The Rest of Peace

“Whose mind is stayed on thee.” That is the final secret of peace. The reason so many of us do not find the blessing and are disturbed so often by such trifles of care or sorrow or loss is because our minds are not stayed on God. We are distressed by every little disappointment, by every failure in plan or expectation of ours, by every hardness in our circumstances or our condition, by every most trivial loss of money, as if money were life’s sole dependence, as if man lived by bread only. A trifling illness frightens us. The most trivial things in our common life disturb us and send us off into pitiable fits of anxiety, spoiling our days for us, blotting the blue of the sky and putting out the stars. The trouble is, we are not trusting God, our minds are not stayed on him. That is what we need to learn—to rest in the Lord, to be silent to Him, to commit our way to Him.

Paul puts it very clearly in a remarkable passage in which he tells us how to find peace. “In nothing be anxious.”* (Philippians 4:6)ASV That is the first part of the lesson. “Nothing” means really nothing. There are to be no exceptions. No matter what comes, in nothing be anxious. Do not try to make out that your case is peculiar and that you may rightly be anxious, even if others have no reason for worry. “In nothing be anxious.” No excuse is left to any believer in Christ who would claim a right to be anxious. It is our privilege and duty to be free always from anxiety and to show the sad world only victorious joy.

What then shall we do with the things that would naturally make us anxious? For there are such things in every life. Here is the answer: “In every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.”* (Philippians 4:6) Instead of carrying your trials and troubles yourself, and worrying about them, take the frets and vexations to God, not forgetting to mingle praise and thanksgiving with your requests. Get them altogether out of your hands into God’s hands, and leave them there.

“Yes, leave it with Him.
The lilies all do
And they grow—
They grow in the rain,
And they grow in the dew—
Yes, they grow;
They grow in the darkness, all hid in the night;
They grow in the sunshine, revealed by the light;
Still they grow.

“Yes, leave it with Him.
’Tis more dear to His heart,
You well know,
Than the lilies that bloom
Or the flowers that start
’Neath the snow.
What you need, if you ask it in prayer
You can leave it with Him, for you are His care—
You, you know.”