I am struggling for words as I begin to write this, but I must try to relate an experience I had a few days ago.
I was out in a park pouring out my heart to the Lord, for, I go through some very hard things at times. Like all of us these days.
I don’t know if I can adequately describe how I was feeling, except to say that I felt my whole life was so… what has it amounted to? I felt so… broken… so… brought to nothing.
And unexpectedly a deep peace came very close to me. It caught me unawares; I wasn’t expecting it. I’ve known a measure of the peace of God over the years, but this was a peace deeper than anything I have ever known. It was precious beyond words… so precious that I immediately cried out (in my heart), “Lord, you must keep this for me; I don’t trust myself to keep this; please keep this for me lest I lose it.”
…And after a few moments… it… or should I say, He… withdrew.
Paul writes of the peace of God that passeth understanding… but also of the God of peace. I believe it was the God of peace Himself who drew so close to me, for there was a precious Presence in this peace. And even though it was but for a few moments I have come to realize… beloved, we too readily presume in the present level of our spiritual consciousness. What I mean is, we consider ourselves spiritually conscious when in fact we are yet very short of the consciousness of God. There are depths in our God that we simply know nothing about. That afternoon I touched a God who… He is a God of peace. Oh, He loves peace. He loves peace more deeply than we can comprehend. In fact He is peace, peace at a level beyond words to describe. Strife of any kind is to Him the most jarring of things. Violence, force, contention, harshness, strife… whether in word or deed… it pierces Him to the heart. This strife-torn world is an alien world to Him. He is so gentle of heart. Oh how He longs for a world that is filled with His peace.
And He will yet have such a world. For He has promised that of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end… till the kingdom of His righteousness and peace covers the earth as the waters cover the sea.
I feel so helpless trying to describe the peace I felt, and I guess I have to give up trying. What is a description compared with an experience?
And so all I can say is… it isn’t enough that I had so fleeting a taste of this peace. All it did was wreck me. It seems like all else has become ashes to me. I must pursue this peace. I will not stop short of coming to abide in this peace… in this God of peace. I noticed in my Interlinear Bible that every place where the God of peace is mentioned it actually says, “the God of the peace.” In other words, it is a matchless peace, there is none other like it—the peace of God Himself… the God of peace Himself.
Oh, to abide in this peace!