The Lord of Peace
2 Thessalonians 3:16 (ESV) says, “Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times in every way.”
This is my prayer for you today. God himself is peace. His wrap-around presence is what we need in times of uncertainty.
It is easy to lose sight of peace and get caught up in worry, distraction, frustration, or chaos. Living in any of these conditions that crowd out peace is that we usually have a justification for feeling that way. Sometimes those fees arise because we have to grow in maturity and surrender. Most often, I find that these peace-disrupting emotions have a very real source we can address. A friend reminded me yesterday that we cannot just will our feelings away. If anything, we can suppress them and make ourselves numb. We can experience these emotions—even dramatically—if we learn to lean on God and look for the path to peace.
When we allow these emotions to rule our lives, we begin following a more destructive path.
God desires that we would live in peace. However, he is not interested in condemning us for the times we miss out on his peace. God knows the path of truth without compromise, but he does not use that power as grounds to mock, shame, or condemn us. Instead, his heart is motivated by compassion to sacrificially open a way for us to live in freedom.
Our view of God’s grace can be distorted. We might think we need to figure out how to get back to peace on our own before God accepts us. Maybe pastors or churches have even prescribed tools to do this. Religion has a way of mastering outward perfection, but it has no power to transform us on the inside.
Jesus invites us to come to him and receive peace. The story of the cross is that we give up our fears to receive eternal life.
God will give peace to those who ask. Perhaps you need an encounter today where God will flood your life with peace. Maybe your prayers are about redirection, and God desires to bring an increase of peace as you go through your day. The bottom line is that God is offering peace to all who will come to him.
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