A sense of Calm

This post was written March 9, 2009.

The title is somewhat contradictory to my last post considering it was in fact written before. I guess the only explanation I have is that at times I have this amazing sense of peace about everything, and at other times, like when I look at my to do list and start thinking about all that needs to be done, I feel overwhelmed.
Yesterday, I was talking to our amazing Beyond Borders prof and I told her that usually I'm ok if I just don't think about it too much. She told me I should put a sign on my wall saying "Don't think" and I could even make it bilingual if I wanted to! This is good advice because every time I start over-thinking everything that is coming up in the next month and a half of school and then leaving for the summer, that's where the sense of drowning comes in.

so here's the post that has been sitting on my desk for the past 2 days, (there is some repeat form the last post):

Tonight I was in the chapel at Saint Jerome's University and I had the most wonderful inspiration. It has been a long time since I have posted and I have been worrying about that because I wanted to write but I wanted it to be meaningful. So here goes.

In the past week or so, school has become very busy on top of Beyond Borders preparations. I love both but at times my 'to do' list becomes rather long and daunting. So for me on Monday morning this week had already started out as a worry week.

Tonight though, I went down to the Chapel to do my prayer & reflection time that I try to do each day. As I knelt in the Chapel and just let myself be still I felt this amazing sense of calm and peace settle over me. When I opened my Bible I came upon the story of when Jesus and His friends are in a boat, Jesus is sleeping and a storm comes up and His friends are worried so they wake Him and He commands the storm to stop, and immediately it becomes calm. And then He asks them: 'Why were you so worried?'

Now as I sat and let the familiar story settle in a totally new meaning became clear.

My worries are the storm and when I give in to them I start to toss on the waves, but when I run to Jesus he calms the storm that's raging inside me. I can almost see him lovingly shaking his head and saying "silly girl, why do you worry yourself into such a storm?"

I immediately felt the need to write about this and one of my major worries had been my rejecting this blog. Thank you Jesus for answered prayers and inspiration.


A few parting words of wisdom offered to me by my roommate on one of my previous worry days:

Matthew 6:34

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. (New International Version)