Welcome to Welling for your spiritual well-being and your ministry overflowing. We have been in a rich verse in scripture, something that meets the cries of the human heart right now in the distress that we have faced across the world, personally and corporately, in the destruction that we are seeing, in the death that is being experienced.
This fabulous verse, which I had not noticed until the start of COVID, has comforted me throughout the entire season and is comforting me right now, giving me the courage needed to face some other matters at a time of personal need. It simply goes, now may the Lord of peace himself continually grant you peace in every circumstance, slash, in every manner. And then the apostle Paul in second Thessalonians 3:16 says, the Lord be with you all.
That’s how he finishes that verse, the Lord be with you all. That whole verse is a wish, we said at the very beginning. We said it was a prayer, definitely. But it is also a promise.
That phrase, the Lord be with you all, is a common phrase in the Old Testament. Yahweh, God himself says he will be with his people. Who has not claimed the incredible verse of Isaiah 41 where the Lord promises his servant.
He says, do not fear, for I am with you. Do not be anxiously looking around here about you, for I am your God. I will strengthen you. Surely, I will help you.
Entire songs and verses have been written around that great, great claim of the Lord in Isaiah 41. In promise, I will uphold you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. And that’s the exact phrase the Lord Jesus claimed for himself when he told his disciples, I will be with you till the consummation of the age, till the end of the age. Not only to his original disciples but to their perpetuation in succession throughout of history, when this present age continues, I will be with you.
No wonder the apostle Paul here says, the Lord be with you all in accompaniment, in presence. Not just passively, but actively assisting you and aiding you and aiding, assisting me. He will never leave you, nor forsake you, said the author of the Hebrews. Jesus, the Lord will be with you.
I pray for his total protection daily. I pray for his protection from harm and danger, from sickness and weakness and pain. I pray for his protection from Satan and my very self, from waste and mistakes. I pray for protection from a temptation and sin. I also pray for his provision, his global provision daily, ideas, of opportunities, of resources, of activities.
But most importantly, not only his total protection and his global provision, I pray in confidence for his personal presence, for the Lord being with me. His presence gives me eternal peace in the face of fear. It gives me internal courage in the face of risk to take them.
It gives me internal peace and the strength to persevere. For after all is said and done, it’s not my perseverance. It’s his perseverance on my behalf. That’s individual peace. But the last word of this verse says, be with you all in a corporate piece, all of you together, all of us together.
Did you know this is an oblique but not an obscure claim for the deity of Jesus, again, by the apostles? Not only Jesus’ own claim when he said, all authority is given to me in heaven and Earth. Go pursue my commission. And those pursue my commission, you have my presence, to all of us who are pursuing his commission.
I have seen this corporate kind of peace in the most remote parts of the world, claiming this remote verse in the scripture. Where Christians going through suffering, they experience peace in the middle of persecution while facing martyrdom, while they are decapitated and decapitated. I have seen this peace with Christians going through sickness, peace in the Middle of pain, transcendent peace, beyond explanation, which surpasses all understanding, not against and without explanation, not I against and without understanding but definitely a transcendent peace, not just a transient peace.
I’ve seen these Christians who are going through sorrow, pressing on in the middle of peace, experienced in the middle of pain, all coming from the Lord of peace who continuously grants us peace in every circumstance, in every way. That wish, that prayer, that promise is how I finish today, once more sharing with you not just a correlation but the cause. The presence of the Lord of peace gives us the peace of the Lord in every circumstance, in every way. The Lord’s peace be peace, be peace to all. Amen.