Practicing Peace

To remain in continual peace is God’s will. For peace to flow in your life, you must practice it every day. 

Jesus’ instruction to the woman who had been healed of the issue of blood was to “go into peace so that you may be continually healed.” It’s His instruction to us (Mark 5:34, AMPC).

Does that mean you can’t be tempted to worry? Temptation is inevitable. However, you must resist the temptation to succumb to the sin of worry. But here’s the thing: just as you can develop a habit of worry, you can also cultivate a habit of not worrying. By consciously choosing to focus on peace, you can create a habit that brings inner calm to your life. 

“Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27).

Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you.” When Jesus talks about this peace, He’s saying He’s leaving it with us. It’s His peace. It’s the same peace that governed His life. He said it will govern ours. 

“My peace I give unto you,” Jesus said. We don’t have to work up our own peace. It’s His peace He gives us to walk in. He also said His peace wasn’t the peace the world gives. Next He’s telling us how to stay in the peace He’s given us. “Let not your heart be troubled. Neither let it be afraid.” 

Jesus is telling us how to guard our peace—to keep our minds and hearts free of worry and fear. To stay in peace, we must resist the temptation to worry. Jesus lived in peace. His peace is the same peace He gave us. He’s telling us that we can do as He did. We can safeguard our hearts from worry and know His peace.

Jesus had many opportunities to lose His peace. But He made a decision to remain in peace. Jesus also said in John 16:33 that in Him we have peace. He then said the world would give us tribulation but to be of good cheer. The Greek actually says that “to be of good cheer” means to encourage yourself. There’s a time when you need to speak to yourself and say, “This is going to be alright. I live in God’s peace.”

Do you realize that you will come to believe what you hear? You must speak His peace to yourself. If you’re listening to wild thoughts and creating scenarios that make you anxious and afraid, you’re listening to the wrong thing. If you don’t have anyone else to speak God’s peace into your mind and heart, you can speak it to yourself. 

Cheer yourself up. Tell yourself, “This is going to be alright. God’s Word is true. Peace and healing belong to me. Victory is mine in Jesus.”  Encourage yourself out loud, and let these words fill your ears, for faith is born from hearing and hearing comes through the Word of God (Romans 10:17). If you have no one else to cheer you up, cheer yourself up.

One of the strategies of the enemy is to remind us over and over where we messed up. We went a wrong direction. We made a bad decision, and the enemy implies there is no hope; we must pay the price because we did it wrong. But Jesus says we must cast all our cares on Him. That’s right. All our anxieties on Him. All our fear. All our sins. Especially when we’ve messed up. He’s waiting for us to repent, and let Him have our mess. When we mess up, we need His help more than ever. 

Jesus is right at our side saying “Why are you carrying around all that weight? Let me have your burden. It’s going to crush you. Just heave it onto me. I’ll carry it and deal with it.” 

Give Him that burden. Move it from your shoulders to His. If you continue to carry all that worry, it will affect your health. It will keep tearing you down until you are completely defeated.

“Be anxious for nothing, 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 minds through Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7).

Guard your mind and heart. Think on things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely, and of good report (Philippians 4:8). You must practice peace everyday. And once you continually practice it, you become skillful with it. It becomes second nature to you. The flow of peace becomes your good habit. 

Peace is unparalleled. It’s the only way to live.