See Beyond Your StrugglesSample

Exchange Anxiety for Peace 

“Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” —Philippians 4:6-7

We need to believe that we can experience the peace of God. But hear this—we have to do something. Paul said in 1 Timothy 6:12, “Fight the good fight of faith.” Like King David who “encouraged himself in the Lord” (1 Sam. 30:6 KJV), we have to activate ourselves. We need to take the initiative to be spiritually aggressive and shift the spiritual atmosphere around us from anxiety to confidence and peace.

This is a battle. You don’t move from 100 percent anxiety to 100 percent peace all of a sudden. You don’t go from being a zero to a hero in a day, a week, or even a year. God didn’t drive out Israel’s enemies all at once but “little by little” (Exod. 23:30). We progressively move into less anxiety and more peace. Yes, it is a fight, but we will overcome as we pour our lives out to the Lord and communicate with Him every day; talking with Him even more than we talk to our friends, parents, or spouse. As we share our life with the Lord, are honest with Him, and invite Him to help us, we will see recovery and more and more be freed from anxiety.

How does this happen? The Spirit of the Lord enters our lives, and through our dependence on Him, doors are created within us so that God gets more and more possession of our mind, disposition, and emotions. As that happens, we will find ourselves girded with more and more of the peace of God. This is a real transaction. We give Him our anxiety and He gives us His peace.

Today, I want to encourage you to fight the good fight of faith. If you’ll war for this, you’re going to find as time goes by that you are walking in a heavier and heavier anointing of the very shalom of Jesus Himself.