Recently I was talking with a woman who is 57 and has no children. She has no peace either. She questions God, feels uncomfortable with her childless state and is in a constant wrestling match with how her desires do not line up with her reality. She wants children and she cannot have them. Medical help for infertility and the pursuit of adoption and foster care were all fruitless and expensive and endeavors which got her no closer to having the family she longed for. Peace seemed a million miles away.
Acceptance is not the same thing as peace. We can accept our circumstances and still have no peace. We can endure the brokenness in our lives and still hate it. We can resolutely hold the cards we have been dealt and still grow bitter, angry and resentful. Acceptance does not beget peace. Only God can usher peace into a heart that has been ravaged by pain and longsuffering.
When Jesus was in the garden of Gethsemane the night before his crucifixion, he was in great turmoil and distress. He did not like the circumstances set before him and was in so much agony that it felt like sorrow was crushing the life out of his soul. I cannot think of a more anxiety-provoking time than the night before you know you will be tortured to death.
“Then he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death;”
Matthew 26:38
Have you ever noticed that on the day of his crucifixion, just hours before he is hung on the cross, Jesus seemed quite calm? He stood quietly before the chief priests, Herod, Pilate, soldiers and an angry mob who wanted to kill him. He did not plead with them for his life. He did not appear to be frantic or upset. He was not on his knees begging to be spared and crying about how life was unfair. The distress from the night before seems to have vanished.
Why the difference? How can Jesus go from a man sweating drops of blood due to anguish over his circumstances to a man standing almost unruffled in the face of certain death?
That night in the garden, Jesus prayed. He literally fell on his face praying before God, asking that things might turn out differently. Through continual prayer, Jesus surrendered his will to his Father’s will. His circumstances most certainly did not change but Jesus walked out of that garden with a peace that allowed him to stand before his accusers with dignity and quiet strength. His surrender ushered in supernatural peace which allowed him to carry out the final steps of his mission on earth.
Surrendering peacefully to torture is inconceivable. Surrendering calmly to an unjust death carried out by people you were only trying to love and help is absolutely illogical. Having peace with the fact that you are 57 years old and cannot have the children you so desperately want does not make sense. Having peace despite painful circumstances raging around you is not rational.
Peace in the face of pain and suffering is illogical because it’s supernatural. God’s peace transcends reason and fact and reality.
“And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your
hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Philippians 4:7
Jesus didn’t will himself into peaceful submission. He prayed, surrendered and allowed God’s supernatural peace to flow through him until he took his last breath. Did he still cry out in anguish on the cross? You bet. Will we still have moments of confusion and distress as we face our hardships? Yep.
Peace does not eliminate all future doubts, anguish or questions. Peace surpasses those doubts and frustrations with the security of knowing God will see us through our darkest moments.
Ephesians 2:14 tells us that Jesus Christ himself is our peace. We have access to this supernatural peace because Jesus is the peace we long for. It may not happen overnight like it did in the garden of Gethsemane, but peace will come as we faithfully draw near to Christ.
In Christ, peace is our forever.
