- 2 Thessalonians 3:16
"His peace should not be an infrequent surprise but the ongoing rule of our lives." -Beth Moore. The apostle Paul wrote about how crucial peace is. It needs to be at all times and in every way. Every aspect of my life should be completely surrendered into the Creator's hands. The only way we experience peace is through Christ's peace. I cannot produce peace at all because it is a fruit of the Spirit. Isaiah 26:3 states, "You will keep in perfect peach him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you."
Definition of steadfast:
-adjective
1. fixed in direction; steadily directed: a steadfast gaze.
2. firm in purpose, resolution, faith.
As I sit here and really process what a steadfast love for Christ really looks like, I am just put in awe. The continual cry of my heart the past few months has been "Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me." -Psalm 51:10. I want my gaze to solely be on the face of Jesus. I want my soul, mind, and heart refined for the sake of God's glory alone. Jesus Paid It All is currently playing in the background as I write this and I get goosebumps when the song repeats, "Oh praise the One who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead." This line is repeated with power and firm faith. My soul longs for nothing but to praise the Lord above all things. When I have felt true surrender, peace comes to follow. The Lord has had to drastically change my mindset of peace. I used to think that if I could at least just not think about something that was bothering me for an extended period of time then I could have peace about it. I could just hide it until I could forget about it. This is absolutely not peace. All this does is cause pain. I think about one of my best friends in junior high school. Him and I hung out everyday basically and being a junior high girl, I swore we were going to get married one day. I thought I was head over heels with this best friend of mine. Our friendship turned sour fast after a couple years after hearing from a friend that he had "been in love" with me as well this whole time but never wanted to admit it due to his own fear of what his more popular friends would think knowing that I "was not the thinnest girl to like." I was devastated that this came from my best friend who I put so much trust into. However, after time of "healing"--really just kept pushing it down to forget about it and not processing through it--I thought I had finally felt peace about what had happened and was ready to move on. It has taken me YEARS to realize this was definitely not peace. Peace was not going to truly come until I surrendered this past situation to the Lord and see God's truth. Not going to lie, his words had cut me deep and the enemy had used them so many times to keep me believing I was not made perfect in God's eyes. The Lord had brought this to my attention a couple years ago and brought me to my knees over it. He kept whispering to me that it was finally time to surrender my struggle with beauty. Not only that, He actually changed my heart to do so. It has been a slow, painful process to fully surrender past hurt dealing with this particular issue. But, I was able to finally fully forgive my friend. I experienced a freedom that I had waited so long for. I finally stopped trying to free myself and let God free me from the pain of this particular situation. I had to be on my knees in prayer many times and laying on the ground in surrender is the best feeling. The Lord is teaching me a lot about peace in other areas. Just recently, the Lord has brought me to my knees multiple times in surrendering my future plans after graduation of college. It's crazy because I can say I am doing full-time ministry after college and I would have NEVER thought that is where my life would be headed. He has given me so much peace about this that I didn't even know I could be experiencing this much peace. As Beth Moore said, "
Amen, amen, amen is all I can say!
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