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Thursday, July 24, 2014

Finding Peace

This is the message given at the WOW (Worship on Wednesday) service in Gettysburg on July 23, 2014.  The Bible verses used are 2 Thessalonians 3:16-18.


            Tonight we again look at a “Three-Sixteen”, the sixteenth verse of the third chapter of a book of the New Testament.  Tonight it’s 2 Thessalonians Three, Sixteen:  “Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way.  The Lord be with all of you.”
            That sounds a lot like a benediction, and it kind of is.  It comes at the end of the Apostle Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians.  It’s a blessing that Paul is giving to the people at Thessalonica.  Paul asks the Lord to be with them and to give them peace.
            It’s a nice thing to say.  And I’m sure Paul meant it.  It’s something all of us want for ourselves, and it’s something we’d all wish for others, at least the people we care about.  We all want to feel the Lord with us.  We all want God to give us peace.
            But how does it happen?  How do we get that peace?  Because there are an awful lot of times when we don’t feel like we have it.  Life can be really unpeaceful at times, right?  And you don’t need me to tell you why.  
We don’t very often feel true peace in our lives.  Even when we’re really trying to feel peace, and even when we feel like things have calmed down at least a little, it feels a lot more like a truce or a temporary cease-fire than real peace.  I’m not going to ask you, but I suspect all of us here have something going on in our lives that is really bothering us.  If it’s not in our life, then it’s in the life of someone we care about.  And when something is bothering us like that, it’s hard for us to feel true peace.  True peace, real peace, is hard to find in our lives.
            Peace is defined as the freedom from any strife or dissension.  It’s defined as being in a state of harmony.  That’s what we want.  That’s what we’d like the Lord to give us.
            Now, realize what peace is not.  Peace is not everything going perfectly.  And we’re lucky that it’s not, because you and I are not likely to ever have a time when things are going perfectly.  And one of the biggest reasons for that is that you and I are not perfect.  If you and I cannot be perfect, then our lives cannot be perfect, either.
            But peace does not mean everything is perfect.  We do not achieve peace, we do not achieve a state of harmony, by having never having anything go wrong.  We achieve peace, we achieve a state of harmony, by being okay with whatever happens, right or wrong.
            Now, when I say that peace is being okay with whatever happens, I am not saying that we should just accept bad things and not try to change them.  There are a lot of things in the world that need to change.  Poverty, hunger, disease, oppression, inequality, all kinds of bad things exist in this world.  And they’re only going to change if people do something to change them.  People like you and me.  Peace does not mean accepting the bad things of the world and not trying to do something about them.
            But it’s entirely possible to try to make things better and still be at peace.  And I think that, even though this is a benediction, Paul gives us some clues as to how we do that.
            Listen again to what Paul says.  He says “may the Lord of peace himself give you peace...The Lord be with all of you.”
            True peace, real peace, only comes from God.  The only way we can get peace is if we get it from God.  And the only way we can get peace from God is if the Lord is with us.  
            What we’re talking about, really, is trusting God.  We’re talking about doing whatever it is we can do, doing it the best we can, and trusting God to take it from there.  We will not do everything perfectly.  But we also know that God does not expect us to be perfect.  God asks us and expects us to do the best we can at the time and under the circumstances.  And God asks us to trust that when we do that, God will take it from there and make things work out the way they’re supposed to work out.
            If we do that, then we’ll achieve that state of harmony.  We’ll be at peace.  We’ll be okay with whatever happens.  Because we’ll know we did the best we could, and we’ll know that God is taking it from there.  And if God is taking care of things, then we know things will be okay.
            That all sounds really good.  And it is really good.  The times I’ve done it I’ve felt really good about life.  But there are a lot of times I cannot do it.  And what happens when I cannot do it is that I start to worry.  I start to feel like I’m responsible for everything.  I try to take control of the whole situation, rather than just doing my part as well as I can and letting God do God’s part.  I make myself responsible for making things work out the way they’re supposed to rather than trusting God to make them work out.
            So how do we stop doing one and start doing the other?  How do we get ourselves to just do our best and let go and let God take care of things?  How do make ourselves do the things we need to do to feel that peace and harmony that we want to feel?
            I wish I had a nice, simple answer for you.  I don’t.  I’m no better at this that you are.  There have been times when I’ve felt like I was at peace, like everything was going the way it was supposed to go and God was taking care of everything.  But there have been other times when I did not feel like that at all.  There have been times when I’ve felt like nothing was going the way it was supposed to go and I could not see how it ever would.  And sometimes there’s not a lot of time between when I feel one way and when I feel another.
            I’ll tell you something that helps me, though.  It’s a phrase from the Lord’s Prayer.  Now, maybe you’re thinking it’s “thy will be done”.  It’s not.  It used to be.  “Thy will be done” is where I used to go when I was looking for peace, and there’s nothing wrong with that.  If it works for you, that’s great.  But for me, there’s a different phrase that helps me when I’m trying to get God’s peace.  The phrase is “Give us this day our daily bread”.
            The reason I go there is not because I love food, although, of course, I do.  The reason I go there is that I think this phrase refers to a lot more than just food.  I think what Jesus is telling us to pray is:  “God, give me enough of everything I need for today.  Enough time.  Enough patience.  Enough energy.  Enough enthusiasm.  Enough love.  Enough joy.  Enough forgiveness.  Enough of everything.  Including, enough peace.  Give me enough for today.  And give me enough trust to believe that, when tomorrow comes, you’ll give me enough for tomorrow.
            The reason I go there is that, for me, the main reason I don’t have peace is because I worry.  And when we pray for God to give us enough of everything we need for today, and we pray for God to give us enough trust that when tomorrow comes God will give us enough of everything for tomorrow, and when we can get that prayer to really sink in, what have we done?  We’ve eliminated worry.  We’ve taken worry right out of the equation.  It’s gone.  We’re trusting God to take care of it.  What we’ve told God is that we’re willing to take it one day at a time.  If we trust God to give us enough for today, and if we trust that God will give us enough for tomorrow when tomorrow comes, what do we have to worry about?  Nothing.  And when we have nothing to worry about, we can be at peace.
            If only it was that easy, of course.  It’s not.  It’s not easy at all.  It’s something I have to pray pretty much every day.  Sometimes more than once a day.  Asking God, not to take care of all my problems forever, but to just give me enough of everything I need for today.  And again, that includes asking God to give me enough trust to believe that God will also give me enough of everything I need tomorrow when tomorrow gets here.
            Like most things, it takes time.  And it takes effort.  And I mess up and slide back sometimes.  But as I’ve kept at it every day, day after day, I have found that I have more peace in my life.  I feel like I am in more in harmony with the world and with God.  I feel like there are more days where I feel like things are going to go the way they’re supposed to go and that God will take care of things.
            So if you’re having trouble feeling peace, I’d suggest that you try it.  Every day, ask God to give you enough for today.  Enough time.  Enough patience.  Enough energy.  Enough enthusiasm.  Enough love.  Enough joy.  Enough forgiveness.  Enough of everything, including, enough peace.  And may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way.

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