Pastor and author Timothy Keller shares certain keys to peace despite negative circumstances, one of which is a daily habit of prayer. He discusses the story of a missionary who, despite everything going wrong, was brimming with an unwavering belief in the goodness of God.
“One of the most moving pieces of church history I’ve ever read comes from 1851, where there was an English missionary named Allen Gardiner,” Keller says. “He was shipwrecked with a number of other people on a very remote, uninhabited island just off the tip of South America, and they died on that island one at a time. Of all we can tell, he was the last one alive, and he kept a journal that was found right next to his body.
“The very last entry was a quote from Psalm 34:10, ‘The young lions do lack and suffer hunger, but they that seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing.’ And the very last thing he wrote in his journal as he was dying … he said, ‘I am overwhelmed with a sense of the goodness of God.’ … You and I infer the goodness of God from the good things that are happening to us. … But Allen Gardiner must have gotten directly in contact with that goodness, because there were no good circumstances.”
To watch the entire video discussion for more encouragement during difficult times, click here.
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