Optimist’s Roundtable

By Martha Sykes

Joni Eareckson Tada is someone that I admire and follow in her ministry called Joni & Friends. She wrote a book entitled, Swimming Against the Tide, where she shares her experience of a diving accident that left her a quadriplegic at the age of 17. It was a tough time for her as a Christian as she went through depression and it took several years for her to find peace with this tragedy. During that time she questioned God, she prayed, talked to fellow Christians and read the scriptures until she finally found peace. After all of that, she has been a beautiful servant of God as she carries out a wheelchair ministry to help unfortunate children and adults.

After Easter, Jesus visited His disciples in the Upper Room and said to them , “Peace be with you!” Wouldn’t it be wonderful to hear Jesus say those words to us when we go through tough times?

Sometimes life causes us to search for that peace that we can find in Jesus. Being tied to Christ and knowing He is near through the Holy Spirit can give us peace. It is that inner peace that passes all understanding and comes to us despite hardship, grief, unexpected tragedies , and any other difficulties.

Despite her hardship, Joni has become an instrument of love and peace to countless people of many ages after she found that peace through Christ, our Savior.