peace

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.) ¹⁰And 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. ¹¹The 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?

It feels like I have used this title before…maybe I have but if so its worth repeating. I live my life by inches not by miles.

The older I get the more I realize that life, to be truly tasted and enjoyed needs to be taken in small bites.

There is a temptation to lose the beauty of the single flower because I am trying to conquer the whole forest.

When I give into that temptation, and start to think about the miles I have to go before I sleep for the night, instead of the inch I have left to walk before I can rest for a minute, I find myself getting filled with stress and striving. In that negative mindspace I find myself constantly disappointed by my own inability to meet my self imposed demands and by the world which falls so short of my expectations.

Take the Vicarage project for instance.

When I look at the project as a whole, and think of all that needs to be done, and think of all the money its going to cost, and consider all the possible problems which are going to rise between now and the time I pay the final installment of the loan we are taking out to pay for it all well….

But life isn’t meant to be lived in all those miles at once. It is meant to be lived in the inch we are on right now, because honestly that is all we can deal with…right now.

More than that it is meant to be a celebration of this inch. Not a worry about what the next inch will bring. What can I find to be thankful for in the moment….

I am thankful that all of our bank paperwork has now been received.

Something bad kept happening when I tried to send it, but our friendly neighborhood banker Deb took care of it for me this morning. Yay!

More than that though Brenda has found a new home base for her work in The Netherlands. She was told just over a month ago she would have to move from her current BOO (Base of operations) becacuse the owner is selling it.

Photo by Michael Wysmierski on Pexels.com

That news created a few tough inches. It is not easy finding an apartment when there is an ocean between you and a site visit. But thanks to some very dedicated ministry partners and a good recommendation from her old landlord, Brenda just signed paperwork on a new two bedroom house.

May be an image of brick wall and outdoors

May be an image of furniture and kitchen

Notes From the Vicarage

A minister's family living in a micro forest garden

PLACES THAT HELP ME RECOGNIZING PEACE

By Inches