Dear Members and Friends of Prince of Peace,
When think of how Jesus cared for people while visibly present here with us, we are quick to think of the feeding of the 5000. There, the people following Jesus, listening to Him as he taught, found themselves in the middle of nowhere with the darkness of night setting in upon them. The people needed food, and to fulfill that need, the disciples suggested sending the people to the villages nearby. Jesus, however, instructed His disciples to feed them and they did so with only five loaves of bread and two fish—which Jesus blessed. It was a miracle.
If only such miracles still happened still today! Right? I mean, it seems like we too are in a desolate place! The situation caused by the pandemic has been challenging in one way after another. Jobs have been lost, positions furloughed, and work requirements altered—sometimes radically so. Restaurants have closed and then opened, and then closed again. Stores have called it quits. Activities have been canceled or modified. School has re-opened-but with a new format of sorts. Masks have become the order of the day and who knows when bicycles will ever be available again!
How is it that we can be brought through such a challenging situation?
Well, miraculously. By depending on the provision of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. By our relying on our Savior whose solutions to the problems that we face every day are so often simply not even close to what we are thinking.
Something breaks in our house, we get an estimate for the repair, an estimate that is way beyond us, and a friend fixes it instead—a friend that we did not even know had the ability to do so. We go to the doctor with a minor problem only to have a major life-threatening problem discovered, and operated on successfully. We find we can no longer participate in an activity due to physical limitations, or financial concerns, or logistic impossibilities only to find that something new and more beneficial becomes possible.
I mean the list could go on an on and on here about how we try to address a challenge in life, and are stumped, only to have that challenge met in a way of which we would never think. Is this miraculous? As miraculous as the fish with the coin in its mouth caught by Peter to pay the tax for Jesus (Mt. 17:24-27). The miracle was not in the coin being in the fish. The miracle was not in the fish being caught. The miracle was in Peter catching the fish in which the coin was–as Jesus had directed.
So let us simply take to heart the familiar words of our Savior:
“Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” Matthew 6:31-33
