FINDING PEACE

 ‘The LORD blesses his people with peace.’ Psalm 29:11 NIV

Increasing our pace often decreases our peace. There have been loads of inventions through the years that have promised to save time and effort on all kinds of tasks. We can go online and find any number of time-saving life hacks. But often the reality is that we don’t gain more free time, we just end up living life at a faster pace. And as our productivity increases, our peace and quality of life can feel like it’s decreasing. Think about your phone – there’s probably a few different apps on there to help you keep in touch with people. It’s great to be able to connect with others in so many ways, but the downside is that we need to keep an eye on several apps at once. We can message people instantly, which makes things really convenient and helps us stay connected even when we can’t physically be together. But it encourages us to become impatient when someone doesn’t reply to us straight away, and others might expect an instant response from us. And that expectation can lead us into multitasking – we might answer emails while we’re in a meeting, message a friend while we’re eating lunch, and so on. Instead of reducing the busyness in our lives, we end up doing two or three things at once. So where can we go to slow down and be assured of rest and peace? To Jesus, whose name is ‘Prince of Peace’.

If you feel pressured to reply instantly to messages, try setting yourself some boundaries. You could try something like: ‘If it’s not urgent or time sensitive, I’m going to wait 20 minutes before replying.’

PRAYER LINE: Today He’s saying to us: ‘Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world give. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid’ (John 14:27 NIV).

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Have quiet time with the Lord for the desired answer.