Father, the weekend has been much fuller than I had planned. With my father-in-law taking a fall and us all spending the last two days in the hospital schedules have been a bit askew, to say the least. We are so grateful that things have turned out much better than we thought they might. He is not totally out of the woods yet but we are placing our trust in You. Thank You for Your watch care over us all.
Colossians 3:15 (<<click here)
Lord, yesterday we looked at a harmony of love and today’s verse begins with “and” so it continues that progression of thought. When we do the clothe ourselves with love we are called to “let the peace that comes from [You] rule in our hearts.”
Now, Lord, You know that unlike many of my friends and family, that when it comes to sports I am a take it or leave it kind of guy. But I do think Paul, the writer of Colossians, liked sports. According to my NLT Application Study Bible, the word rule is “from the language of athletics” and it’s saying that peace, Your peace, should rule in my heart – peace is to be the umpire or the referee when I “play” with others, if you will. Even I know the importance of officials in sports. They make sure the rules are followed, they settle disputes and they do all of this while in the middle of all the action.
So Your peace, wrapped in Your love, should be the guiding force in all I do – period. By nature (as You well know!) I quite often want things my way and it’s quite easy to follow that train of thought but from experience that is not the way of love or peace. If I let this mindset carry me along I will have some pretty blatant “personal fouls” along the way but usually, it is subtle. I quite often will bend the rule of peace to get my own way; to get what I want. I try to get away with it hoping nobody notices. But when I do that, my garment of love slips off and peace is shattered.
Lord, help me to keep love securely in its right place in my life – enshrouding my whole being. And with that in place may peace be my rule and my guide – not the world’s shallow and temporary peace but Your peace – eternal and secure.
So many times in my life my choices are made with split-second decisions. The good I could do is either ignored or it is outright shoved out of the way for selfish reasons. Sometimes my actions are subtle, many times no one has any idea what I have done or not done. Sometimes my actions are blatant and people get hurt.
Jesus, please rule in all things of my heart even in those split-second decisions. Give me a bent to the right, give me a leaning to love. Help me to place others before myself. They will truly know I follow You by my love and by the peace that rules my actions.
June 24th, 2015, Wed, 6:15 am
