The view from my room stuns me. Hillsides lush. Blue blue sky. A breeze moving the bamboo. And the voices.

Young children in school singing “This is the day that the Lord has made” in Creole.

Yes it is. And I am here, wanting to soak it all up.

Those words they sing come from Psalm 118. So I scan it and see this:

Out of my distress I called on the Lord;
the Lord answered me and set me free.
⁶ The Lord is on my side; I will not fear.
What can man do to me?

Kinship, sweet kinship. I’ve had distress. They’ve had unspeakable distress. But today we are leveled on the same plane, all needing Jesus to answer us and set us free. So we can sing no matter what our lot. We can choose right now NOT to fear.

We heard four distinct gun shots last night. Very near. Yet oddly I felt no fear. Curiosity, yes. Trepidation, no. In that settled place in the arms of Jesus, we can live free like that.

Do you live that way? Do I?

Do we live in such a way that we can cheer even when life is hard, we are perplexed, or stress mounts?

Before this trip, God clearly said to me, “You need to take care of your stress problem.” And of course He was right. My constant stress, production and worry need to cease. Problem is, I can’t seem to fix myself.

Out of my distress I called on the Lord;
the Lord answered me and set me free.

Note the similarities in the words stress and distress. The reason I’m not seeing victory in this area is that I must somehow love being stressed out. I prefer it to calling on the Lord.

Right now I pray, “Out of my distress, I call on You Jesus. Please answer me and set me gloriously free.” And as I pray that, I pray that for every person reading this post.

You have a choice. To worry or sing. To despise your place in life or lift your voice and belt, “This is the day that the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be glad in it.”