Two Ways to Find Peace

Even in a characteristically secular age, everyone agrees on one thing: true peace is the key to achieving lasting happiness. So we look and lie and search and covet and crave peace. Many people get a sense of pseudo-peace that comes from something superficially trustworthy - money, people, careers, education.

But it always falls apart; it always reveals its hand - pseudo-anythings tend to do that.

The Christian is the only one who knows real peace, lasting, true, trouble-annihilating, and soul-satisfying. It comes from resting in the sovereign source of peace, God.

Everyone's searching for peace, but there's only one place to get it. But how do we get it? As my dad exposited in his sermon yesterday, there are two ways:

1. Don't worry. In Philippians 4:6-7, Paul writes, "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

The first thing he does is command the soul to be free from anxiety. Worry interrupts peace. They are in conflict with each other and will become mutually exclusive.

2. Pray. Then, the antidote to worry, Paul says, is to pray. Trust God. Cast your cares upon Him.

And pray with gratitude. "Pray with thanksgiving that God is gracious and merciful," my dad said. "Pray with thanksgiving that God loves those who are His." He said, pray with thanksgiving for Christ's work. Pray with thanksgiving for breath today.

Let your prayers be fueled by thanksgiving to God.

Then, how do we find peace in a restless, careworn world? Look to our Heavenly Father. Put aside your worries and trust in Him and do that through prayer. Go to Him with your anxieties. He loves you.

And remember that eternal peace is coming.