Peace…true peace…is a fruit of the Holy Spirit.

I teach my people that the Holy Spirit lives in us when we come to a place of faith in Christ Jesus. Paul the Apostle taught that in the Book of Romans…

But you are not controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit of God living in you. (And remember that those who do not have the Spirit of Christ living in them do not belong to him at all.) ¹⁰ And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life^[d] because you have been made right with God. ¹¹ The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you. Ro. 8:9-11

So if Peace is a fruit of the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit lives inside of us believers, then we have all the peace that the Holy Spirit has inside of us.

For that reason I no longer pray for myself to have more peace or more love….or more of any of the fruits of the Spirit. I already have the fullness of the fruit in me. Instead I pray that I would recognize the fruit and that God would give me grace to remove all the things that block the fruit manifesting fully in my life.

When it comes to peace, one of the things that helps me remove the blockages to that peace, is to regularly find places that help me recognize the fruit of peace, and to spend time in those places.

I think everyone probably finds peace in different kinds of places. I find peace in quiet spaces. In lonely spaces. In spaces where I can rest. In spaces that defy the ordering hand of man, wild spaces.

I find peace in the forest garden, spending time watching the squirrels and rabbits, listening to the songs of the birds in the trees and the gentle violins of crickets.

For me peace is not clean and ordered it is messy but comfortable. It is a place where life can be free to do what it wants. It’s a place where my mind can wander and never run out of discoveries. It is a place that offers beauty without demanding I fix it or keep it.

Like I said I think the places we find peace are different for every man and woman but for me finding a place of quiet chaos helps me to recognize the fullness of peace in my heart.

WHAT PLACES SPEAK PEACE TO YOU?