Be Still

It is summer, and Ana — the fastest, loudest, most perpetually-in-motion of the Jones children — cannot imagine a day worth slowing down for. But one ordinary evening, worn out at last, she falls asleep and opens her eyes somewhere she has never been: a small wooden boat on a wide sea, with weather-beaten fishermen at the oars and a Man asleep in the stern. When a sudden storm turns the water to mountains and even grown men cry out in fear, Ana discovers there is one storm she cannot outrun. Then the Man stands, speaks three quiet words — “Peace, be still” — and the wind lies down at once. In the great calm that follows, the stillness reaches all the way inside the girl who is never still. A dream-episode about the peace the Lord gives in the very middle of the storm. Scripture: Mark 4:39 (KJV).