Perfect Foresight

A significant southern storm barreled into our Smalltown, USA.    The weather measured somewhere between hurricane and tornado -- five inches of rain, fierce wind, lightning,  trees snapped or uprooted, stop signs flattened, trampolines on rooftops, fences down, power outages--the worst storm we experienced during all our years living there, and of course it hit during the darkness of night.  Two of our three children ended up making their way to our master bedroom and slumbered securely between me and husband.  Our oldest child somehow managed to fall asleep in her own bed.  

At 3:00 a.m. husband and I both found ourselves awakened by the thunder.  We lay in bed listening to the wind and rain.  After a few minutes we commented to each other how strange it was that child #1 hadn't yet burst through the door as she is deathly afraid of lightning.  In my head I thought maybe we should go check on her.  I rationalized that thought away because mothers know to let sleeping children be.  I didn't want to open her door and risk waking her.  I commenced drifting back to sleep when quick as a flash husband jumped out of bed and said, "I'll be right back."  Moments later he returned carrying child #1 in his arms and said, "Make room."  Snug as bugs in a rug, or rather as snug as two adults and three children can be in a kingsize bed, we then fell back to sleep.  

The next morning the first thing child #1 said to me was "Mom, I had an experience with the Holy Ghost last night.  I woke up during the storm.  I was really scared.  I prayed I could go back to sleep.  That didn't work.  I prayed I wouldn't be afraid.  That didn't work.  I prayed that dad would come get me because I was too scared to walk to your room.  It took a little while but finally dad came!"  

Husband recalled that when he went into her room she was under her covers petrified in a tight little ball against the wall.  I remain grateful that husband heeded the prompting and was instrumental in child #1's testimony being strengthened instead of diminished.  But why did child #1 turn to prayer in the first place?  Why didn't she try yelling for us from across the house?  What made her reach out to God in that moment and why did she keep trying different ways of praying until relief came?  I'm sure it's because she had previous experience of faithfully approaching God through prayer.  She had a belief that God loves her.  She had already come to know that Christ is the Prince of Peace.  Some of her knowledge surely came from our teaching her in the home as her parents.  Some of it surely came from lessons in Sunday school.  Some of it surely came from her own life experience.  God reaches out to His children of all ages.  Often it is the youngest among us who feel most deeply a confidence in God.  

We often speak of God granting peace during a trial.  We often speak of the peace God bestows after a trial, but perhaps the most significant thing about the peace God offers is that He has the perfect foresight to grant us peace before the storms in our lives so then the word REMEMBER becomes critical to us indeed.  When the days and weeks and months and years seem dark, when the doubts creep in, take a moment to REMEMBER and recall freebie moments of peace God gifted to you before your current life storm.  Did He gift it to you right before the onset of the trial or years before?  God orchestrates things years in the making.  To Him it is but a few moments in time even if to us it looks like years.  

The reason we know Christ as the Prince of Peace is simply because He does what He saw His Father do.  He patterns His actions after God the Father, our King of Peace.  Want to come to know God rather than just knowing about God?  Pick a specific character trait you imagine He has and ask Him to make you aware of how He displays that attribute personally in relationship with you.  You'll be given opportunities to become reacquainted with the different angles of His personality and you'll be given the sweet experience of coming to know that Christ contains the same attributes as His Father.  When we read in the scriptures that Christ is in the express image of His Father we should not be so shallow as to assume that means in physical appearance only.  

We grasp onto a brighter HOPE each time we test this principle.  Give it a try, Dear Reader, then in wonder be stilled and know that God is a God with perfect foresight who first speaks peace to the soul before speaking commands of peace to earthly elements.