Peace, God's Type!

Peace, God's Type 

And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:7 KJV

To fully understand the context of the verse above, it is important to look at the one before it. It says: Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. It is easy to claim to the promise of the peace of God, and ignore the condition under which it has been promised. It would appear from the verse highlighted above that the peace of God has an environment in which it thrives:

1. Careful for nothing: it is impossible for the peace of God to exist and thrive in a heart that is prone to anxiety. Being careful for nothing means not allowing anything to weigh upon your heart to the point where it becomes a burden. It is NOT ignoring the facts before you; it is a choice of seeing the divine in the mundane, and God's hand in the daily grind of experiences that make up life. 

2. Prayer and Supplication: it will be an extremely impossible thing to be able to deal with anxiety, and not replace it with something else. Nature abhors a vacuum; if you get rid of anxiety, something else must come in. The choice of what to occupy your heart with lies within your power. Prayer and supplication cannot be forced; you have got to be willing to do them. My praying is not an attempt to force God to do my bidding, but to seek for, recognise, embrace, promote and celebrate His perfect will. It is not an attempt to push my own agenda, but to seek how God may be made known to all men. Why do you pray? Do you get discouraged when it appears that your prayers aren't been answered? 

3. Thanksgiving: is it really possible to pray and yet pray amiss? Of course, the Bible makes it clear it is very possible. As long as I do not sort out the purpose, motive and condition for prayer to line up with the will of God, I will only labour. The attitude and condition of prayer has to be thanksgiving. It tells God that I appreciate all He has done, is doing presently and all He will do. 

When all of the above are in place, tell me, how can the peace of God not overwhelm that heart? You are in a place where you are not in a race with anyone; you are not seeking to be better than anyone in anything. It is not a competition about who is closer to God, but a personal encounter with God, which will stay with you for the rest of your life. 

The peace of God in a man's life cannot be hidden; the things that shake and upset others meets and leaves you in peace; the storms that shake up and uproot others only make you more secure. When the peace of God is the anchor for your soul, there is nothing the earth can produce that can shake that anchor. 

So, which one do you have: the peace that a good bank account balance can give or that which the Presence of God alone can birth and sustain? When God is in, He comes with all that I need for life and Godliness, including all the resources required to promote the will of God. Know God, know peace. No God, no peace, at least, the type that God alone can give. His time of favour is here.