The Holy Spirit Brings Peace (338)

0:01 Welcome to the Quality Christian Living Podcast. Once again, I am your host, David Friend. We're continuing our series on the Holy Spirit and today's topic is, The Holy Spirit Brings Peace. You know, we just completed one called, The Holy Spirit Brings Joy. And, you know, I don't know if I want to go down all the fruit of the Spirit, but for sure, I want to cover this one today. We're going to talk about, how can we live in peace during trials? And why do so many live without peace? And why is my favorite, now that's me personally, why is my favorite scripture on peace, Philippians chapter 4, verse 6 and 7? Now, also we're going to discuss, have you struggled with finding peace? And why Why is peace so difficult for non -believers? And finally, how do you find peace and what is it? What is peace? Well, let's pray first before we get into this. Heavenly Father, we're taking on a topic, Father, that many people struggle with. And I pray, Lord, that you would bless this podcast. I ask the Holy Spirit to come in now, take control, take charge, and lead me in the direction that I should go. Open up the scriptures and reveal what you want me to share with those who are listening in today. And for those, Lord, who need peace, I pray, Father, you would bring a special touch upon them. May the Holy Spirit speak to them and help them. And may they receive something in this podcast that would just change their mind said and our thoughts about living in peace.

1:22 Bless I ask everything that's said done and I'll be so careful to give you praise and glory for all the results. We ask these things once again in Jesus name we pray. Well, to get into this particular podcast on how the Holy Spirit brings peace, I'm going to basically try and discuss each and every topic that I outlined in my introduction and see how that goes. Let's just see how the Lord leads us. I kind of want to start off with talking about the difference between what God intends for us and what we sometimes do in our flesh. Matter of fact, what we do all the time in our flesh is to get what we want when we want it. And so let's look at a scripture I think that helps us out to get started on this topic. the Holy Spirit brings peace. It's found in Romans chapter 14 verse 17 in the New Living Translation.

2:07 For the Kingdom of God is not a matter of what we can eat or drink, but of living a life of goodness and peace and joy in the spirit. So now this kind of combines last podcast and this podcast because it talks about both peace and joy, but it's so important we get the premise of this down and that is what the scripture is telling us is that God plans something better for us than just simply what we can eat or drink or the car we drive or the house we live in or the vacations we go on or the clothes that we wear. All those things can be fine as long as they don't get in the way of serving God. So those things can be fine but that's what life is not about. Life is not about how big a house you've got. Life is not about who is making the most money and all your friends from high school or college. It's about far more than that. It's about living a life it says of goodness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. So what this scripture is telling me is that I can't find peace and joy without the Holy Spirit because my flesh, my self -centeredness doesn't desire those things of God. It desires the things that I want to be pleased with. It's going to be those things that I think I need, my wants, my needs, and my desires. The things that control many of our lives are the things that get in the way of what God wants to give us. Many times I talk to people who are very successful financially but they have no peace. They don't have any joy in their life and they sit back and wonder they've got all the money they've got all the success and all those things and yet they're so unhappy it's because they don't understand this scripture and they're violating it once again the scripture

3:39 is for the kingdom of God is not a matter of what we can eat or drink but of living a life of goodness and peace and joy. And the key is in the Holy Spirit. And that's what this podcast is all about. This series is what we can do in the Holy Spirit. We're gonna look at some of these introduction comments that I made earlier in this podcast when I first started it off. And I always do that. I always give kind of an outline of what we're gonna cover and the topics we're gonna cover. And this particular one, I really felt led to go a little more specifically into those, very specifically. and take them one at a time. So the first one is how can we live in peace during trials? Well, Galatians 5 22, I used it in the last podcast where we read about the Holy Spirit gives the gift of peace because Galatians 5 22 talks about the fruit of the Spirit which is love and joy and peace and patience and goodness and kindness and gentleness and thankfulness and you know those wonderful qualities and self -control those are the things that we need to have in our life and only the Holy Spirit can bring those into our lives. So the question is, how can we live in peace during trials while we yield ourselves to the Holy Spirit and we yield ourselves to receive that peace and that joy? See, peace is not a feeling. It's not, oh, I feel good today or I feel good about this or feel good about that. The feel good thing can come or go. I mean, we can feel good one day and feel terrible the next day, but we can live a life walking in joy and walking in peace. And that's what this whole

5:10 series is about, to be led by the Holy Spirit and allow the Holy Spirit to do the things in our life that He wants to do. Some people say, well, I feel this and I feel that. I don't like to talk about how I feel. I like to talk about how my faith is and my trust in God is and where my confidence is and who I put my trust and strength in, and that's the Lord Jesus Christ. Because I talk about those feelings. It's so easy to say the word feeling in reality. They come and go. Feelings will hurt us. They will desert us. See, the devil himself can come after my feelings but he can't rob me of my peace. When God gives me peace and trials get into my life, peace wins. Peace wins out when we have a right relationship with the Lord and we're following the Holy Spirit and being led by him. So let's go to the next question now and see what it has to say. Why do so many live Without peace. Well, there's there's a lot of reasons I could probably just stop here and spend the next 30 minutes Talking just about this particular one because because there's so many people that don't have peace I can remember many many times being the pastor of our church and you know, and I would ask people honestly I'm gonna ask a question. I want everybody to close your eyes and bow your heads. I don't want anybody looking around I'm gonna ask you a question How many people need peace in your life and I'm telling you 75 80 percent of the church would raise their hand and I would say, okay, put your hands down, how many people lack joy? You want to have more joy? And 50 or 60 % of the church would raise its hand because people live without peace and without joy and it's not necessary that we do that. There is

6:41 an old saying that says, some things are taught and some things are caught. I use that from time to time in podcasts because that's the truth of the matter is I can teach you about a premise, but you've got to catch it, which means you have to receive it and take it in and receive that as God's Word for your life. So I'm going to read a scripture here that I used to read all the time before I became a Christian. I read it in Sunday School and all that before I gave my life to Christ. And I just read it and I thought, well that's nice, but I didn't understand really what it meant. And so... I had it been taught to me, but I had never caught it. I never received it into my life. And the scripture that answers, I believe the question the best as to why some people live without peace is they don't understand, they have not caught Philippians chapter four, verses six and seven. This is the apostle Paul.

7:30 This is one of my absolute favorite scriptures in the entire word of God, but it's absolutely my favorite scripture dealing with peace. It's so important that we take this in and receive it now. Since it's my favorite, I hope I got your attention. The Apostle Paul is talking. He's being led by the Holy Spirit when he wrote these words in Philippians chapter 4 verses 6 and 7. I'm reading it out of the New International Version. Peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

8:10 Now, there's so much to be said here. I'll make it quick, but there's so many important things. Number one, the first premise is, do not be anxious about anything. I also used to tell my congregation at the end of a service, I'd say, I might read this scripture and say, if we can just get one thing out of the service today, get absolutely nothing else but just this one thing, Philippians chapter four, verse six, do not be anxious about anything. Many people here would love to walk out of here and not have to be anxious about anything, and everybody would agree to that. That's something that we all want to have in our life. But it says, but in every situation, good or bad, not just bad, but good or bad, by prayer, alright, that's the foundation of our having peace, and by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, what we bring to God with thanksgiving, we've got to be thankful when we bring prayers to God, present your request to God, and the peace of God. Now, the peace of God, it doesn't say the peace of man, it doesn't say the peace of your pastor, it doesn't say the peace of your husband or your wife. The peace of God, that's why it's so amazing to catch this. It's the peace of God which transcends, which means it's way beyond. All understanding will guard your hearts and your mind in Christ Jesus. So if we want to have Holy Spirit -led peace, that scripture, I would make it one that you would pray every day. Matter of fact, I do not go to bed at night before I have quoted this scripture and read it, and I thank God for it. I like to read it this way, just so I go to bed. Heavenly Father, I thank you that my wife and I don't have to

9:42 be anxious about anything. but we can bring everything to you in every situation and we can pray to you and bring our petitions to you and be thankful for who you are and what you've done that we can present Lord to you our request to you Lord and you God will give us your peace which transcends all understanding and it will guard my heart and my wife's heart and it will guard my mind and my wife's mind in Christ Jesus. That's the way I like to pray because see I like the scriptures to be read to where they apply to me so that I know art applied to someone else. Just apply it to that situation, that person. It becomes living that way. The scriptures become alive and we catch what it's saying rather than just being taught what it's saying. You see, this scripture can be taught. constantly, but it will not help us until we catch it, we receive it, we accept it. It's the same thing about becoming a Christian. You can be taught about being a Christian. I was for many, many years. I was 25 years old before I became a Christian, and for probably 20 of those years, I remember going to Sunday school and Bible classes and vacation Bible school, all those things. I was in two or three different types of churches, and my mom and dad always made sure we went to church, but none of us, including my mom and dad, were Christians. We had never committed our life to Christ. We were being taught about these things.

10:59 I knew all the little stories, all those things that I'd heard, but I didn't catch it that it has an impact on my life. So when I caught it, I was 25 years old, is when I finally caught the idea that John 3 .16 says, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him. would not perish but have everlasting life. I had heard it for years and years and years. I was being taught that, but I didn't catch it until one day I realized there's more to this Bible than what I'm seeing and I received Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and everything started to change. Our marriage changed, our lives changed, my career changed, God was in control and my life has never been the same ever since. Thank the Lord for that.

11:42 Now here's another question I had at the beginning of this podcast. so difficult for non -believers? Well, see, they place their trust in something other than God, everything else but not God. In Matthew chapter 6 verses 19 through 21, the New Living Translation, it says, don't store up treasures here on earth where moss and eat them and rust destroys them and where thieves or when thieves break in and steal. So what that means is that it's saying basically, the treasures that we have here on Earth, we're not going to take them with us. They're all going to perish. Not too long ago I was at a funeral, a man was worth millions and millions of dollars, incredibly wealthy man, very, very successful in so many different ways, and yet he was gone. And they took his body, they put it in a coffin, and they buried him. And that's over. That body is now here on earth. But his soul went to heaven. He was a follower of Jesus Christ. But he left all of his possessions behind. And I think the family is going to take care of things and settle things easily. I hope so. But bottom line, we spend so much time, if we're not careful, we'll spend so much time trying to acquire stuff here and help ourselves financially. But we don't do anything to help ourselves spiritually. This man did take the time to produce a spiritual life. And he became a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ.

13:01 and became a very generous man in a lot of ways, but he was still gone. And the things that he had, the moss would eat them up, and the rust will destroy them, and the thieves will come in and steal them. I mean, that's the things that we have here on earth, but that's why non -believers have a difficult time getting peace in things is because they're wrapped up in their treasures on earth. And when they do that, they rob themselves of the bigger blessings, the greater blessings of being a follower of Jesus Christ. You see, a non -believer in Jesus Christ. They just don't believe. They put every bit of effort they have in doing things their way. That they put Jesus away. Let me repeat that. Non -believers in Jesus Christ, they don't believe in Him, they put more effort in doing things their way and that way they put Jesus away. There's an old song, and you know which one I'm going to say, there's a song that I dislike a lot. I just don't care for this song at one bit, not as a follower of Jesus Christ. And it's a song that was sang by a lot of different people, and it's basically, I did it my way. I have a real problem with that, and I hope that that doesn't bother you or offend you, but that song, I think, is all about self.

14:09 It's I did it my way. I did it my way. Well, that's not what God wants. I prefer God's way. We find God's way in Isaiah chapter 55. In the New Living Translation, my thoughts are nothing like your thoughts, says the Lord, and my ways, listen to that, and my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. So therefore, people who are wrapped up in their possessions and treasures here on earth, for non -believers, they can't be at peace because they're trying to do things their way. When God is saying, I can do so much better than you can do, his ways are greater, his thoughts are higher, than ours and so we should then get rid of our way and do things God's way. Wow, I could probably go on there, but I need to move on. We're about halfway through this podcast already. Have we struggled, another question, have we struggled with keeping peace?

15:02 You see, we may experience peace, but it seems to go away. Peace requires our source of peace. It requires understanding our source for peace, and our source is the Holy Spirit. We struggle with peace because we go in and out of doing it our way versus God's way. Here's some scriptures I think that might help explain this a little bit better. In John chapter 14 verse 27, Jesus said, peace I leave you, my peace I give you, not as the world gives. Do I give to you? Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid. You see, Jesus is saying, the peace that I'm giving you is peace that the world doesn't have. The peace I leave with you, it's my peace, he says. It's God's peace. I give it to you. It's not the world's peace. The world doesn't have peace.

15:48 The world has other things. They might look like they're having peace. They might act like they're doing okay because maybe their finances are big and they do a lot of things and travel and stuff like that. But deep inside, God has created man with a desire to follow Him. There's no doubt in my mind that the Holy Spirit is out there hovering around the earth, going around, you know, and trying to draw people into a relationship with Jesus Christ. And I believe that God created in us a desire to serve something greater than us. And when we do that, we will find Jesus Christ. Isaiah chapter 26 and verse 3 says, you will keep in perfect peace, listen to that, whose mind is stayed on you because he trusts in you.

16:29 Okay, so another way that we can keep peace and not lose peace is keep our mind stayed or focused on God. focused on prayer, focused on his word, listen to Christian music, be around other Christians, attend church faithfully, not once a month, not once a year, but faithfully. Every time on Sunday, get up and go to church. I mean, if you're sick, fine, stay home, watch it online or something. But bottom line, we've got to keep our mind and our focus stayed on God. And when we do that, we can get peace and we can keep peace. But if we go in and out of church, one foot in church and one foot in the devil's side of the world, and we're causing ourselves great strife and great challenges, and we don't have to. We need to jump both feet head first into a walk with God and let our steps be led of God. If we trust God with all of our heart, we lean not on our own understanding and always acknowledge Him, then He will direct our steps. And when He does that, we will have peace. everything that we put our hand to. Okay, let's move on. What is peace to you? Now that's an interesting question, isn't it? What is peace to you? Some may define peace as financial security. Matter of fact, when I was a banker I met a lot of people. That's how they would define peace. It's well -being financially well -off. Yet those people, many of them who were financially well -off, were not at peace unless they were followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. You cannot have peace that Jesus has until you give your life to Jesus Christ.

18:01 Christ. You surrender your will and your desires and everything that you want to do to the Lord Jesus Christ. You surrender to Him, ask for forgiveness of your sins, receive Him as your Lord and Savior, and then the peace of God comes into our life. It's so important we understand that. And finances and financial security is a good thing. There's nothing wrong with financial security, but I don't like the statement financial independence because as a Christian financial independence is basically saying I don't need anything other than finances. Financial independence, I I know what it means. I remember I've taught finances for years. I was a banker for 15 years, real estate developer for 20 years, and I've taught and written on the topics of finances and all those things and success and generosity. I understand all that, but the thing we've got to remember is that financial independence, those aren't words that a Christian should have. We should be dependent. Our finances should be dependent upon God, upon who He is and what He does. And we must give of what we have first to Him. And I believe in tithing. I believe in giving 10 % of everything that we make back to the work of the Lord through my local church. I believe that, and God has never made me feel that I regretted it. I've never in my life ever regretted giving finances to the Lord. It seems like when I work with the 90 % I have left over, I accomplish more with that 90 than I could with the 100 % of my finances I had before I decided to give of God the first fruits of what I receive. So people in the world who have a problem with peace, they define it as maybe it's financial security or it's having a lovely home or something. And those are good things. And finances are fine.

19:32 Finances are not evil. It's the love of finances, the love of money that's evil. But there's nothing about finances that can bring true peace. I mean, absolute true peace, the peace that Jesus talked about. The apostle Paul wrote about peace and money. to Timothy about it. Timothy was a young man that was getting involved in a church and Paul was trying to teach him and train him. And in 1st Timothy chapter 6 and verse 10, New Living Translation, listen to this, this is absolutely powerful. For the love of money is the root, right, of all kinds of evil. And some people, craving money, have wondered from true faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows. That's it. That's a podcast all on its own and I'll be doing a series of podcasts on finances again at the end of this I'll tell you how to look up the podcast that I've done on finances and living debt -free and all those types of things but bottom line It's so important to understand that Timothy had these words and Paul wrote them and gave these to Timothy You've got to understand it's the love of money is the root of all evil and by if you love that then you'll turn away from the things of God and you'll never have peace that God wants us to have now peace of mind is more important than money. Money does not give peace. for a lifetime. It might give a little bit of what the world calls peace temporarily, but not true peace. There's nothing wrong with money. Nothing wrong. We need it. We got to use it. We have to spend it. We have to build churches with it. We have to help other people with it.

21:00 We need to provide for our needs with it. So that's important. So there's nothing wrong with money. There is everything wrong with placing money first in our life and loving and money. I know people that's all they do is talk about money and bless their hearts. They struggle a lot of times with of having peace in their life. 1 Timothy 6 and verse 17 says this, teach those who are rich in this world not to be proud and not to trust in their money, which is so unreliable. Man, all you gotta do is watch the stock market go up and down. I know over time stock market keeps going consistently up, but it's not a whole lot of fun when it drops down 20 or 30 or 40%. And I'm not talking of whether stock is good or stock is bad, that's not the point. But the point is it's important to understand God's Word says about money and that we cannot find peace because peace cannot be defined by how much, how many possessions that we have, how many cars that we drive, how many houses that we own. Peace comes totally different. Peace is one of the fruit. of the Spirit of Almighty God. The Holy Spirit gives that gift to the Christian who desires to be led by Him. If you want to have peace, you want to have it in your life, then you've got to draw close to God. When we draw close to Him, He draws close to us. He'll give us peace.

22:15 Now, as a pastor, the most frequently asked question I receive is, how can I get peace with what I'm going through? I think I've given you a pretty good outline on how to do that. I would encourage you to listen to this podcast again, go back and listen to it, preview it a little bit, go through it, and listen to these scriptures. The peace of God that's in here, it flows through his scriptures. Let me give you a couple of them real quick. The question was, how can I get peace with what I'm going through? John 14, 27, Jesus said, peace I leave with you, my peace I give you, not as the world gives, do I give to you. Do not let... your hearts be troubled or afraid." Isaiah 5, 26, 3. You will keep in perfect peace, perfect peace, just to say peace, perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on you because he trusts in you. Wow. I tell you, a lot of people talk about, I trust God, I trust God, I trust God for this and for that, and that's wonderful.

23:12 Sometimes I wonder, can God trust us? And I believe sometimes in the area of finances, we don't get the finances that we'd like to have because God can't trust us with the finances. And He knows that too much finances or too many finances could rob us from the life that He wants us to live. This is not a podcast on finances, but there's been a pretty good section of it that we talk about it because a lot of people think that's where they get is to have more money. If I just made more money and that's just not the answer to receiving peace in your life. Peace comes through relationship with God and being led by the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit led peace protects our heart and protects our mind. Holy Spirit led peace brings forth the group of the spirit, love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, et cetera. Holy Spirit led peace gives us a satisfying life. Holy Spirit led peace tells us that it's God's way, not my way. These are the things that we've got to remember and draw into our life in order to truly understand how the Holy Spirit brings peace. With that, I hope this has been a blessing. Let me... pray for you right now.

24:19 Heavenly Father, I pray you would bless those who are listening in, many of which may be struggling with having peace as they flow in and out of it, but I pray they'd take these scriptures to heart, Lord, they're your word, and apply them to their life, to apply them to their circumstances, and receive the peace of God that passes all understanding, and it will guard their hearts and guard their minds in Christ Jesus. Father, I thank you, Lord, that you've taught peace through the Holy Spirit to all of us. I pray now that we'll catch it. It's been taught to us, now let us receive it. and every one of us I'll thank you for it and give you praise for it now in Jesus name I pray amen well like I say I hope that you receive this and enjoyed it I've thoroughly enjoyed doing this our next podcast that's gonna have to do with what the Holy Spirit teaches us that's an interesting topic because there's so much for us to learn right I'm gonna look at these questions what does the Holy Spirit teach us and why does he want to teach us and what do we need to be taught now those are interesting questions and we'll we'll get into that in our next podcast so I hope that you'll tune in for that when I listen for it. You might want to let your friends and family members know about that. So I just thank you once again for listening to our podcast. If you'd like to know more about Quality Christian Living, you can find out more about it by going to my webpage at davidcfriendauthor .com and when you get there, the very front page of it will show a link to my podcast. Now this is podcast number, I believe it's number 338, yes, and therefore that tells you there's a lot of podcasts. It's been right at four years now that we've been doing these podcasts, and God

25:50 has blessed us to be downloaded into over 140 countries in the world, which just absolutely is amazing to me. I'm not boasting or bragging. That's just the Holy Spirit doing what He does. And to look up and see that people are downloading podcasts in Asia, in Africa, in North America, South America, just all over the place. It's such a blessing to know that the words that are here, that God is using this tool. through Charisma Media, which is who I use for my podcast, and to be able to get these podcasts out. If you'd like to subscribe to my podcast, you can do that by going to cpnshows .com or wherever you listen to your podcast. And while you're on my webpage, you might want to scroll down and look at some of the books that I've written that are on Amazon, books on finances, books on how to find a miracle, I have books on faith, books on generosity. There's some help books for veterans. because I was a Vietnam veteran and very blessed to and honored to be serving my country. So I hope that those would be a blessing to you. And if you'd like to know more about quality Christian living in general, just simply spend a little time and look over all the podcasts we've done, so many different topics on things that have been taking place in the last four years. I hope they'll be a blessing to you. I want to thank you so very much for listening. And if you've enjoyed this episode, please take a moment to rate and review the podcast. really helps us reach more people. You can leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Charisma Podcast Network, or give

27:21 us a star rating on Spotify. However you choose to support us, we certainly appreciate that. So I'd like to close with a little blessing for you guys. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May his face shine upon you. May he be gracious to you and give you peace. May you prosper and be in good health even as your soul prospers. So until next time, may God richly bless you. I look forward to our next podcast talking about how the Holy Spirit teaches. You might want to let your friends and family members know we're doing that. Thank you once again for listening to Quality Christian Living. I am your host David Friend. Thank you for being a part of this series on the Holy Spirit. God bless you.