by By Brian Prince
You do not live in your circumstances. As a child of God, your immediate environment is Christ because the reality is that your true life is now hidden in Christ (Col3:3).
This means that your circumstances are not in between you and Jesus but both of you are looking at the circumstances from the same side. Jesus is with you in the boat.
It is no wonder therefore that Paul asks, “If God be for us, who/what can be against us (Christ and us)? (Rom8:31) That would be a foolish endeavor right — to try and oppose Christ.
Does this mean therefore that bad things will not happen to us or that we may never be overwhelmed by things happening to us? Not at all!
As long as we are on earth we are bound to be in difficult or painful situations that feel overwhelming.
“I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth, you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” (Jn 6:33)
But just because things are unpleasant and feel overwhelming does not negate the reality that Christ is with us in the situation. Remember the famous story of the three Hebrew boys who were thrown into the fire by Nebuchadnezzar because of their faith in God? But instead of God rescuing them from the fire, He appeared in the fire dancing with them. (Dan 3:25).
The presence of the Lord in the fire made the fire of non-effect. In fact when they came out, they did not even smell of smoke whereas the people who were tasked to throw them into the fire got scalded by the same fire (Dan 3:19-27).
