COMFORT IN CHRIST

“Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”  (John 14:27)

In a matter of hours, the dreams of the disciples would be dashed.  Jesus would suffer and die—His limp, lifeless body stretched on a slab in a sepulcher of stone.  Knowing the hour was rapidly approaching, Jesus sought to comfort them.  He said in John 14:1-3,

“Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me   In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you.  I go to prepare a place for you.  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.”

Christ gave us peace in our hearts.  How could He talk of peace at such a troubled hour?  Jesus knew that such peace did not depend on outward circumstances, but was the gift of God.  Truly, it is, “the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding" (Phil.4:7).  It was a favorite word of Jesus.  Time after time, we find the Prince of Peace uttering the words, "Peace be unto you."   We have peace through the Scriptures.  Jesus went on to say, "And where I go you know, and the way you know.”  (John 14:4)  God has spoken with authority concerning the issues of life and death.  We also have peace through the Spirit (John 14:17-18).  The Spirit of God indwells each child of God. He is called the Comforter.  The Greek word means, “One who stands alongside.”  He stands with us that we might stand our burdens.

Christ not only assured peace in our hearts, but the preparation of our home.  Paul said that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord (2 Cor.5:8)—and what a glorious welcome we receive there!  A place is prepared particularly for us.  In the twenty first and twenty second chapters of Revelation, John described the Holy City coming down from God as a bride adorned for her husband. It is a place where there is never a night, and the Lamb is the light.  The streets are paved with gold.  Gates are fashioned of a single pearl.  Walls are made of jasper.  The tree of life bears twelve kinds of fruit, planted beside the river of God that flows from His throne.  It will be a place of no sin, sickness or sorrow.  God will wipe away every tear from our eyes.  We will put on a robe of immortality.  Death for the Christian is just moving day.  It is moving out of the old house we used to occupy, which is no longer fit for habitation, and moving into a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

Christ gave us peace in our hearts, the preparation of our home, and, also, a promise of certain hope, “Because I live, you will live also.”  (John 14:19b)  Hopes that withered on Friday, would bloom anew on Sunday!  The source of our hope is in the fact that Jesus is alive!  He has conquered death, hell, and the grave.  The span of our hope is forever—eternal life in glory!  What a blessed hope this is!  No matter what you face today—the best is yet to come!  No matter how dark the hour—the brightest day is going to dawn!