God’s Working People
The Work of Keeping Peace of Mind – Part V
Scripture Reading: Philippians 4:10-20
Key Verse: Philippians 4:19
And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus.
There are many verses that describe God’s promises so that we can have peace of mind and heart, but today’s Key Verse is a powerful one.
We have been talking about our “work” to keep God’s peace in our hearts. Do not forget the Apostle Peter’s challenge to us:
Turn away from evil and do good.
Search for peace and work to maintain it. (1 Peter 3:11 NLT)
Take special note of the phrase “work to maintain it”; in other words, try your best to keep God’s peace in your life and in your relationships.
These last few devotionals have focused on keeping peace in our minds and hearts. I want to spend one more day on that part of God’s peace. Today’s Key Verse reminds us that God meets all our needs, according to the riches of His glory in Christ Jesus.
Would you agree that most, if not all, problems create some needs on our part? We might need wisdom to solve a problem. We might need some money to pay a bill. We might need a supernatural work in another person’s life.
The great news that today’s Key Verse gives us is that God has already decided to meet all our needs. When we trust this verse and claim it for our problems, we naturally have peace of mind.
The word “needs” is the tough thing about this verse. We only see our immediate needs; God sees both our immediate needs and the eternal needs of our life. In other words, God may see in some of our immediate problems that if He gave us relief then He would not be providing for a more important eternal need. If we learn to totally trust God’s wisdom, then we can have peace of mind even if God does not immediately relieve a problem according to our prayer.
There is another obvious truth about our “needs”. That is, we call some things needs that God does not really see as needs. As an example, we may feel a need for advancement in our careers or an improvement in our finances that God may see as a desire rather than a need. James reminds us:
When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. (James 4:3)
We may not be able to discern our real motives in some of our requests of God; trust His wisdom in these matters.
Father, grant me strength to fight against fears concerning my needs; thank You for promising to take care of those needs. I will live in peace, trusting Your promises. In Jesus’s Name I pray, amen.