Peace Beyond Understanding

In 1873 a man named Horatio Spafford stood on the deck of a ship in the middle of the Atlantic. The captain told him they were passing near the place where, a few weeks earlier, the Ville du Havre had sunk in twelve minutes. Spafford's four daughters had drowned there. His wife survived, and her telegram to him said, "Saved alone."

Spafford wrote the hymn "It Is Well with My Soul" out of that crossing. The line people sing the loudest is the one that cost him the most: "When sorrows like sea billows roll." He did not write that the sea was calm. He wrote that something held steady while the sea was wild.

That is what Paul actually promises in today's verse, and it is narrower and better than the way it is usually quoted. Look at the verb: "shall keep your hearts and minds." It is a soldier's word, the word for a guard posted at a gate. So the peace of God is more than a mood that settles over you and makes the problem feel smaller. It is a guard, set over the two places where you break first, your heart and your mind. The phrase "passeth all understanding" means this peace runs ahead of your ability to work out why you have it. That is exactly why it does not vanish when your reasoning runs out. Paul wrote these words as a prisoner, and he ties the promise to the instruction just before it: "Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God." In the old English, "be careful for nothing" means do not be anxious about anything.

Notice that the waves are never told to stop. The whole promise is built as a guard posted inside the storm. God's peace stands where you cannot stand, and through Christ Jesus it keeps the part of you that would otherwise be overrun. So bring your requests to God today, with thanks, and let Him post the guard.

Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 298 is Number Our Days (Psalm 90:12).

All 365 readings in Daily Manna