Sheryl Brady - The Pathway Towards Peace

I want to talk to you today about the subject of the pathway toward peace. The pathway toward peace is something you have to carve out, and in the day and age in which we live, there is an attack on our peace. It’s an attack on our sanity; it’s an attack on our joy—everything that makes us who we are. I’m telling you, there’s an assault on it, so you have to be solid in the Lord and have a strong foundation. One of the first things the enemy is after is your peace because your peace is what guards your heart; it is what guards your mind. If you don’t have your peace, then your heart is under direct attack. Thus, that pathway toward peace is very vital. According to Google, I just picked up my iPad and searched for «peace of mind» to see what Google would say about it. I found that Google offers insights including that peace of mind relates to skincare, healthcare, and health products. There are mentions of relaxing and meditating to achieve peace of mind, and alarm systems that they suggest when you talk about peace of mind. There are countless ways they want to tell us about peace of mind; some say it’s in candles, others say it’s in oils, and some suggest it’s in exercising. It might come from finding toilet paper today—hello! Sometimes, just locating what we need for our homes can provide peace of mind for a lot of people. Maybe it’s about finding meat on the grocery store shelves or whatever it is; everyone has their own definition today of what brings peace of mind. Having peace of mind is utterly important; it’s vitally important. I’ll say that again because I don’t want you to take it lightly: having peace of mind is vitally important, and people will do almost anything to try to find it. People go into debt looking for peace of mind; they accrue debt for things they can’t even afford, and really, what that does is rob them of the peace of mind they do have once all the bills start coming in. People embark on exotic trips trying to drown whatever is causing them to be in the frame of mind that they’re in. Some people just live in denial; they would rather push things aside and act like they don’t even exist, which gives them peace of mind momentarily. Others turn to drugs—various kinds of drugs—they turn to alcohol, they turn to pornography, and they turn to so many different things just to try to find that peace of mind. They explore so many different avenues searching for it, but the truth of the matter is that many people are simply not at peace within themselves. They are not at peace with who and how God made them or with His plan for their lives. Most people, especially in today’s culture, are living with extremely high levels of stress, anxiety, tension, and pressure. Many of us are living in smaller quarters, seeing the same people we’ve been with for the past several weeks, and we’re like, «Lord Jesus, I love You, but if I could just get a break from these kids, or from this husband…» Then there are those who are saying, «You know, I’ve been by myself; I would love to know that I had someone with me.» There are just all kinds of different situations. I want to talk to you today about your peace because it’s vital. I want to discuss three things that rob you of your peace—things that come in and steal your peace, the peace that God has ordained and intended for you to have, which is rightfully yours to possess. The enemy comes in and wants to rob and steal that. So today, I want you to write this down: here are just a few ways that the enemy comes and robs us of the joy that God wants us to have. When our circumstances are uncontrollable, it robs us of our peace. Let me say that again: when our circumstances are out of our control, one of the first things that happens is that it robs us of our peace. Think about it—if you’ve ever been on an airplane and had to make a connection, you might have thought, «My God, my flight has been delayed!» Something is going on, and you can’t get to your connection point on time, or you arrive and the gate is far away. Flight delays always cause frustration. It has certainly caused me frustration many times! How about being stuck in traffic? Today, we didn’t have a lot of that since not many cars were on the road, but being stuck in traffic can delay you and lead to all kinds of frustration. How about just being stuck at home? Being stuck at home can also cause frustration. The crashing stock market can lead to immense frustration as well, along with having to hide in our homes from a virus we cannot see. It’s frustrating. There are single parents right now who are saying, «Lord, I just don’t know.»