Look Up

Peace.

You hear that word a lot this time of year.  And it’s something many of us long for all through the year.

Peace – in our homes, our communities, our country, our world.

It’s something we seek that often seems out of reach.  And sometimes the harder we search for it, the farther away it seems.

Perhaps that’s because we’re looking for peace in the wrong places. 

We’re looking for other people to change, for circumstances to change, for situations to change.

And while such changes are possible, any resulting peace will only be temporary.  Before we know it, we will find that peace has escaped us once again.       

For true peace is not an absence of turmoil and chaos.  It’s not an absence of pain and suffering.  It’s not an absence of grief and heartache. 

True peace is not dependent on such factors.

True peace is a state of being, of resting and trusting God to work in and through our circumstances.

I experienced a tangible example of this during a time when I found myself facing various difficult and painful circumstances. 

At this particular time, I was encountering frequent bouts of vertigo.  Whenever I turned or lowered my head, I would become quite dizzy and would have to grab hold of something to keep from losing my balance.

As I knelt down in prayer one day, I bent my head down, and everything around me began spinning.

As the room spun, I placed my hands firmly on the floor to brace myself and cried, “God, this is what my whole life feels like right now, everything is spinning out of control!”

As soon as I had spoken these words, I sensed God impressing upon my heart, “Don’t look down – look up.”

Of course that was the literal answer to keeping my vertigo in check.  But it was also the metaphorical answer to keeping my circumstances in check.

The same applies to us all.

Don’t look around.  Don’t look down.  Look up.

Don’t look at our circumstances.  Don’t look to our own thoughts and emotions.  Look up, to God.    

Seek God’s thoughts, His perspective, His direction, His will.

In the process of trusting and waiting on God, He might change our circumstances.  He certainly is capable of doing so.

But He also might not.  He might instead use our circumstances to change us.

Perhaps God wants to grow our faith, to teach us to trust Him completely.  To release control of trying to work everything out ourselves and trust Him to work everything out – in His way and His time.  To trust His bigger plan for our lives, which may be different from our own.

Perhaps God is trying to teach us to release negative thoughts and emotions, those such as bitterness, resentment, anger and strife.

It’s been said that harboring unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die, and that anger is punishment we give ourselves for someone else’s mistake.

Such things only harm us.  And when we allow them to take root in our lives, they steal our peace.  Our peace with others, our peace with ourselves and our peace with God.

But we can choose otherwise. 

We can choose to release harmful thoughts and emotions and abide in the peace that God offers. 

Instead of looking at our circumstances/situations and our feelings/emotions, we can look to God. 

Look to God’s strength.  Look to God’s promises.  Look to God’s providence. 

In the relationships and situations where we need the most peace, we can seek God’s voice and follow His lead.

And as we keep our eyes on God, we can find the way forward.

We can find peace – when we look in the right place.

When we look up.

“Look to the Lord and His strength; seek His face always.” Psalm 105:4 (NIV)

 “I listen carefully to what God the Lord is saying, for He speaks peace to His faithful people…”  Psalm 85:8 (NLT)

 “You [God] will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in You.”  Isaiah 26:3 (NIV)