GOD’S PLACE OF TRANQUILITY

When you are distressed — when you feel overwhelmed with fear, laid low by great affliction, troubled by concerns for your future — God says there is a secret hiding place. It is a place of comfort where we find composure for our souls.

Where is this secret hiding place? It is a chamber in your mind that Isaiah describes this way: “You [the Lord] will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You” (Isaiah 26:3, my italics).

When God tells us, “Shut the doors,” this is what He means. He is showing us the need to shut out the many troubling voices in our head. We are to close the door to all thoughts about tomorrow, about world events. Jesus told us, “Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things” (Matthew 6:34). The Lord who has faithfully brought us this far will not fail us in the days ahead.

Consider these cries of the Psalmist:

“Be merciful to me, O God . . . for my soul trusts in You; and in the shadow of Your wings I will make my refuge, until these calamities have passed by. I will cry out to God Most High, to God who performs all things for me. He shall send from heaven and save me; He reproaches the one who would swallow me up. God shall send forth His mercy and His truth” (Psalm 57:1–3, my italics).

“When I remember You on my bed, I meditate on You in the night watches. Because You have been my help, therefore in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice. My soul follows close behind You; Your right hand upholds me” (63:6–8).