Peace Wrapped with Anxiety

Peace wrapped with anxiety is a complex concept but an all too realistic one. Just look around, at church, our family, our community, our country and our world. It's crazy! How many times have you found yourself mumbling, 'what next'? I know that I do it. Nobody knows what tomorrow will bring. Not the weather guru's, not the financial analysts, not the political analysts, not our best military experts...we just don't know. Things change at a moments notice and a new factor moves to the forefront. All of this creates a bit of chaos...which leads to anxiety.

Anxiety left unchecked...leads to fear. If you don't believe me just go to your local gas station and sit and listen to people. If you live in Metro Atlanta you will understand and you will quickly find that if there if there is gas when you arrive, it will be gone soon. Now just watch and listen to people, their anxiety melts into fear as the pumps slow due to reaching the bottom of the tanks. You quickly realize that each person is out for themselves as they move into protection mode and fear creeps in. I found myself in this same camp as I went from station to station looking for gas and wondering when my car would stop because I was running on fumes.

I am reminded over and over of 2 Timothy 1:7 (NKJV) "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind." Back in June I blogged about that. (If you want to read that you can click here)

Now here comes our part, as believers. We have an opportunity to live out Grace with those around us. We have an opportunity to let Peace rule our life. We have a peace that passes all understanding and that peace resides somewhere deep within us. As we live out our live with authenticity in this world of chaos we can also choose to let God's peace reside within us. As we walk with the faith that God is in control...no matter what, we may find that our peace is wrapped with anxiety. But at the core is peace, though we are living in a world of chaos. But is it really chaos? From our perspective it is, but God is still in control. Once we come to grips with this, we then can move to sharing Grace with those around us. Grace...transforming grace.