Hello and welcome back to the One Thing podcast. The Word of the Lord for today is Ecclesiastes 10:4. And it's really the second half of the verse and I really love this it says, “...calmness can lay great offenses to rest.”

"God can allow us to step into a place of mercy, we can come into a place of reconciling things that we may have messed up..."

And this whole verse if you read it, it's saying you know, ‘If a ruler's anger rises against you you do not leave your post; calmness can lay great offenses to rest.’ So bottom line what the Scripture is saying today is that if you find yourself in some trouble - whether it's in trouble spiritually, whether it's in trouble physically with your boss at work or maybe just something happening in our life. And I'm not just talking about a trouble from the outside but a trouble that maybe even you have caused, because we know that that happens, there are times we make the wrong move we make the wrong decision - whatever it may be. But bottom line it's saying if you find yourself in such a predicament in such trouble, ‘Stop! Stop! Calmness can lay great offenses to rest.’

Even the worst of offenses, rather than finding ourselves in trouble rather than finding ourself in a bad situation and quickly looking for an excuse - letting our minds run and trying to figure out whose fault it is besides ourself - the Word of the Lord says, ‘Calm yourself stop! Because calmness can lay even great offenses to rest.’

"I pray today that we would be those who would never leave our post today and to continue in the calmness and the peace of God. "

Now what does that mean does it say just be quiet? Does it say don't make any moves does it say just let the wrong and the offenses go? No, but it is saying this: ‘Stop for a moment. Seek the Lord! Seek the Lord and examine yourself!’ Examine the heart examine our minds. Why did we make the decision that we made? Why have we found ourself in this trouble, is it truly my fault - just stop for a moment, and allow God to speak and to bring clarity. That's why in our calmness - in our calmness of calming our mind stopping all of our excuses stopping all the things that we just kinda utter out so quickly - and we stop and we yield to God, everything changes. Even the offense that is caused, even the wrong that has been done - God can allow us to step into a place of mercy, we can come into a place of reconciling things that we may have messed up, whatever it may be - stop and allow God to speak. Allow a calmness of God to overtake our mind and our heart, to put the excuses aside to take responsibility, and to walk as God has called us to walk - in His peace and in His truth.

I pray today that we would be those who would never leave our post today and to continue in the calmness and the peace of God. Even in our troubles, even in our circumstances that we might have brought upon ourselves, that today we would move and walk in God and not take a step further without Him. Praying that this Word would find each one of us and bless us, and that God would be glorified. Amen.