God desires for you to live in such a way that His peace remains intact no matter what circumstance you find yourself in. Since Christ is peace, and He lives within your heart permeating every fiber of your being, you are able to abide in Him. Take some time and look up scripture on abiding in Christ. Allow God to reveal Himself to you in a new and fresh way.
This world is very active, and it moves fast. When abiding in Christ, you quickly learn that God’s pace is opposite of how the world operates. God is about rest. A rest that calms your soul. A soul that is learning to abide in Christ knows that some changes need to be made and is willing to align his life to what God desires for him. One learns to walk on the road called obedience.
Taken from a Day Spring calendar titled, “Never Forgotten Always Loved,” you get a picture of God’s peace and obedience: “Spiritual rest is the absence of self-generated action. Spiritual rest lets God’s will direct your motives and His power direct your actions. Spiritual rest frees you from the burden of pleasing others to doing all to please Him. Spiritual rest moves you from perplexity to divine power, from overloading to the Spirit’s promptings, from frustration to every good and perfect work. Spiritual rest looks to God for guidance, hears from God for approval, waits on God for timing, leans on God for sufficiency, and depends on God for the results.”
If you lived this way, if I lived this way, there would be peace all around us. Why? For God would be allowed to move freely, destroying every stronghold that the evil one has set up to keep you and I under his thumb of control. Jesus came to destroy Satan’s hold on us.
Take some time and study the above quote. Where does Satan have a hold on you? Ask yourself questions like these: Does your daily routine reflect your strengths and efforts more than God’s faithfulness? Why do you do what you do, is it for yourself, others or God? Do you wish to have more breathing room in your day? Do you go from one activity to the other, needing to get it all done? When was the last time you asked God for help and guidance? Do you take matters into your own hands instead of allowing God to show you? How well do you wait on God?
A peaceful soul knows his need for God in every aspect of his life. Christ becomes his life.
A peaceful soul understands that he cannot accomplish anything of eternal significance without God.
A peaceful soul lives for heaven. He has allowed God to deaden the worldly ways that Satan has trapped him in. He sheds off any dead work that inhibits Christ from shining through, and he abides in Christ each and every day.
A soul misses His peace when he fits God into his life.
Stop and keep rereading the above sentence until God reveals truth to you. Look at what Jesus tells people in Matthew 5:17, “Don’t misunderstand why I have come.” How would someone fit God into their life? Are you fitting God into your life rather than you changing for Him?
It is Christmas time. May the birth of Christ take you deeper than you have ever gone before. God desires to give you a peaceful soul, but you must relinquish your rights, your ways, your thoughts over to Him and allow God to change you from the inside out. He begins with a heart transplant.
I will end with Ezekiel 36:23-27, “I (God) will show you how holy My great name is, the name on which you brought shame among the nations. When I reveal My holiness through you before their very eyes, says the Sovereign Lord, then the nations will know that I am the Lord. For I will gather you up from all the nations and bring you home again to your land, then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. Your filth will be washed away, and you will no longer worship idols. I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart. I will put My Spirit in you so that you will follow My decrees and be careful to obey My regulations.”
Carol J German 