We’ve all been there: wake up late, the oldest kid late for school, the youngest misses the bus, the chores aren’t going to be done, no fire in the woodstove, no time for a shower…and late for work.
I can hear the hurried steps pounding above me, footsteps racing back and forth, up and down stairs, in and out doors, kids complaining, dogs barking.
In the beginning I offered to help, but the request was brushed off. “I have everything under control.” So I let the morning play out because we’ve all had mornings like this.
But it’s different for them. I’m praying for peace in the spaces between them, where anger lives and harsh words that can never be taken back slither near the surface…God’s peace. ‘Cuz who wants to go to school or work angry. God’s peace.
I never used to pray the kind of ‘out there’ apostalictic personal prayers that move mountains, the prayers for invisible help like peace. Who can see peace? Whether or not God intervenes is a toss-up, impossible to prove yet impossible to disprove. Or so I once thought. Now I know. Nothing is impossible for God.
My folks, my brothers and I, are not a close family. We live in different states. We hardly see each other. We never visit each other. We hardly ever talk on the phone or gather for holidays. So it was an awkward time when my father died because the five of us in one room together didn’t know how to break the ice. Silence was unbearable but small talk and ‘remember when’ conversations were unthinkable. We all meandered in our own little walls of grief under one roof.
We three younger kids used to tease my oldest brother about being the ‘mail man’s boy’. He didn’t resemble any of us. He stood short skinny pale and unathletic, with thick black rimmed glasses. But when my father died, when his body set in its open casket behind the priest’s podium, when my oldest brother stepped into the light to pay his respects to my father, I caught my breath and could not contain the tears. My older brother, the same age as my father had been when I left home years ago, was the spitting image of the man in the casket, a younger version. Life staring down at death. Death staring up at life. One in the same but different. I closed my eyes and whispered, “Oh Lord, You promised if we pray for peace You’d give us a peace beyond all understanding. He needs it, Lord. He needs it. Please.” I didn’t think much about the prayer; just something said silently for a brother you loved and a father you never knew you’d miss.
After the funeral, we all went back to the house. Most of us had kids to chase after or the time of sitting and/or pacing would have been unbearable.
I Feel Peace Somehow
My oldest brother had no kids. He had no spouse. He was the only one who had consistently visited my folks, had stood vigil with my father at the hospital, had shared Sunday dinners with my mother, had kept the family ties alive.
I remember sitting in the kitchen, at the glass table, rocking back and forth uncomfortably on the black swivel chair, The glass sliding doors were at my back, the stairwell leading to the front door in front of me, kids screeching from every corner. I heard my oldest brother walk across the kitchen floor to a spot right behind me. He leaned in over my shoulder. “It’s so weird,” he whispered. “I just feel peace somehow.”
To this day, the rest of the visit is a blur. But I know ‘peace beyond our understanding’ is real. I can pray that prayer and know peace beyond our understanding will evolve whenever wherever for whatever reasons.
I pray it now for my family above me.
Outside it’s raw gray cloudy and cold. Rain is in the forecast. It’s in the air. Maybe snow. The wind tends to catch itself up here on the hill and blow twice as hard than on the street. I’ve got to get to Home Depot to buy tarps to cover up the wood piles, bungi cords and cinder blocks to tie down the tarps. Or they’ll be no dry wood for the woodstoves. Oh how I hate the cold.
Ukraine Right Now
I can’t imagine living in Ukraine right now. Russia has destroyed the Ukrainian infrastructure. Not just in a town or village. Not just in a city or suburb. The entire country is without heat. Now they’ve had their first snowfall. Kiev is illusionarily beautiful. But oh so cold. And at night, oh so dark. The two things I hate most – the cold and the dark. I keep praying for them all, but I see no results The electricity is not magically on. The Russians have not miraculously stopped bombing bombarding and conquering, murdering torturing and kidnapping. Where is Your Hand in all this? Help them! Help them! Send the Russians home and bring on spring.
There but for the grace of God, I am safe and warm, a thousand miles away. Yet it isn’t fair that I’m safe and warm, a thousand miles away, while they suffer.
I could pray for this peace beyond all understanding, but what would that peace look like? Bigger than an international agreement on paper? Bigger than a 10 pt Peace Plan or a Victory Plan or a Resilience Plan? Would it include more people dying? No more people dying? The peace beyond all understanding has no strings attached, no ultimatums, no human suggestions. It just is! Beyond my understanding!
Would I still pray for this ‘peace beyond all understanding’ if it included the death of my own family or the destruction of my own country? Where do I draw the line and let You be You – God be God? In its early days, the Russian invasion of Ukraine was simply an obvious moral commitment for good versus evil. Now that peace in its present form could include my own state of self-preservation, is this prayer of ‘peace beyond understanding’ a good thing?
Trust Is So Hard
I could stop trusting the world around me as it appears and start trusting You the Creator of this world. Trust is so hard. That which can be seen vs what can’t. Present vs future. The created vs the Creator. Praying ‘peace beyond understanding’ is not an easy prayer to pray.
“In the time of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed nor will it be left to another people. It will crush all those other kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure forever.”
Death before life. Winter before spring. It was all fine and good to read these words in the Old Testament as old, as history, as done. But suppose that it is now, history in the making, His Story in the making. Suppose the death of those kingdoms included the death of my own country. Before my very eyes. Would it be OK then? Peace beyond understanding? Lord, what is peace beyond understanding? Must it first include death beyond understanding?
Peace Beyond Understanding
“Is it true, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, that you do not serve my gods or worship the image of gold I have set up?”
“We do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to deliver us from it and he will deliver us from Your Majesty’s hand. But even if he does not, we want you to know, Your Majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”
Peace Beyond Understanding
“So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.” (1Peter 4:19)
Peace Beyond Understanding
“Be anxious over nothing…” (Phl 4:6)
“Pray without ceasing.” (Thes 5:17)
“And continue to do good.” (1Peter 4:19)
So simple.
So hard.
The rain has begun. The wood is getting soaked while I am dry and warm in my basement apartment Have I failed my world by not rushing from here to The Depot to buy the tarps? Is praying more important than covering the wood? I could say “yes” right now in the spirit of His Love, but I may beg to differ tomorrow when we all need dry wood in the woodstove to stay warm.
If all I can do for the wet wood or the world’s troubles is to pray for ‘peace beyond understanding’, is that right or enough while the wood gets soaked and the Ukrainians are dying?
“…to start becoming yourself prodigally to whoever needs you, to love your neighbors when an intelligent 4th grader could tell you that the way to get ahead in the world is to beat your neighbors to the draw every chance you get – that was what this God asked, Paul wrote. That was what this God was. That was who Jesus was…that in the long run it is such wordlly wisdom of the intelligent 4th grader’s that is foolish and the sublime foolishness of God that is ultimately wise …” (Buechner)
Maybe the wood won’t get soaked through and maybe the Russians won’t fire so many missiles tonight or steal so many children or torture so many POWs.
“If I talk my own truth, it is of no more important to you than your talk is to me, but if I talk the truth of God, you will meet it again and so will I.” (Chambers)
Peace Beyond Understanding
“And the peace of God which passes all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” (Phl 4:7)