In pursuit of perfect peace
“The Lord gives His people strength. The Lord blesses them with peace.” (Psalm 29:11)
The opposite of peace is stress, not war. Most of us will, thankfully, never experience the ravages of war, but many of us will be decimated by stress. We sense it in our minds, reflect it on our bodies, and digest it into our souls. No doubt about it. Stress has the ability to control and destroy us from the inside out.
A recent study reported that sixty-eight percent of polled individuals claimed higher stress levels now than they’ve ever faced before, with an average individual spend of $960 a year on de-stressing activities (1).
I, for one, can wholeheartedly confirm that statistic. My boss was recently promoted to a position where she answers directly to the president of our corporation. She now sits as one of the top ten people in our global organization. As her assistant, it goes without saying that coordinating her time, schedule, and event management has sent my stress level into the stratosphere.
I spent many turbulent years in a former organization, chained to my work cell phone. The expectation was that I needed to be available to address work-needs twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Evenings, weekends, and holidays were all fair-game.
The same can be said for my current role. While it’s wonderful to be recognized for hard work and dedication, I can also fully appreciate the joys of working in a less stressful environment. I sleep better, enjoy my weekends more, and have a lot less anxiety when work obligations are diminished.
That being said, I’ve become much too verbal about the change in my workload, lately. Shame on me.
In one instance, I heard myself babbling about burdens instead of blessings to a group of vendors who were visiting our facility, recently. I walked away wondering at what I’d just done and feeling like the world’s biggest whiner. The encounter was so unlike me that it’s been troubling me, ever since.
I am incredibly grateful for my job and consider it a great privilege to work for an intelligent and highly respected executive in an esteemed organization. I’m fortunate to have the position that I do. I can’t let myself lose sight of that reality.
Why, then, have I felt compelled to grouse so much, lately? Am I seeking understanding from others who can never possibly understand, or is an incongruous tongue just a by-product of an exhausted mind?
All I know is that I’ve become more grumbly and less appreciative at work, and I’m not too fond of that persona. I’m a joy-filled person who doesn’t complain, not a whining curmudgeon that no one wants to be around. What kind of example am I setting as a Christian if I’m always bellyaching? Not a very good one. That’s for sure.
This morning, as I sat in my glorious screen porch, eating my Sunday breakfast of homemade waffles, a fried egg cooked over-easy, and a cup of milk, I was filled with a profound sense of peace.
Yes, my work-week is stressful, but I have a beautiful home, sweet kitties for company, and a beautiful yard to relax in. I am healthy, happy, and wholeheartedly appreciative of the blessings God has bestowed upon me. I am a daughter of the King of Kings, with a promised home in heaven. To let anxiety get the best of me is to let the devil rule over my life, and I can never allow that to happen.
Today, as I opened my day-planner, I flipped to the new month of March, whose theme is – you guessed it – peace. The month begins with a quote from John Bunyan, stating, “But if ever we would live in peace and unity, we must pray for it.” (2)
Behold, the missing component in my newly stressed life – prayer. I pray in thankfulness and intercession for my friends and family, but seldom have I prayed for peace. For the next thirty days, that reality is going to change.
Starting today, I am focusing my mind, anew, on my blessings instead of my stressors. I will strive, daily, to be a source of happiness and peace to all those around me. I want to be a beacon of God’s love rather than a bulwark of obstinancy.
The March 1st verse in my planner is Galatians 6:16, which reads, “God will bless you with peace.”
I couldn’t help but smile when I read that. He already has.
In my daily Bible reading, today’s passage from Psalms reinforced this theme, already solidified in my mind. “The Lord gives His people strength. The Lord blessed them with peace.” (Psalm 29:11).
How perfect to see this theme reinforced, yet again, in God’s word for my day.
Today, I am abdicating my tension to my Savior. The peace that passes understanding is newly flooding my soul. I vow to pray my way through this month in complete surrender to the One who has all the chaos and stressful triggers in my life under consummate control.
I don’t need to spend a thousand dollars on de-stressors this year. I have only to cling to Jesus. He longs to alleviate my burdens if I will only surrender them to Him.
And surrender I will. “All to thee my blessed Savior, I surrender all.” (3)
Reference:
- SWNS. (2019, December 10). How much money we spend each year on trying to feel less stressed. Retrieved from https://nypost.com/2019/12/10/how-much-money-we-spend-each-year-on-trying-to-feel-less-stressed/
- Bunyon, J. (1845). An Exhortation to Peace and Unity. Retrieved from https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3614/3614-h/3614-h.htm
- Van de Venter, J.W. (n.d.) All to Jesus I surrender. Retrieved from https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/441.