Resting in God by Graham Cooke

What you have to focus on now is the incomparable love of God for you. Right now, where you are, He adores you. He couldn’t love you any more than He loves you at this moment. This is the thing that He wants to plant in your heart: “I love you, I’ve always loved you, and I always will love you. I love you one hundred percent, right now. Be at peace.”

There is no good time to learn about resting. There will always be something that will prevent you from resting. Psalm 46 opens with an earthquake and ends with “Be still, and know that I am God.” Mark 4 has a storm threatening the safety and security of the disciples. The antidote was to speak peace, as Jesus did. But if you can rest now, you can rest at any other time. God has given you permission to rest when you are in turmoil about yourself. What are you resting in? You’re resting in the fact that God adores you, right now. You’re resting in His ability to change you all the time. You’re resting in the fact that you are totally acceptable to Him. It doesn’t matter what is occurring around or within you. You are acceptable to Christ. So rest.

Study Matthew 11:28–30:

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for am I gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.

A yoke is a harness which fits over the shoulders. It connects us to the one walking alongside and enables us to move in unison. Jesus has promised us that if we walk with Him we can bear our burdens in a completely different manner. What would the freedom of rest really bring us in our busy lives?

Let the Father’s peace fall in your life, a peace that transcends all understanding. Ask the Lord to come and wash your mind in His peace. Let it fall on you. Pray that the Prince of Peace would come to you. Ask Him to take away worry, fear, doubt, self-loathing, self-hatred, your masks, and your pretenses, leaving only peace in their place.

Identity your current unrest or lack of peace. What are you not seeing about God’s power or faithfulness? Does your lack of peace arise out of a wrong perception? What needs to change so that peace may remain? Sometimes peace is restored by the simple act of pushing away worry, fear, anxiety, panic and unbelief. Try it. Get tough on the causes of unrest within yourself. The writer of Hebrews calls it laboring to enter that rest (Hebrews 4:8–11). We have to work at being at peace!

an excerpt from Towards a Powerful Inner Life,

part of the Being With God Series