21 Ways to Finding Peace and Happiness (14 page)

Now, I’ve learned a few things after twenty-five years in ministry. I was getting ready to preach that morning, and I knew better than to get into the pulpit with strife in my heart! Strife steals our peace and shuts down the anointing. So, I started praying for two things.

I said, “God, help me keep my mouth shut.” That’s the first thing to pray for if you don’t want war. Never overestimate your own ability to keep quiet just because you want to. You have to
pray
for help in this area.

Then I said, “God, if he’s right ...give me the grace to receive it.” I’ve learned that just because we don’t
think
somebody’s right, that doesn’t mean they’re not.

It is interesting how human beings have problems with being corrected. That same spirit of pride that causes us to mistreat people will also prevent us from receiving correction.

The Bible says, “Only a fool hates correction” (see Proverbs 15:5). If you correct a wise man, he becomes wiser. If you correct a fool, he gets angry and won’t even consider receiving it.

Why is it so devastating when somebody tells us we’re not doing something right or tells us, “I need you to change this”? I believe that our insecurity can cause our pride to rise in defense and say, “Nobody’s going tell me anything. I’m right, and everybody else is wrong.” If we don’t learn to recognize this Peace Stealer, we will go around the same stupid mountain, again and again, dealing with the same problems.

P
RAYER
B
RINGS
P
EACE

Well, it turned out that God showed me Dave was right. I made my first round of apologies, but I really wasn’t sincere. I was still a little bit mad, because though I agreed with God that Dave was right, I still didn’t like the way he told me. I didn’t like his attitude or his timing. I was willing to say that I was wrong, but I wanted also to talk about what Dave had done wrong. He wouldn’t talk about that.

I could
feel
my flesh just screaming. I had to pray, “God, give me grace. Give me the grace to forgive. Help me talk to Dave. I don’t want to talk to him. God, help me talk to him.” When we get mad, a wall goes up. We say silently, “You hurt me, and I am not letting you back into my life to do it again.” I know this is exactly the way we all are. Then we just become polite. We talk only if we absolutely have to and use very few words. We answer questions with a simple yes or no, but we offer no further conversation. We avoid the person who hurt us as much as possible.

Dave knew I was hurting, but he also knew I was really trying to do what was right. Even when we are trying to do right, our flesh can still hurt. God’s Word teaches us we are to die to self. That means we say yes to God and His will and no to our flesh that wants to rebel. Dave reached out and patted me on the arm or leg to show love and understanding while I was trying to get over the correction he gave me.

We were traveling with many people on the plane that day, but I didn’t want to talk to anybody. They were all asking, “Why are you so quiet?”

I said, “I’m just having a quiet day.” But the truth was I was hurting too bad to talk. My emotions were whacko, and I really wanted to just be left alone. The entire day was a struggle for me not to cry or scream. It was very difficult for me to be civil to people, but I knew that God was dealing with me and correcting me. I knew I needed to submit to His dealings if I was going to make progress and overcome in the area of being disrespectful.

Sometimes, even after we choose to do what is right, we may hurt for a while. It is the pain that is doing the good work in us. It is actually changing us and making us better.

I have learned that if we don’t listen to God when He tries to correct us, then He will bring pressure from some other direction to get our attention. I am sure God had been dealing with me for a long time about my disrespectful attitude toward Dave and some of the wrong things I said to him, but I was not listening to God. So he led Dave to correct me.

I had a bad habit, and God knew that He needed to help me get free if I was going to do all He had for me to do in the ministry. The Lord wanted to bless my life, but my attitude was hindering Him.

I kept praying for God to give me grace to submit to His dealing and no longer be angry with Dave. I wanted to do right and knew that grace is the power of the Holy Spirit to help us do what we can’t. After some time went by, I felt much better and knew God had done a work in me that would help me enjoy more peace in my life.

If you want to be a maker and maintainer of peace when somebody hurts you, you better not think that you can do it just by decision or self-will. Start praying, because emotions are strong, and they are a controlling force in our lives. Pride gets all tangled up in our emotions and causes strife and eventually lots of broken relationships.

Strife causes stress that can even lead to sickness and disease. God did not create us to live in the war zone all the time. We are supposed to have peace, and when something happens to disturb our peace, we have to work to get it back.

We’ve seen that the Word says to live in harmony with others, and be ready to adapt and adjust ourselves to people. We want them to adapt to us, but God puts the responsibility on
each one
of us to give ourselves to humble tasks.

When Dave corrected me, it didn’t really take me all that long to get my attitude right again. Well, perhaps it was a couple of days (though it seemed like a month), but forty-eight hours was a big improvement over the way I used to stay offended for weeks. Isn’t it amazing how time goes so slowly when we’re upset about something?

Finally, I knew that I had the grace to give a sincere apology. So, I said to my husband, “Look, I’m really sorry. If I’ve ever spoken disrespectfully, please forgive me. I don’t want to do that, but you know my mouth gets me into trouble sometimes.” Everything was fine after that. Peace returned!

God has dealt with me since then about my mouth. Most of us say things that hurt and wound other people. I probably will have to endure correction in this area again, but I really do want to be all that God wants me to be. My desire to please God motivates me to go through whatever I need to in order to be in His perfect will.

P
EACE
R
ELEASES
A
NOINTING

I encourage you always to pursue peace. You won’t have peace with God until you have peace with the people He has placed in your life. It is important to understand that in order to have peace with God, you must work through whatever issues are causing strife in your life and quickly bring closure to them. Don’t pretend everything is okay when you are eaten up inside with strife.

God knows everything that goes on behind closed doors, including the doors to our hearts. If our relationships aren’t right, our lives won’t be right. And if our private lives are not right, our public lives are not right. Whatever we do in private affects our public lives and ministries.

Pride will absolutely ruin us. But the mighty God who dwells inside of us gives us the power to humble ourselves and say, “I’m sorry,” even if we don’t feel like it.

If you need to come to a new level of peace in your life, make a decision to become a maker and maintainer of peace. The Word says, “Blessed (enjoying enviable happiness, spiritually prosperous—with life-joy and satisfaction in God’s favor ...regardless of their outward conditions) are the makers and maintainers of peace, for they shall be called the sons of God!” (Matthew 5:9).

It’s one thing to be a
child of God,
but to be called a
son
or a
daughter of God
implies a level of maturity: someone who can handle blessing, responsibility, and authority that children cannot manage.

The blessing of peace keeps the anointing and power of God flowing through our lives so that, like Abraham, we can bless other people on God’s behalf. God gives gifts to people, and He wants to fill those gifts with His anointed presence to bring blessing. It might be a gift to preach and teach God’s Word, to sing, to lead, to encourage, or to administrate.

There are certain character qualities that God will bless (anoint with power) and certain qualities that He won’t. Exodus 29 gives a detailed description of where the priest was to put the anointing oil. It was to be on the utensils, the altar, the priest’s garments, and the turban on his head, but he was not to put anointing oil upon the flesh. God will not anoint our fleshly actions or our fleshly behavior.

We have to learn to surrender our wills to God and let the Holy Spirit lead us if we want to maintain peace and carry its anointing power in our lives. But first and foremost, I encourage you to pursue peace through prayer today, and be determined to keep the strife out of your life. Without peace you won’t have the power to enjoy life. Pursue peace with God, with yourself, and with your fellow man.

If you lack peace, pray something like this: “Father, I pray for peace with You. I don’t understand everything that is going on in my life. It’s not going the way I want it, but I am deciding to trust You. Help me to have peaceful relationships, and give me the power (the anointing of Your grace) to be a maker and a maintainer of peace with others, in the name of Jesus. Amen.”

In the next part of this book, I will explain seven ways that I found to have peace with myself before I could focus on keeping peace with others. Through wisdom from God’s Word, you can learn to have peace and enjoy your life every day, wherever you are. So next, let’s look at how slowing down will help you to keep peace with yourself.

Part 2
BE AT PEACE
WITH YOURSELF

Now the mind of the flesh [which is sense and reason without the Holy Spirit] is death [death that comprises all the miseries arising from sin, both here and hereafter]. But the mind of the [Holy] Spirit is life and [soul] peace [both now and forever].

—T
HE APOSTLE
P
AUL
,
Romans 8:6

Peacekeeper #8
STOP RUSHING

M
uch of the world is in a hurry, always rushing, yet very few people even know where they are going in life. If we want to be at peace with ourselves and enjoy life, we must stop rushing all the time.

People rush to get to yet another event that has no real meaning for them, or that they really don’t even want to attend.
Hurry
is the pace of the twenty-first century; rushing has become a disease of epidemic proportions. We hurry so much, we finally come to the place where we cannot slow down.

I can remember the days when I worked so hard and hurried so much that even if I took a vacation, it was almost over by the time I geared down enough to rest. Hurry was definitely one of the Peace Stealers in my life and still can be, if I do not stay alert to its pressure.

Life is too precious to rush through it. I find at times that a day has gone by in a blur; at the conclusion of it I know I was very busy all day yet cannot really remember enjoying much, if any, of it. I have committed to learn to do things in God’s rhythm, not the world’s pace.

Jesus was never in a hurry when He was here on earth, and God is absolutely not in a hurry now. Ecclesiastes 3:1 states, “TO EVERYTHING there is a season, and a time for every matter or purpose under heaven.” We should let each thing in our lives have its season and realize we can enjoy that season without rushing into the next one.

It is permissible to enjoy our morning coffee or tea without feeling we must hurry to get to the next thing. We can get dressed calmly without rushing. We can leave the house in a timely fashion, without frantically running out the door already behind schedule. Rushing is a bad habit, but we can break bad habits and form good ones to replace them.

The way we get a day started is important. Often how we start is how the entire day goes. I have found if I allow the “hurry-up” spirit to grab me early in the day, everything within me gets into high gear, and I never seem to slow down or really relax the rest of the day. Hurry creates pressure that in turn creates stress.

Stress is the root cause of many illnesses and is therefore something each one of us desperately needs to resolve. God did not create us to hurry, rush, live under pressure and stress day after day. Jesus said, “My peace I leave with you.” He wants us to have peace.

Pace is very important in life. Our pace not only affects us but others around us. I don’t like to be around people who are always in a rush; they are usually short-tempered and impatient. They certainly don’t minister peace. They make me feel as if I also need to hurry, which I am desperately trying to avoid.

I have noticed in fine-dining restaurants that the hostess who seats people walks very slowly while leading customers to their tables. The waiters or waitresses don’t rush the table for orders; they give you plenty of time to think. I am sure this is because they want the customers to enjoy their experience, and they know that will not be possible if they are rushed.

When following one of the hostesses who is exuding peace simply by the way she walks me to the table, often I am behind her thinking,
Get going, you’re moving too slow.
Then I am reminded (I am sure by the Holy Spirit) that I don’t need to be in a hurry to enjoy the nice meal I am about to pay for.

Our pace of living affects the quality of our lives. When we eat too fast, we don’t properly digest our food; when we rush through life, we don’t properly digest it either. God has given life to us as a gift, and what a pitiful shame to do nothing but rush through each day and never, as they say, “stop to smell the roses.” Each thing we do in life has a sweet fragrance, and we should learn to take it into ourselves and enjoy the aroma.