Calm--Not Speed.

My wonderful friend Valerie mailed me a book of daily meditations during the middle of this past semester. It's full of some really awesome stuff and helps me think and pray a lot about my life. I wanna share today's excerpt.

"In quietness and in confidence shall be your strength"- Isaiah 10:15
All agitation is destructive of good. All calm is constructive of good, and at the same time destructive of evil. When man wants evil destroyed so often he rushes to action. It is wrong. First, be still and know that I am God. Then act only as I tell you. Always calm with God. Calm is trust in action. Only trust, perfect trust can keep one calm. Never be afraid of any circumstances or difficulties that help you to cultivate this calm. As the world, to attain, must learn speed, you, to attain, must learn calm. All great work for Me is first done in the individual soul of the worker.

This really made me think. A lot. The part that talks about man wanting evil destroyed but rushing quickly to action struck me especially. Because isn't that instinctual for a lot of us? If something upsets us, we want something done about it right away. Our instinct is not to turn the other cheek, if you will. We want to call out the people who offend us. We want to justify ourselves by taking immediate action and retaliating. But this meditation gave me something to think about. When put in a situation where you feel wronged, or want to retaliate against something-- don't act. Instead, just listen. Be calm. I think "calm" takes a really deep meaning here. It's not just sitting and counting to ten in order to blow off steam. This calm is a spiritual calm. This calm goes hand in hand with TRUST in God. Trust that he can handle stuff a thousand times better than we can. Trust that acting on our emotions and "intuition" isn't always the brightest idea. God is the man. God is the ultimate voice of reason. We are God's workers. What else is our job if not to first TRUST him, because he brought us here. He didn't have to. We were given this unbelievably awesome gift of LIFE and the ability to love. How dare we think that we're in charge? How dare we think that we have it figured out? We don't. At all. Which is why seeking solace, true calm in God, is one of the most important steps in building a life in Him.
It's not easy. I'm not saying I'm a pro... at all. In fact, I'm pretty sure I suck at it. It takes a lot of humility. Swallowing your pride and crawling like a child towards God is sometimes what it takes. But oh, how much more rich, beautiful, and lovely would our lives be if we constantly trusted instead of just acting on anger or emotion.
I'm pretty sure it's impossible to calm a storm with another storm.
You can't fight fire with fire or stop a flood with a rainstorm.
The only way to live is to trust, to find God's peace. Be calm. Slow down. God's plan of action is probably way better and more rewarding than yours.
Just stop and listen. Don't try and calm a storm with a storm. Let God take over.