The Secret of Peace

“Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee.”* (Isaiah 26:3) There is music in these words of the old Hebrew prophet. Why can we not get the music into our lives? Why do we not all have this perfect peace in our hearts? Why do we lose the quiet and the calm of our spirits so easily in the world’s distractions and troubles? Let us see if we cannot learn the secret of peace which lies in the prophet’s words. The secret is in two parts.

One is that the keeping is of God, not us. We cannot keep ourselves in peace. There is a majestic power in self-control, and we should seek to have that power. Not to be master of our own life is to be pitiably weak. We should learn to control our feelings, our emotions, our appetites, our passions, our desires, our temper, our speech. He that rules his own spirit is the greatest of conquerors, greater than he that captures a city (Proverbs 16:32). No doubt perfect self-mastery has much to do with keeping the heart quiet in danger, calm and undisturbed in sudden trial. But this is not the real secret of peace. Our self-control reaches but a little way. One may have it and remain unmoved in the face of the most disturbing experiences, and yet not have the peace of God.

“How shall I quiet my heart? How shall I keep it still?
How shall I hush its tremulous start at tidings of good or ill?
How shall I gather and hold contentment and peace and rest,
Wrapping their sweetness, fold on fold, over my troubled breast?”

“The Spirit of God is still, and gentle, and mild, and sweet;
What time His omnipotent, glorious will guideth the worlds at His feet,
Controlling all lesser things, this turbulent heart of mine
He keepeth as under His folded wings, in a peace serene—divine.”

That is the secret of peace which the old prophet’s words reveal. God keeps us. “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace.” The Bible everywhere teaches this truth of the divine keeping as the source of all true security and confidence. There is no other keeping that really avails. It is only when God is our refuge and strength that we can say, “Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea.”* (Psalm 46:2) There is a story of a saintly old man who desired that the only epitaph on his grave should be the word “Kept.” This word contained the whole history of his life. In one of the psalms the lesson is written out for us in full. “The Lord is thy keeper.”* (Psalm 121:5) “He that keepeth thee will not slumber…. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul.”* (Psalm 121:3,7) It is God who keeps us—it is God alone who can keep us—in perfect peace.

Our peace never can be more secure than that on which it depends. Our trust never can be more sure than that on which it leans. Only God is eternal, the same yesterday and today and forever, and only when we rest in God and trust in Him can we have a peace which cannot be disturbed. “Trust ye in the Lord for ever: for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength.”* (Isaiah 26:4) When we are held in the clasp of His love, we are safe from any disturbance, for He is omnipotent. Our refuge is secure forever, for He is from everlasting to everlasting.

We have the same teaching concerning the divine keeping in a passage in one of the epistles of Paul, in which he also gives us the secret of peace. “The peace of God… shall guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus.”* (Philippians 4:7)ASV The figure is military. Men sleep in quiet confidence in their tents, in the darkest nights, in time of war, in the presence of the enemy, because sentinels wake and watch through all the darkness. God’s own peace keeps guard over our hearts and thoughts, so that nothing shall ever disturb us or alarm us. Nothing ever can disturb God. He looks without fear upon the wildest storms. He is never dismayed by things which seem to us calamitous. His infinite and eternal peace will guard us and keep us in the shelter of its own blessed quiet and calm.

This is part of the great secret of peace which we are trying to learn: “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace.” It is God’s omnipotence that keeps us. It is God’s Spirit who broods over the turbulent floods of life and brings order out of chaos. It is God’s Son who stands on the vessel, amid the wild storms, and compels them to become quiet and still at his feet. It is God’s grace that enters into the believer’s heart and abides there as a well of living water within, springing up into everlasting life. We cannot command our own spirit and compel it to be at rest, when sorrow or peril is on every side. God alone can keep us in peace. Nothing that is not infinite and eternal can be a safe and secure hiding-place for an immortal life.