MONDAY MEDITATION: The Terror Outside the Door (January 13)

 The one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. — 1 John 4:4b

I’m writing this on the morning after the “winter storm of the year” started. We had gone to bed with dire warnings of ice, snow, downed power lines, impassable roads–basically, Armageddon–floating in our minds. My wife accurately described the feeling: “It’s as if we’re in a horror movie, and we know there’s a terror right outside the door, about to come in.”

And how many times have we felt that way? When we face something that’s ahead of us and we’re terrorized by what might happen? A health challenge, such as surgery or treatment? A family situation? A vocational crisis? Whatever it is, the feeling is the same as when we went to bed that night: We can plan as much as we like, but we simply don’t know what the future may hold, we can’t control it, and it’s easy to fear the worst.

Maybe such times serve to teach us a really good lesson. Control of our lives is an illusion. There will always be things that creep up on our front porch, knock on our doors, and dare us to answer. The best we can do is listen to the soft reminder that the elder in the early church, John, gave his flock. Paraphrased, it’s this:

You’re scared, uncertain, uncomfortable–fine. Just remember that you never face anything alone. Jesus once promised that he is always with us, even to our very last breath and beyond. So, every time you fear that terror outside the door, say to it: “You don’t scare me anymore. Greater is the one who is in me than whoever is outside my door!”

There’s still another 24 hours before the wicked weather is supposed to end. We don’t know what ultimately will happen. But we do know who is waiting it out with us–the one who once said to the waves during another storm warning, “Peace! Be still!”

POSTSCRIPT: The terror ending up being nine inches of snow covering a layer of heavy, thick ice. With me recovering from shoulder surgery, it left my wife alone to shovel sidewalks and driveway. We’re very grateful that, without our asking, someone mysteriously did an early shoveling, and two neighboring couples came over and pitched in to help Barbara. Such folks were Jesus in disguise, since he was famous for being moved by compassion and doing surprising things!