Joyce Meyer - In Pursuit of Peace: 21 Ways to Conquer Anxiety, Fear, and Discontentment

Copyright 2004 by Joyce Meyer

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from THE AMPLIFIED BIBLE (AMP). THE AMPLIFIED BIBLE, OLD TESTAMENT, copyright 1965, 1987 by The Zondervan Corporation. THE AMPLIFIED NEW TESTAMENT, copyright 1954, 1958, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

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First eBook Edition: September 2004

ISBN: 978-0-7595-1248-1

T he first forty years of my life, I lived without the blessing and benefit of peace; therefore, I can say from experience, life without peace is miserable. One cannot enjoy life without first having peace. Without it, we live in turmoilalways worried, anxious, and upset about something.

I came to a point in my life of being so hungry for peace that I was willing to make whatever changes were necessary in order to have it. As a result of that decision and the investment I made during the following years, I now enjoy a life of peace that often passes understanding. In other words, I enjoy peace during the storms of life, not just when the storms dont exist. I am not saying that I have arrived at a state of perfection in my pursuit of peace, but I have made a lot of progress. As the apostle Paul said in Philippians 3:12, I have not arrived but I press on.

There were times in my life when I could be peaceful if everything was going my way, but since that seldom occurred, I rarely had peace. Now I have learned to change what I can change, accept what I cannot change, and regularly seek wisdom to know the difference. What I can do, I do with Gods help; what I cannot do I turn over to Him so He can work. This leaves me free to enjoy my life.

A life of frustration and struggle, a life without peace, is the result of trying to do something about something you cannot do anything about. The apostle Paul said, 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 NKJV).

Once we realize we are struggling with something and feel upset, we need to start praying and immediately turn the situation over to God. You and I are not called to a life of frustration and struggle. Jesus came so we could have righteousness, peace, and joy (see Romans 14:17). He said, The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows) (John 10:10). The Word teaches us to search for peace (harmony; undisturbedness from fears, agitating passions, and moral conflicts) and seek it eagerly. [Do not merely desire peaceful relations with God, with your fellowmen, and with yourself, but pursue, go after them!] (1 Peter 3:11, italics mine).

Simply desiring peaceful relations is not enough. Were to pursue peace with God, peace with ourselves, and peace with our fellow man. In this book, I will share with you many things within these three areas of relationships that needed to change in order for me to enjoy peace.

If you sincerely want a life of peace, you will need to be willing to change too. Peace does not just come; we have to pursue, crave, and go after it. Walking in peace must be a priority, or we will not make the effort needed to see it happen. I spent years praying for God to give me peace and finally realized He had already provided peace, but I had to appropriate it.

Jesus said in John 14:27, Peace I leave with you; My [own] peace I now give and bequeath to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. [Stop allowing yourselves to be agitated and disturbed; and do not permit yourselves to be fearful and intimidated and cowardly and unsettled.] We will refer often to this verse throughout this study.

We can see that Jesus has already provided peace, so now we must take action and stop responding to unpleasant things by being upset. Being upset certainly does not change anything, but it does make usas well as the people around usmiserable.

Jesus made the statement recorded in John 14:27 after His death and resurrection and prior to His ascension into heaven. There were many things He could have taught His disciples, but He chose to talk about peace. This fact alone reminds me of how important peace is. What a tragedy it would be if we spent our lives without peace when it was available all the time.

Some people dont have peace with God because they are not born again and need to trust Jesus Christ to be their Savior. But some, even Christians, still lack peace because they have not responded to the leading of the Holy Spirit simply to do what is right. They dont have peace because they are living in disobedience or they have built up a bad habit of worrying over the years. And some people dont have peace because they are mad at God. Perhaps they prayed for something and it didnt happen. Perhaps somebody else got what they wanted. Perhaps somebody they loved died, and they dont understand why, or they were praying for a healing and didnt get it.

There are many, many reasons why people dont trust God, but in order to enjoy peace, we must learn to trust Him in all things. We must trust that God is totally and completely just, which means He always makes wrong things right if we continue to lean on Him. The Bible says we know in part. I believe God has an individual plan for everyone. God is perfect; He never does anything wrong. We dont know everything, and were not ever going to know everything. Sometimes we make ourselves unhappy because we dont trust enough.

We always want God to change our circumstance, but Hes more interested in changing us than He is our situation. A lot of people have faith to ask God for deliverance from something, but they dont have enough faith to take them through anything.

Job said, Even though He slay me, yet will I trust Him (see Job 13:15). If were asking God for something and dont get it, then we have to believe God knows more than we do. We need to trust God beyond what we see and beyond what we know. We cannot have peace without that trust in God.

We tend to think that the persons with the greatest faith are the ones who get the miracles. Im not really sure about that, myself. We make so much out of miracles when they happen. We think, Oh, what great faith they have! They got a miracle. But I think the ones with the greater faith are the ones who keep their peace even when they dont get the miracles they wanted. I think the greater faith is in those who have to walk it out and decide to love God anyway. The people who dont get everything theyre asking for, and who might not understand why, but yet continue to love and praise God, are truly trusting God. They stay in church, give their tithes and offerings, and stay full of peace. That is remarkable faith, in my opinion.