Thursday, July 14

Don’t let your heart be troubled

Scripture: 2 Chronicles 1-2, John 14

John 14:1–3 “Don’t let your heart be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. 2 In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? 3 If I go away and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, so that where I am you may be also.”

John 14:27–28  “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. 28 You have heard me tell you, ‘I am going away and I am coming to you.’”

Observation

“Don’t let your heart be troubled.” Jesus says it twice in this chapter. He has told His followers that He is going to the Father. He is leaving them! Imagine someone you love, someone to whom you are devoted, announcing that they were dying, leaving for good. Troubling!

But Jesus asks them to trust Him, and gives them two promises.

First, He is going to prepare a place for them and will come and take them to Himself, so they will be where He is.

Second, He gives them His peace, a peace unlike anything the world offers, a peace that will sustain them while He is gone. His peace would carry them through the grief of losing Him.

 

Application

These two promises are for us as well as the first disciples. 

I have the promise of heaven, of going to be with Jesus in the Father’s house. I love Jesus and the thought of being with Him forever. 

I have the promise of His peace right now in the midst of whatever I’m going through. Jesus’ peace is more than the absence of conflict or trouble. It is shalom, thriving in the midst of trouble, joy in the midst of hardship, confidence in the midst of difficulty. 

Years ago, I read about a vivid painting of peace. It was a tree branch suspended over a roaring waterfall; there was a bird’s nest in that branch with a mother bird tending her young. Peace in the midst of the chaos.

“Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God and believe in Me.”

Prayer: Lord, I believe in You. Thank You for these promises of peace now and heaven after.