Hold Your Peace

“The LORD will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” Exodus 14:14

The command comes from the Lord, and sitting down reading this verse, it might seem the easy way to go. Hold my peace? Not a problem. Imagine that this command comes to us while the mob rages in front of us. We know that to hold our peace will suddenly become much more difficult, because this mob is going to say the worst things and do things we don't want to see. It would be easier if the insults and injustices were hurled at us personally, but no, it will be any way they can get to us. Injustice will be thrown at those we love and respect. False witness will come forth against innocent ones. Now try to hold your peace. Already the arguments are marshalled inside you about whether the Lord meant our peace to be silent or not. Yes, not so easy now, is it? 

Another time of difficulty is in those battles of the mind. In place of winning the contest that takes place only in our imagination, the Lord calls us to hold our peace and He will fight for us. A little disappointment may leak into our feelings as we realize that in holding our peace there will be no more easy victories in the imaginary war to help us feel good. And what is the Lord doing there? He isn't fighting the way we would or would have Him to fight. The greatest difficulty in obedience of this command might be holding our peace while the Lord does in His perfect wisdom what we do not expect of Him. This very thing caused the Judeans of our Lord's day to reject Him as the Anointed One even as His love spoke a request to the Father to forgive them from the cross of His salvation. 

Amazing and wonderful is our Lord.

Bucky