What Kind of Joy

The room is cold and damp. I can hear tiny feet skittering across the floors.  Rats!  Why did it have to be rats?!
It seems like forever I have been in this prison of mine
Now I face a death sentence cast down upon me.  If only I could find an escape...
     There are two other men on the other side of the wall.  I can hear them talking and singing.  I lean over to the hole in the wall and listen.  I can hear two men talking with excitement and laughing talking about the last few weeks occurrence's.  I holler thru the wall a "hello" and they respond back with the same.   I ask them how they can be so joyful in this place.  They respond that they are here for crimes against the government, but the King that they serve knows they are here and has sent a Messenger to tell them He will take care of them.  They ask me why I am here, and I reply jokingly, "I shot the sheriff...but I did not shoot the deputy!"  I tell them I feel like I have been in this prison all my life.  Subject to the four walls of pain surrounding me everyday.
      They tell me with a joy in their voices that this is not their first time in a prison or being beaten but they are glad to suffer for their King.
What kind of joy is this, to count it a blessing to suffer?  When they should be crying, there is joy in their eyes.  What kind of joy gives these prisoners a song when they are staring death in the face?
They tell me it is the joy of a soul that is forgivin' and free...
My King has promised me this joy, it just seems sometimes I forget the tune and need to be reminded every now and then.  May my song be sung loud enough that others would ask me, "what kind of joy is this" you have?

What A Week!

What a week this has been! Have you ever had a week when everything just seemed to go wrong? Well, that was my week. I turned my back on a friend, lost a friend to death and just felt like everyone in this small town had it out for me.

See, it started out so great, just another day of having fun laughing with friends, ministering to people and seeing lives changed. Then all of a sudden, poof! It was like somebody ripped the carpet out from underneath me.

We were all out to dinner just sitting around the table eating and telling jokes, sharing out our day of ministry, when out of nowhere someone at the table announces he's going to die. That isn't something you just say; it's not like, "hey pass the salt, oh, by the way, I'm dying, how's the meat loaf?". No, there needs to be preparation, a lead in a buffer. But no, not this time.

We were all shocked, nobody was saying anything, it was too quiet. That eerie quiet. So I spoke up and said, "I won't allow that to happen", as if I could stop it.

That was a week ago. The group all got together again tonite. We were all in the room, kinda hiding out to regroup and see what our next step was going to be. Nobody was really sure what to do. Should we all separate and go back to what we had done before we formed our group or should we continue with the ministry. To be honest, we were a little scared to go forward, but nobody really wanted to admit we were scared.

I was just about to leave when I heard a girl screaming! I turned and there was my buddy Luke, screaming like a girl, screaming "Ghost!!" We all turned and there in the room stood a man who appeared from out of nowhere. His voice sounded familiar, that soothing calm, familiar. He held out his hands and said, "Peace be with you."

Out of all the things He could have said, that was the one thing we needed to hear!

At that we realized it was our friend who had died! Jesus was back! My heart leaped. I wanted to jump up and hug him, but I was in to much shock to move! He sat down with us and once again for once last time and ate with us. We laughed and shared stories and shared about how our ministry was going to go on....

Until I meet you again on the road,

The Disciple Peter