Finding Peace in Gain and Loss
Enjoy prosperity while you can, but when hard times strike, realize that both come from God. (Ecclesiastes 7:14)
You probably don’t think of them much but gain and loss are a central part of life. We get used to and enjoy the gains. We struggle with and resist the losses.
When we are gaining – things are going well – we feel like we can live without loss. But then something happens. A car wreck, an unwanted doctor’s diagnosis, a relationship breaks up, a loved one dies, and it causes us to pause. We’re forced to rethink life.
I wonder, where are you right now? Do you feel like you’re gaining or losing?
Gain is joy, victory, laughter, a sense of completion after hard work. Gain is blessing, celebration, connection, light over dark, finally having a need met. We love gain and want to experience it again and again.
Loss is pain, struggle, regret, sorrow, failure (or at least imagined failure). Loss is being alone, isolated, forgotten, or misplaced. Loss can be having someone we love move away, get sick, or even die.
Both gain and loss mark our lives.
Jesus once said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).
Think about that. Jesus said, “in me you have peace” and “In this world you will have trouble.” He is telling us that he can give us peace regardless of our circumstances. Whether we are experiencing gain or loss, if we allow our self to rest in Jesus, we have a peace the world can’t understand. This “the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7).
This peace is rooted in Jesus’ care for His own. When we know Jesus in this way, we realize that He is greater than any earthly gains and losses. Jesus invites us to be with Him regardless of our circumstances. When we say yes, we find He steadies us in both gain and loss. We see beyond the immediate world to the Eternal One. We discover that now and forever He is our sustainable loving Constant!
Jesus also said, “But take heart! I have overcome the world.” These words are so strong and powerful!
Jesus told his disciples this the night before they would see Him bloodied, beaten and crucified. He wanted them, and us, to know that His presence would be able to hold their hearts no matter what conditions they find themselves in. How? Because He overcame death – the ultimate loss - with life. In this world our losses will ultimately be overtaken by His Presence with us and then the promise of eternal life with Him forever.
Gain and loss let us see God for He is, that He is eternal! Gain and loss let us see ourselves as we are, finite but with the promise of eternity with Him.
He invites us to see our present life realistically, but also to look beyond it to Him. Gain and loss both come into our lives, but neither last. He does, and He came that we may know Him, in the midst of gain and loss, and that we might travel with Him from here to eternity!