Have you ever had a crisis in which you deliberately and emphatically and recklessly abandoned everything? It is a crisis of will. You may come up to it many times externally, but it amounts to nothing. The real deep crisis of abandonment is reached internally, not externally. The giving up of external things may be an indication of being in total bondage.

Have you deliberately committed your will to Jesus Christ? It is a transaction of will, not of emotion; the emotion is simply the gilt-edge of the transaction. If you allow emotion first, you will never make the transaction. Do not ask God what the transaction is to be, but make it in regard to the thing you do see, either in the shallow or the profound place.

If you have heard Jesus Christ's voice on the billows, let your convictions go to the winds, let your consistency go to the winds, but maintain your relationship to Him.

It may seem paradoxical, but the only person who is at rest has achieved it through conflict. This peace, born of conflict, is not like the ominous lull before the storm but like the serenity and the quietness following the storm, with its fresh, purified air.

The person who may appear to be blessed, having been untouched by sorrow, is typically not one who is strong and at peace. His qualities have never been tested, and he does not know how he would handle even a mild setback. The safest sailor is certainly not one who has never weathered a storm. He may be right for fair-weather sailing, but when a storm arises, wouldn’t you want an experienced sailor at the critical post? Wouldn’t you want one at the helm who has fought through a gale and who knows the strength of the ship’s hull and rigging, and how the anchor may be used to grasp the rocks of the ocean floor?

Oh, how everything gives way when affliction first comes upon us! The clinging stems of our hopes are quickly snapped, and our heart lies overwhelmed and prostrate, like a vine the windstorm has torn from its trellis. But once the initial shock is over and we are able to look up and say, “It is the Lord” (John 21:7), faith begins to lift our shattered hopes once more and securely binds them to the feet of God. And the final result is confidence, safety, and peace.

The adverse winds blew against my life; My little ship with grief was tossed; My plans were gone—heart full of strife, And all my hope seemed to be lost— “Then He arose”—one word of peace. “There was a calm”—a sweet release.

A tempest great of doubt and fear Possessed my mind; no light was there To guide, or make my vision clear. Dark night! ’twas more than I could bear— “Then He arose,” I saw His face— “There was a calm” filled with His grace.

My heart was sinking ’neath the wave Of deepening test and raging grief; All seemed as lost, and none could save, And nothing could bring me relief— “Then He arose”—and spoke one word, “There was a calm!” “IT IS THE LORD.”