"My peace I give you"

All this I have spoken while still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. (John 14:25-27 NIV)

It's very easy to look at other people's lives and think they are not living in peace. But what about us? Do we live in peace? Peace, like rest, is something that eludes us, it seems to slip so easily out of our grasp. Life can be very full as we feel we are being consumed by activity and busyness with little or no time to slow down and discover a slower rhythm. Stress is all around us and there is a constant pressure from so many sources to conform or to have or to be. Often, even when we sit at home, we are not truly at peace because the engine of our heart is still whirring madly. Where, oh where, is the peace we crave?

As we allow God to be a Father to us, we will be filled with his Spirit. It is the indwelling of the Spirit of life in us that will produce the fruit of peace. Not our fruit, but the fruit of the Spirit. 

On his last evening with them, the disciples are unsettled and so Jesus gives them a gift. The supernatural gift of his peace. A peace that goes beyond our limited understanding and becomes a protection or shield around our heart and our mind (Philippians 4:7). Peace sometimes sounds like it is a bit fluffy and lacking substance but here we see it as a powerful protective force.

My prayer for us today is: can we let the power of his peace surround us in order that, even in the storms of life, we can be at rest, experiencing his peace flooding our heart and our mind?