set·tle

verb, set·tled, set·tling.

verb (used with object)  1.  to appoint, fix, or resolve definately and conclusively; agree upon (as time, price, or conditions).

We went camping this past week.  The timing was perfect.  School ended.  We spent a few days discouraged, tired, bickering, fighting, exhausted, regrouping…did i mention fighting?? 

My girl and my older boy had a rough year of fighting.  The days after school ended, days of extra sleep and lessoned responsibility did not change things between them.   

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler is a novel by E. L. Konigsburg.  In it 2 children run away from home.  At one point something happens.  They don’t realize exactly what it is until later.  They became a team, adventuring together, rather than single individuals happening to be on the same adventure.   They still have fights.  But it’s different now.  I remember reading that and praying, Lord please do that for my own.

Anyway, back to camping.  We all started to regain ground exiting the mire of our weariness with the excitement in prepping for camping.  Up we went to beautiful Rocky Mountain National Park.  We popped up our camper and set up the tent for the older 2. 

Ahh, rest.

That night it was windy.  Extremely windy!  The 2 were there in the tent together…. afraid.  The wind howling, the tent flapping and twisting and collapsing in, then expanding out.   They both woke up and endured together for a few hours.    Hours!  Finally we intervened and brought them into the camper and took down the tent.

Things are now different between them.  They have it settled.  They are on the same team.  Oh i am sure that they will need to settle this again…and again and again.  But one day i pray it will be settled once and for all.  There will still be arguments-for that is only healthy.  But it is different to argue on the same team, than to argue on opposing teams.

…..~…..~…..~…..~…..~

Settled.  I’ve been thinking about this.  There are some things the Lord has been settling for me.  And each time it comes thru some experience that i would never choose….but to have the thing settled is always worth it.

to settle who my provider is… might mean a lay-off

to settle where my source of joy is….might mean a loss of something that has brought me joy

to settle His sufficiency….might mean a deep experience of another’s insufficiency

That is the gift of suffering, the hope of suffering.  To have a thing settled.  Resolved definitely and conclusively.  He has settled for me that He is both sovereign and good.  He has settled for me that i am deeply loved.  and in the facets of my heart where these truths are still murky, He gives me a gift of suffering, wind for strengthening, waves for cleansing.  Until it’s settled.  This is my hope in suffering, he’s settling something.

Therefore, since we are justified (acquitted, declared righteous, and given a right standing with God) through faith, let us [grasp the fact that we] have [the peace of reconciliation to hold and to enjoy] peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One).

² Through Him also we have [our] access (entrance, introduction) by faith into this grace (state of God’s favor) in which we [firmly and safely] stand. And let us rejoice and exult in our hope of experiencing and enjoying the glory of God.

³ Moreover [let us also be full of joy now!] let us exult and triumph in our troubles and rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that pressure and affliction and hardship produce patient and unswerving endurance.

⁴ And endurance (fortitude) develops maturity of character (approved faith and tried integrity). And character [of this sort] produces [the habit of] joyful and confident hope of eternal salvation.

⁵ Such hope never disappoints or deludes or shames us, for God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit Who has been given to us. (Romans 5)