When the hour is dark, when the situation is desperate, when we are humbled and brought very low, we finally begin looking and longing for God’s peace. Trembling, we grope through the darkness, longing to know that all will be well*. “These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.” — John 16:33
Matthew 11:28 AMP:Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy-laden and overburdened, and I will cause you to rest. [I will ease and relieve and refresh your souls.]
Isaiah 54:10 AMP:For though the mountains should depart and the hills be shaken or removed, yet My love and kindness shall not depart from you, nor shall My covenant of peace and completeness be removed, says the Lord, Who has compassion on you.
John 14:27
27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.
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Peace is finding a sweet calm, solemn repose even in the tumultuous sea.
Peace is a state of the mind that you find and not get. It is sought after and not given. Peace is having one hundred reasons to be sad but choosing to be happy in the misdst of it all.
It’s extremely easy to be bitter when you feel as though your life was negatively shaped by events in your past; events that you had no control over, yet seem to affect your everyday life even years after the fact. You cling onto bad memories and refuse to let them go, you put walls up refusing to let other people into your life, and you put on a strong front to everyone, thinking that your show of strength will make people believe that you have moved on and put your past behind you. You will lie to yourself and everyone around you when in reality, you truly haven’t moved beyond your past and it still very much affects your present.
When something traumatic happens to you in any stage of life, it is our natural instinct to want to understand why it happened to us and not someone else.
Why were we put through so much pain, through no fault of our own, and then left to deal with it by ourselves? We sit and that “Why?” question runs through our head over and over, day after day, week after week. It seems extremely unfair that some of us had to endure so much and then suffer in silence when we see everyone else around us happy and seemingly well adjusted.
I would be lying if I proclaimed that I was at peace with my past; the hard labour I endured as a child and the effects of it that still affect me today as an adult. I am bitter when I have a flashback or a trigger that makes me burst into tears or reminds me of a moment I wish I could erase from my memory forever. I still have walls up to protect myself from feeling any of the hurt I felt as a child, and I know that I lie to myself every single day when I tell myself that I have moved on from my traumatic childhood.
So why cling to something that hurts me so much? Why still let the pain of something that happened over 20 years ago still affect me today? Because I’m stubborn and because deep down, I thought that there was still a chance that I could change the past; change what happened to me and have everything I ever wanted.
I couldn’t come to peace with my past because I refused to accept it. I refused to accept that I couldn’t change anything that happened to me when I was a child and I spent way too many years of my adult life letting that “fantasy” control me.
But I sit here today, alive and well, with a beautiful family and friends who loves me for the person I am now; not the fantasy. I have to accept that I am who I am because of what I went through, and there are people in this world who love me for that. I have to stop being ashamed of what I went through and stop trying to change it; I need to own my past and be proud of what I have overcome to be able to sit here and write this today.
Our pasts should never be forgotten because our pasts are what shaped us into the amazing and unique people we are today. But instead of using our pasts as a crutch and a means for self-destruction, we need to embrace what we went through and be proud of what we have overcome. You must accept your past because you will never be able to change it, but never, ever be ashamed of it.
…”FINDING PEACE”
Embrace your past and realize how strong you are to have overcome.
Sometimes in life we go through a very rough patch in life and this seems to take a very huge toll on our flesh but it is our duty to plant ourselves like a tree and tell ourselves that we must get back to becoming better than we were before. I remember a local adage that says *Tough times never last but though people [read more]...https://infoglobemedia.com/finding-peace-iwuji-emmanuel/