Anxiety Will Be Swallowed Into Peace

January 16

The world is fraught with anxiety. People are experiencing a sense of foreboding that shows little evidence of abating in spite of the various interventions of governments that are designed to eliminate poverty, increase man’s self-sufficiency, and reduce man’s dependency on an ever decreasing supply of natural resources.

The benevolent endeavors of men to afford assistance to those who are desperate—in spite of man’s best efforts—find the monumental problems confronting our world increasing rather than lessening.

The machines of war still traverse the seas and overarch the land. Combat gear is still the attire of the world’s armies, for swords still have not been beaten into plowshares (Isaiah 2:4) and man has not yet arrived at the point when he shall not know war anymore (Micah 4:3). Peace negotiations are doomed to failure because the opposing sides have placed inflexible expectations upon their outcome.

It would be logical to throw up our hands in despair…to give up hope of ever living in peace and prosperity because strife and war are on every hand. Man seems incapable of putting aside his prejudice against his brother and man seems incapable of winning the war on poverty that has spent itself to no avail over the last 50 years.

Only when we delve into the Word of God do we find cause for hope. In I Peter 3-5, the Apostle exults, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In God’s great mercy, He has caused us to be born again into a living hope, because Jesus Christ rose from the dead!

“Now we hope for the blessings God has for His children. These blessings, which cannot be destroyed or spoiled and cannot lose their beauty are kept in heaven for us. God’s power protects us through our faith until salvation is perfected for us at the end of time.”

Though we now “see through a glass darkly, then we shall know Him fully as we are fully known, for we shall see Him face-to-face,” II Corinthians 13:12. When Jesus returns, all mysteries will be unveiled; all problems will be solved; all men who have placed their lives at His feet shall abide as brothers.

Anxiety and foreboding will be swallowed up in the absolute peace that will attend Christ’s thousand year reign upon the earth (Revelation 20:6). We who believe will “rule and reign with Him,” II Timothy 2:12, if we will but endure.