Do not be Anxious

 This candle is lit to remind that our Lord Jesus brings peace to all who trust in Him.

God created this world to be a good place to live, but sin curse came, and filled it with sadness and hardship. Despite our sin, God promised the people of Israel(and us) that He would someday restore the joy of living in His good creation. Spiritual redemption came with the baby of Bethlehem. True peace is possible, because through Jesus birth we can now be reconciled to God.



 But still, “we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies."  Sin continues to reduce the field of our dreams and concerns down to wants, needs, and feelings. Sin can make living scarily self-focused, self absorbed, self motivated, becoming a knife that cuts asunder our loyalties between the pursuit of God and the affairs of this world.

We fret....
  
        We worry...

               We are anxious....

financial burdens, parenting, health expectations, work expectations, holiday performances, presentwrapping, Christmas clutter, house cleaning.....anxiety continually invades, blotting out joy,

replacing with angst...

 The busyness of Christmas can keep us from retreating to  place of

refuge..

 somewhere quiet that will ensure peace.

 But peace isn't a place to be found on a map, or even a place that can be created.

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
                                                          ~ Isaiah 9:6

Christ's life outwardly was one of the most troubled lives that was ever lived: tempest and tumult, tumult and tempest, the waves breaking over it all the time. But the inner life was a sea of glass. The great calm was always there.

                                                      ~Henry Drummond

For enduring Peace, look for a Person whispering the word softly to your anxious heart: Peace, peace, peace. Seek a Person, the very Lord of Peace, who is willing to give you his very own abiding, unwavering peace.

                                                       ~Ann Voskamp

Breathe deeply.  

Stress deceives: There are no emergencies.


Stress isn't a situation. Stress is a state of mind.


...and state of mind is all choice. Choose to take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ, (2 Cor. 10:5)  the Person of Peace.


I can choose stress thoughts... or I can choose to dwell with the Prince of Peace in this place.


Doesn't urgency over everything imply that God's in control of nothing? Or do we secretly like blustering about perpetually stressed --- because we suppose it's evidence of the pressing importance of our work? And yet if I'm on edge, doesn't that mean I'm not centered.... in Him?

Deep breath in, deep breath out. I'm all here and so is He and there's no fear.



When I fully enter into now, the weight of being fully in the moment slows time down.
Stress is not a function of our environment, but of our thinking patterns.

God invites us to slow down and abandon our worries. To come and abide.

There's a silence waiting with the door open, a slow pace where He lingers.  Cut a clearing through the mental clutter; He will make a way in.

Wind down the whir of the holidays, and you will hear it: the whisperings of the one who was born 2,000 years ago in  a lowly manger.

~Lord help me to slow down, to take moments to sit without words, embracing humility, abandoning temporal cares, allowing the Prince of Peace to abide within me. 

May the Advent of the Christ waiting bring us peace from the one who was sent to break sin's curse and reconcile us with our creator God.

 The punishment that brought us PEACE was upon him. Isaiah 53:5

Always Seeking Higher Ground,

Nora