Things were really active at our house tonight, but in a very good way.  Jessica, Will, and the three girls arrived home earlier today after having been gone for several days of vacation in north Georgia.  Gale decided to cook supper for our family tonight, so the air was full of chatter from excited girls as they brought Nana and Papa up to date on everything that has been going on since they last saw us Sunday:  Mallory was excited about getting her first car, Addy was filled with glee over what she saw at the Cabbage Patch doll hospital in Cleveland, and Raegan was busy running all over the place.  It was a lovely evening with lots of Nana’s good country cooking that is better than can be bought at any restaurant anywhere around (and that homemade peach cobbler that she baked from fresh peaches made a delicious grand finale!).

As I sat at the table watching Raegan enjoying vanilla ice cream, I could not help admiring her for the look of not having a care in the world.  She had that glow on her face that we should all have:  no worries, but complete confidence that all her needs would be met; she leaves life’s worries to her parents and grandparents.  Then I wondered at what point in life do we lose the joy of complete trust in the absence of all worries?  I do not know the answer to that, but I do know that somewhere along the way it becomes easy for us to trade the joy of complete trust for the heaviness of worrying and fretting over a lot of things that we should leave in the hands of our loving and providing Heavenly Father.

There is no doubt that life is full of tough moments.  Some of them are significant and life changing while others are little more than inconveniences, but at the time they are happening to a person, all of them tend to serve as a source of heartache and worry.

It was a really stressful moment when Christ, preparing His disciples for His death on the cross, said to them, “My children, I will be with you only a little longer.  You will look for Me, and just as I told the Jews, so I tell you now:  Where I am going, you cannot come” (John 13:33, New International Version).

That was a statement that must have nearly knocked them off their feet, but He did not leave them without hope.  Take note of the hope He offered them:  “Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Trust in God; trust also in Me”  (John 14:1).  One writer suggests that another way to convey what Christ was saying is, “Stop being troubled.  Set your heart at ease.”

Life contains many moments and events that are hard to bear, and as was the case with the disciples of Christ as recorded in John 13, to learn that something has occurred or is about to that will forever impact your life can seem as though you have been knocked off your feet.  Perhaps you have already been there.  May I remind you that you can take comfort, because there is hope through trusting in God.  His word to you is the same as it was to those to whom His words were originally spoken:  “Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Trust in God; trust also in Me.”  Because of His love for you, He provides hope that enables you to “Stop being troubled.  Set your heart at ease.”  A great goal in life is to trust the Lord enough to be at ease like a child no matter what the circumstances.