A Special Peace Comes Over Me Sometimes

This is part two of a four part series about Doc’s journey with terminal cancer (read part 1, 3, 4). Doc was a 69-year-old physician admitted to Hospice in October 1996. During my first two visits Doc shared how he almost died from an insulin reaction. While feeling himself “slipping away”, he told himself, “I’m not ready to die. There are things I have to do.” So in the next couple of weeks Doc completed his tasks and afterward told me, “I feel like a boy let out of school”. What a testimony to the freedom we can experience by taking care of unfinished business.

Weeks passed with Doc confined to his hospital bed. We talked about what helped him cope with being bed bound. He stated he enjoyed watching TV, especially the history channel, and listening to music. Friends and family also visited, which helped. But then, out of the blue, Doc stated, “You know, some people receive a special strength from the Lord. I’ve always been fortunate that way. A special peace comes over me sometimes. People think I’m sleeping, but I’m not. I just relax and a peace comes over me. It feels so good.”

It seems that peace is a rare commodity in our culture. Everyone seems stressed or distressed. If there really is a “peace of God, that passes all understanding” (Philippians 4:7), how do we find it? Where do we find it? Do we find it on vacation in Florida or on a Caribbean cruise? Do we retreat to the forest, return to nature? I don’t think so, because peace isn’t geographic, recreational, social, occupational, or even purely psychological. True peace is spiritual, attitudinal, positional, and prepositional.

I’ve observed that peace fills our hearts and minds when we have an accurate perception of whom we are and who God is; when we see God and ourselves in the right proportions and the right relationships.
God corrected the perception of the Hebrew people through the prophet Isaiah, when he told them; “Surely you have things turned around…I am the potter and you are the clay.” (Isaiah 29:16) How easily and quickly we turn things around and upside down. We delude ourselves into thinking we are in control.

I’ve come to believe that the first three steps of “The Twelve Steps” of Alcoholics Anonymous, are relevant to anyone and every one: 1) We admitted we were powerless…that our lives had become unmanageable; 2) Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity; 3) Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

I’m reminded of a well-worn story that graphically illustrates our struggle in living out the AA slogan, “Let go and Let God”: Once upon a time there was a farmer who liked to walk the high ridges of his farm. But one day he got too close to the edge of a cliff and fell off. On the way down he grabbed hold of a root protruding from a crack between the rocks and held on for dear life. He couldn’t climb back up and it was a two hundred-foot drop below. So he started yelling, “Help, is there anybody up there?” Finally a voice returned, “I’m God, let go and I’ll catch you.” After a moment of contemplation the farmer yelled again, “Is there anybody else up there?”

You see, sometimes we have to let go in order to realize the hand of God beneath us. I love the words of Nichole Nordeman’s song titled “What If”: “What if you’re right and He was just another nice Guy? What if you’re right? What if it’s true? They say the cross will only make a fool of you….But what if you’re wrong? What if there’s more? What if there’s hope you’ve never dreamed of hoping for? What if you jump? Just close your eyes. What if the arms that catch you, catch you by surprise; What if He’s more than enough? What if it’s love?”

Also read:
Part 1
Part 3