Jesus at the Helm

I’ve finished Colossians in my devotions. Still, I find myself coming back to Colossians 3:15 over and over again. There’s just something about that verse that speaks to my heart right now. There’s something about allowing God’s peace to control my heart. It’s a lesson I’ve really needed hammered home as of late.

This week has been a lonely one. It’s been a week where my daughter and I have pretty much been on our own. It’s had days where I’ve desperately needed to speak to another grown-up. Do you ever have days like that?

It’s been a week that has really caused me to think about where my heart abides.

Does it abide in circumstances?

Do I spend more of my day worry about the things happening around me then I do on my knees?

1 Thessalonians 5:17 tells us to “pray constantly.” Do I do this?

I hope that I do.

I need to pray constantly.

Why, you may ask?

Because, my dear friends, I need the strength of God so much. I need Him to help me through the hard days. To encourage me on the discouraging ones. To give me the strength to be the mommy I need to be to my little girl, the wife I need to be for my husband, and the friend I need to be to those around me.

I try time and again to do it on my own. But I can’t. I can’t meet the demands of this life without my Jesus at the Helm of it all. I have only made it this far in this thing called life because of His strength and peace.

Grab hold of him dear friends. Let him take your heart and fill it with His peace. Let Him take control. Trust me, there’s no better place to be.

A Peaceful Heart

^“And let the peace of the Messiah, to which you were also called in one body, control your hearts” [Colossians 3:15, HCSB).

“You’re unworthy,” the voice says. “You’ll never make it. Why don’t you just stop trying?”

The battle rages on and on in my brain. Daily Satan tempts me, encouraging me to give up on what is true and right and believe his lies of deceit. His lies are good ones, ones that focus on my own weaknesses and past failures. He knows how to push my buttons.

But I serve a God who is greater than Satan and his lies.

I serve a God who promises to invade my life with peace and joy.

Sometimes, as I walk through a particularly hard day, it’s a continual battle. A continual process of taking those doubts and placing them in the hands of Jesus.

Because I long for peace so much more than strife.

I don’t want to dwell on past mistakes and failures.

I don’t want to remember, once again, how other people have let me down.

Instead I want to focus on how great my God is.

And so I pray, once again, that peace would invade every corner of my heart. Because there’s no better place to be.

A Prayer from Colossians

Good morning dear friends! Take a moment and let these verses sink in. They’re truly amazing ones. They remind us where our focus should truly be in this life:

“For this reason also, since the day we heard this, we haven't stopped praying for you. We are asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding,  so that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing [to Him], bearing fruit in every good work and growing in the knowledge of God. May you be strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for all endurance and patience, with joy giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the saints' inheritance in the light. He has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of the Son He loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins”

[Colossians 1:9-14 HCSB)

Some prayers of my heart:

May I always grow closer to my Savior.

May I bear good fruit, fruit that shows the love of God living in me.

May I have joy, glorious joy, even during a time of deployment. Because I feel that life is too precious to not live every day with joy.

May I have patience, patience with my daughter as she grows and learns and patience with my husband as we keep our marriage strong from a distance.

May I never forget the great price that was paid for my sins!