Perfect Peace

Recently I was reading a little book given to me by a friend that is just Scripture verses arranged by topic, and I came to a section on peace. A few verses jumped out at me, and I wanted to share them along with some brief comments of what went through my mind as I was reading them. I will list the references at the end of this post.

You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.

If we focus on God as we go through our day and trust Him, the gift we will receive is perfect peace.

The kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

"Eating and drinking" here are not limited to food intake. Those two things here represent things in the physical world around us, specifically things we need (or at least think we need). God's Kingdom is not effected one way or another by the things around us.

For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.

Not only does focusing on the things of God result in a life of righteousness, peace, and joy - but the reverse actually results in death! I am of the camp that believes that once you receive God's Salvation through Jesus, you cannot take it back, so I don't think this is talking about spiritual death in Hell. I think this is talking about emotional decay and rot (anxiety, stress, worry) and eventually physical sickness and maybe even untimely physical death.

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.

Jesus said two things: (1) He was leaving us His peace. HIS peace. Imagine the peace that was present inside of Jesus as He walked the Earth. That's what He left for us. (2) We should not "let" our hearts be troubled and afraid. That implies that if we begin to feel those emotions, there is a mechanism available to the Christian to eliminate those things. WHAT? I can switch fear off like I'm turning off a light?? Seems like Jesus was saying that if you are fearful, it's because you let the fear happen.


I'm going to further elaborate on each of these over the next few weeks, so plan on stopping back by - if you want to read more thoughts about peace between now and then, here are some links to a series I wrote about peace a couple of years ago: Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 ...or you can click "peace" in the "labels" section at the bottom of this post.


Scriptures quoted (from the English Standard Version of the Bible): Isaiah 26:3, Romans 14:17, Romans 8:6, John 14:27