Fri­day eve­ning. Af­ter the wor­king week I sit down among ot­her ser­vi­ce gu­ests. My mind is ti­red – so emp­ty and so full at the same time. I feel I would not have had the phy­si­cal strength or the so­ci­al ca­pa­ci­ty to come to ser­vi­ces. My mind goes back to the events of the past week, the en­coun­ters and dis­cus­si­ons with my friends.

It is good that se­ve­ral songs and hymns are sung be­fo­re the ser­mon, and I can just sit there deep in thought. I lis­ten to a song about the many things we find dif­fi­cult to un­ders­tand. I feel a lump in my throat. I al­so un­ders­tand so lit­t­le. The song con­ti­nu­es about the fog of doubt that obs­cu­res our view and our need for a he­a­ven­ly friend. The words hit a sore point in my he­art, and te­ars be­gin to run down my face. I take my phone and re­turn to my re­cent dis­cus­si­on about the be­au­ty and the hard­ness of life with my friends.

I have so many doubts, and I am ti­red of doub­ting. There are many things that I know about and un­ders­tand very lit­t­le, and the more I know, the more I doubt. Doubts make me pau­se and pon­der about my life. They may gui­de me to­ward good things or cau­se me to make bad choi­ces. Doubts may cau­se an­ger and fear to block my mind or re­mo­ve such blocks.

Faith in­vol­ves doubt. When the dis­cip­les gat­he­red be­hind a loc­ked door, Je­sus en­te­red the room and said: “Pe­a­ce be with you.” I won­der if I am al­so co­we­ring among my doubts be­hind a clo­sed door? It is so good to know that God’s grace can re­ach even in­to that clo­sed space. Doubts of­ten make us slow down and look for strength from faith, for an abi­li­ty to see bey­ond our own mind and will and to trust in God. The mo­ment when doubts fade away and faith shi­nes bright­ly is won­der­ful. One can feel God’s love even un­der the pain of doubts. I wrote about this to my friend:

”I pray that God would let His light shine on the dif­fi­cult si­tu­a­ti­on. So that I would fear what needs to be fe­a­red. That I would rely on what is safe and se­cu­re. That I would not wil­ling­ly build a wall against fear, but would trust in God’s bles­sing and the se­cu­ri­ty of His pro­tec­ti­on. That I would be strong where God wants me to be strong, not where I would my­self like to be strong.”

The most dif­fi­cult thing is to pau­se when I need to be humb­le. It would be ea­sier to find a roun­da­bout way around the mat­ter or to turn a blind eye to it. So­me­ti­mes I even make the mis­ta­ke of bla­ming so­me­o­ne el­se for what I can­not face my­self. But when I am ab­le to con­fess my own we­ak­ness, I ex­pe­rien­ce the mer­cy and love that give a pur­po­se to my life. That ma­kes me hap­py even in the midst of pain.

I am hap­py when I am sur­roun­ded by this love and my doubts. I am hap­py be­cau­se, on my lo­ne­ly watc­hing post, at ser­vi­ces and at work, I feel the pe­a­ce en­gen­de­red by God’s grace. ”This day has been a mi­rac­le. I be­lie­ve even more strong­ly that God gui­des all things and lets all things hap­pen. I feel calm and pe­a­ce­ful. Con­fi­dent. I fold my fin­gers qui­et­ly and pray that God’s pe­a­ce would come over us and would open the minds of both the weak and the strong to be­lie­ve in His good­ness. Even my mind."

I hear the an­noun­ce­ment: ”We be­gin the ser­vi­ces and sing hymn num­ber 195. ”Our yo­un­gest, who is qui­te tall al­re­a­dy, keeps tur­ning around on my lap. The ol­der child­ren are sit­ting close to me and sin­ging. I am hap­py that they have come to lis­ten to the words of grace. Right here and right now, I have a glimp­se of he­a­ven­ly pe­a­ce. “Pe­a­ce I le­a­ve with you; my pe­a­ce I give to you. Not as the world gi­ves do I give to you. Let not yo­ur he­arts be troub­led, neit­her let them be af­raid.” (Joh. 14:27.)

Text: Hen­na Kin­nu­nen

Trans­la­ti­on: Sirk­ka-Lii­sa Lei­no­nen

You will find the ori­gi­nal Fin­nish blog post here.