“And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.” Colossians 3:15
We all crave peace. Nations pursue peace. People stand in streets waving signs for peace. Yet, it seems to elude us. As we stand and say “I want peace”, we tend to voice personal solutions we think will bring peace. Take away guns, put and end to wars, abide by these rules, look this way, stop doing this…The list of ways to find peace could go on and on. And yet, it still eludes us. Why and what is peace?
Isaiah 9:6 tells us what peace is:
“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.”
Jesus is true peace. There will never be peace with man made solutions. Only Jesus will bring the peace we all crave. One day, when He returns again, He will bring with Him eternal and abiding peace. But what about right now? How do we pursue peace in these confusing times?
Psalm 46 paints a picture of violence and chaos. A picture far from the peace we all desire. Yet nestled in all this chaos it says these things:
- God is our refuge and strength
- God is in the midst of her, she shall not be moved
- God shall help her
- The Lord of hosts is with us
- Be still and know that I am God
- The Lord of hosts is with us (again)
I think God lovingly lets us know, peace starts with us. Because we have the Prince of Peace living in us, we need to look inward. When we inwardly find peace we can then radiate it to all we come in contact with. Ephesians 4:29 talks about how only edifying things should come from our mouths. The heart behind this should be the pursuit to build others up and shower grace to those who hear.
Psalm 19:14 takes it even further and says this:
“Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my redeemer.” Not only what we speak, but also what we ponder in our heart should be edifying. If you are anything like me, this is really hard. I have my own opinions. I have bad thoughts towards others. I wonder why things are the way they are, but yet, the Bible asks us to think on edifying things. From here, I find myself questioning the balance. It isn’t healthy to hold all our thoughts in because we do need to work through problems. So how do we do both?
Because the Prince of Peace lives in our hearts we need to align our hearts to Him. We need to become more Christlike every single day. We will have bad thoughts and we will need to discuss them in a healthy manner with others, but we can’t let them hang us up. We can’t dwell there. We need to allow God to teach us and move in our hearts to grow past these hang ups. God will show up to teach us if we are willing to listen. As we continually pursue Him, He will guide us to understand His heart more and more. It is a journey we are all on. But if we dwell on what we have in common–the Prince of Peace living in our heart–we can grow in Peace. We can work through our struggles and hang ups together and refuse to stay in the same spot. Let’s all move forward towards Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace.
Peace starts with me. It starts with me growing more and more Christlike everyday. The same is true for you. Let’s run hard after Him.
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