courted my waking hours. My writing fell silent. It felt as if I couldn’t do it anymore. I wanted to quit. All I saw were walls, defeat, not gateways or opportunities. Grief beset me. Bitter thoughts hammered away at me. No. No. No. Go away. I beat them back, only for them to return like miserable company.

I asked God for a thought to help me handle this disappointment in a godly way, in His way, for Him to help me let go of the disappointment and heartache. Nothing came. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Four days and still nothing but sick at heart. How this was affecting me was shocking to me. I thought I was stronger than that.

I prayed through my tears. I encouraged the other person’s faith, trying to put a good face on it, while bathed in a flood of my own sad thoughts. I decided to bear up alone for I knew I must accept this misfortune without involving any of my friends or relatives.

This too will pass. I knew I could not bear to languish in regret’s melancholy embrace very long without it robbing me of my soul’s joy in the Lord. One has to practice what one preaches, right?

Peace Enters

This morning, when pain revisited my waking thoughts, the phrase ‘Peace at the Center’ also entered. Peace at the Center is an old Quaker saying, one I have appreciated and repeated during many a woe. Peace at the Center is a phrase to cling to when you are in distress and also when you are not in distress. Just the saying of it can soften the edges of a stressed condition with a gentle sense of peace.

You can secure peace at the center when you choose to seek it and rest in it. Peace at the Center can chase away bad thoughts, similar to how “In Christ” you can find the strength to go through the time of difficulty.

God helps us absorb peace in the core of our being. You encourage beauty in that sentiment, in its words, in the strength of God being with you–come whatever may come. My thoughts still go to the source of my pain where an element of distress remains, but God’s peace through Peace at the Center brings immediate relief. In the saying of it, “peace at the center,” a sigh then uplifts, relaxes, and bears me up.

For All of Us

Misfortunes happen. Life hurts us and causes pain to our loved ones. Circumstances befuddle and confuse. Dreams die a painful death. We lose what is dear to us, think we get the short end of the stick, realize we are not quite so secure as we thought.

You try to make sense of what happened by looking at what is true. Then you allow the truth to set you free. Grace gives its abundance as you work it through until relief comes in and sorrow wanes.

Peace at the Center is a gift. No one has to bear their sorrows alone. God is with us. He is peace on earth, good will to men–to all, to you, to my dear ones, to your dear ones, to me. I cannot live without Him, without His peace. God is my life. He is my hope.

“Peace at the Center.”