Peace Like A River

Perhaps you gave your life to Christ a while ago and yet you do not have peace of mind. You run from pillar to pole to experience peace, but all to no avail. You cast, you bind, you pray, you fast, but peace becomes a mirage — the more you chase the farther it becomes. You associate and mingle, and even dissociate from friends and relatives to experience this peace, but all you got in return is disappointment.

How do you know you lack peace? If any of the following often happens to you, seeing this world as a place of competing with others and not as a place of complementing others; you are not in control of your emotions and reactions; you have personal ambition rather than God’s ambition for your life; you are fond of promoting self rather than promoting God and others; you value physical success more than spiritual success.

Selfishness and peace are two things that are in opposite directions; they are two parallel lines that can never meet. If you are selfish, which is lack of love, you can never experience peace. I am not surprised that the two commandments mandated to us by our Lord Jesus Christ teach us how to be selfless (Matthew 22:37-40).  Throughout the bible, I have not come across where we were commanded to love ourselves, but several verses in the bible commanded us to love God and our neighbors. Loving ourselves is God’s work, and He has been doing it from the beginning of the world, and He still loves us (Jeremiah 31:3, John 3:16).  So, stop doing God’s work!  Do what is expected of you—loving God and your neighbors, and you will have peace of mind.

Sowing means obeying God’s instructions, God’s words are seeds, stated as commandments in the scriptures and inspirations directly from the Holy Spirit (1 Peter 1:23). So, sow peace continuously as a seed through the words of God, when it is convenient and when it is not convenient. And you shall reap it as a fruit. As written in the scripture (Hebrews 12:14) to follow peace with all men and holiness, the more you obey the commandments meant for allowing peace to reign, you are sowing peace which you will definitely reap.

Let me expatiate on the above mentioned signs of troubled hearts, which are in our lives as a result of absence of peace and other fruit of the Spirit — love, self-control, gentleness, faith, patience, goodness, meekness, joy.

LIFE IS A CONTRIBUTION AND NOT A COMPETITION– (SOW LOVE TO REAP LOVE) 

If you view your life as competing with others, a race to be better than others and not to be the best you can be for your creator, to be the greatest in the whole universe, then you are inviting into your life spirit of strife, jealousy, idolatry, emulations, fighting, fears, lust, and lasciviousness which are in contrary to the spirit of peace. Even the power and zeal to be the best in whatever God has commissioned in our hands is not ours; it is God’s.  According to a scripture, Philippians 4:13, which says we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us, we have no power of our own let no one boast of it, if we do not allow God to strengthen us there is absolutely nothing we can do on our own. Do not compare yourself with anyone; you are uniquely made in the image of your creator; nobody can be you; stop being another person, and stop competing with another life. Your life is for a special purpose which you must find out.

A life that is fulfilling is a life that contributes to expansion of God’s kingdom and development of people.  You are not here on earth to compete with anyone, but to contribute your own quota. Apostle Paul died a fulfilled man of God because he lived a selfless life without being carried away with mundane things of life that are making a lot of Christians run away from God today. You cannot experience peace, until you get to a point of no return with God, despite His silence to answer your desperate prayers; where you have to confess that whether God blesses you or not, He will still be your God because you also love Him unconditionally. You must always justify the motive of the substance you are praying for, is it meant to contribute or compete?

A lot of people today are praying for things that will make them more competitive than their neighbors, which will later take away their peace; even gifts of the spirit some people are praying for, are to be able to have dominion and oppress their neighbors. What we desire is more than what we need because of the competitive spirit in us. Our neighbor bought a car, we must buy one too, and as a result of this all things must stand still until our desire is satisfied. For how long are we going to chase shadows, let us give our souls rest and contribute our quota and give others chance to do the same.  Remember, talents given by our master are not shared equally, so we need each other to deliver as expected.

YOUR REACTION IS YOUR POWER – (SOW SELF CONTROL & GENTLENESS TO REAP THEM IN RETURN)

 If you want your peace, let your words be few and do not do anything rashly. You should be in control of your emotions because the power and ability to talk, respond to actions, behave in a particular way has been given to you, unless you lose this power by not having knowledge of the power or not applying the knowledge.  Some people have lost their peace because they could not control their emotions.  Knowing that your reaction is your power is not enough but applying this knowledge is the key, and it takes wisdom to apply knowledge.  This is where grace comes in to be able to manifest all the fruit of the spirit, because they work together. You cannot experience peace without self-control; you must be able to control your reactions and emotions. You must be able to control yourself from anger, lying, and pride which can make you lose your peace.

When you are humble, you do not unnecessarily react to issues because your body has been spiritually fashioned in a way you can withstand insults. Humility helps you to avoid overreaction which can lead to loss of peace. Humility exalts, not that you do not have a choice to react rashly, but you count it wise to obey God by humbling yourselves to obtain grace (James 4:6).

GOD’S AMBITION IS YOUR LIFE’S PURPOSE – (SOW FAITH & PATIENCE TO REAP THEM IN RETURN)

 Stop struggling with God; the more you do this the more you lose your peace. Seek with tears God’s purpose for your life, until you know it there will still be conflict of interest between your will and God’s will. Make sure your will is aligned with that of God, to be able to experience harmony within you. You must be willing to surrender your will for God’s will. All you need is faith to believe that the thought He has towards you is of good and not of evil to give you expected end. You also need patience to wait for the expected end (Hebrews 10:36).

IT IS ALWAYS ABOUT THEM AND NOT ABOUT YOU — (SOW GOODNESS & MEEKNESS TO REAP THEM IN RETURN)

 Focus on helping others, and do it selflessly. Always be conscious of living for God and building others. Do not help others because of the spiritual or physical reward you will gain, but help them because you love God and you have His nature within you.  I started experiencing God spiritually and physically when I stopped asking God the question “What about me?” I, instead, replaced it with the question “What about them?”  I mean reflecting the question not only in my prayer to God, but also in my actions and reactions towards people around me.  I stopped seeing my tears but started seeing their tears. I stopped trying to solve my own problems and solve their problems. To my surprise, the more problems I solved for others, the more solutions I got to my own problems!

It takes meekness and kindness to withhold the power you can exercise for your own happiness in order to make others happy!  Jesus did it for us, we must be willing to do it for others. – Isaiah 1:19.

SPIRITUAL SUCCESS COMES BEFORE PHYSICAL SUCCESS — (SOW JOY TO REAP JOY)

 The only way you can be exceedingly joyful in all your tribulation is when you are spiritually focused, as written by Apostle Paul in Chapter seven of second book of Corinthians.  Please avoid filthiness of flesh and spirit but perfect holiness in the fear of God to experience His joy of salvation. Our God is a God of orderliness, in Ezekiel 36: 25-27 He talks about our salvation, sanctification, and Spirit baptism before Ezekiel 36:28-30 where He talks about our dominion, prosperity and fruitfulness respectively.  He will first of all empower you spiritually, before entrusting you with His inheritance. As you are giving to more spiritual things, you are sowing joy which you will surely reap.

What brings you joy? Apostle John said in the scripture 3 John 4 that he has no greater joy than to hear his children walk in truth. Matthew 6:33 makes us to know that the spiritual things are paramount, we should first seek His Kingdom and righteousness which are spiritual, before gaining other things which are physical.

What we have today is people are seeking the physical things without taking into cognizance the spiritual things, as a result we could not experience joy of salvation and peace our souls deserve. He says come onto me all you that are heavily laden, that I will give you rest; seek first peace and other fruit of Spirit that will assure you of spiritual experience like salvation, sanctification, Spirit baptisms before seeking physical things.

In conclusion, as we sow by obeying spiritual instructions we shall surely reap spiritual blessings, we must be conscious and in total agreement with the following:

1. My life is a contribution not a competition.
2. I must always be in control of my emotions and reactions.
3. My personal ambition has been replaced with God’s ambition for my life.
4. My question will always be “What about them?”And not “What about me?”
5. I will always value spiritual success more than physical success.

The joy of knowing God will forever be upon your soul in Jesus’ name.

Perhaps you have not come in contact with Jesus Christ the great deliverer or you need to restitute your way, it is not too late to know Him, all you need to do is to declare Him as your Lord and Saviour, confess and repent from your sins.  He will save you and give you a brand new beginning, and there after pursue the spiritual things to give your soul and heart permanent peace and rest they deserve.

We encourage person to person counseling, if after reading this article you still want to talk to us, do not hesitate to do so. Please email us via counseling@rcgfoundations.org. You are blessed in Jesus’ name.