Finding peace in troubled times

How anxious are you about the future in light of the turmoil and madness of the present? How worried are you that our country will be completely overrun by totalitarian autocrats? How frustrated are you by the unbelievably nonsensical opinions and actions of healthcare professionals, school administrators, government leaders, and Olympic officials?

My answer to all the above fluctuates between the extremes of “Very” and “Not.” Pretty weird, huh? Am I schizo? No. (At least I don’t think I am. Do schizophrenics know that they’re schizo?) Like a pendulum, my state of mind regularly swings from grave concern to settled peace because I am a human being and human beings need reminding.

So every morning (and throughout the day as well) I scroll through “X” to see what the devil’s been up to, and I get angry and anxious by all the glaring examples of his continued and even heightened activity. “This is so wrong! So crazy!” Sometimes I just think it; sometimes I shout it. All times I feel very disturbed.

And then I metaphorically enter “the sanctuary of God.”

Psalm 73 speaks of the psalmist’s frustration witnessing the arrogance, pride, prosperity, and violence of the wicked. He bemoans how they “scoff and speak with malice [and] threaten oppression.” I can relate. He starts slipping into despair and disillusionment as he tries to understand how this state of affairs can be in God’s will. Until, he says, “I went into the sanctuary of God; then I discerned their end.”

When the psalmist turned his attention to and focused on God, he was reminded that the Creator of the universe has total control over all things. God was not unaware of all that was disturbing the psalmist. And this turning of his gaze from his circumstances to God’s character and power moved the psalmist’s soul from “embittered, . . . brutish and ignorant” to being at peace.

Because he remembered that the sovereign Lord of the universe will judge the wicked. If they do not repent they will get the punishment they deserve. And we’ll get to watch.

Our current state of affairs, with all the deception and ungodliness, may continue and even increase. Or . . . godly and courageous people, by the power of the Holy Spirit, may succeed in restoring truth and righteousness as our guiding principles. At least temporarily, because the devil will not surrender, though his ultimate defeat is sure.

Believers do need to be salt and light in our world; we aren’t to just sit back and watch the country burn because God is in control. But because we know that he is, our souls can be at rest even when our activity and prayers don’t achieve the change we want.

And because, like the psalmist, we know that God is with us and that someday we will live eternally in a world where everything has been made right.

Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. – Psalm 73:23-24