“You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You because he trusts in You” (Isaiah 26:3).
All men desire peace in their lives. The world defines peace as the absence of calamity and turmoil. However, as we look at the Scriptures, there is a different type of peace that the Lord offers the Christian.
For the sake of this article, we will label these two different types of peace as WORDLY PEACE and BIBLICAL PEACE
Jesus references this BIBLICAL PEACE, in John 14:27 and provides us some descriptors of this BIBLICAL PEACE when he says “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”
In this verse Jesus explicitly states that his BIBLICAL peace is different than WORDLY PEACE and he teaches us that His peace offers untroubled hearts and fearless hearts.
Do life circumstances leave you experiencing fear and with a troubled heart? If this is our experience, then we are not living in the BIBLICAL PEACE that He offers to the Christian.
A legitimate question then becomes “How do I grab hold of, or experience, this BIBLICAL PEACE that God offers us?” We find answers in Isaiah 26:3.
Isaiah 26:3 begins with a promise that “You (God) will keep him (man) in perfect peace.” What a wonderful promise of God! God himself will KEEP ME IN PERFECT PEACE! But as with all promises in Scripture, God gives man His promises so that HE can get man to do what HE wants him to do, and not the other way around!
In the second half of the verse we find the condition to this conditional promise…we are instructed that man must “STAY” his mind on GOD. What does it mean to “stay” my mind on GOD?
- To stay means: To remain; to continue in a place; to abide for any indefinite time. To continue in a state. To dwell.
This is how we live in, realize, and experience the BIBLICAL PEACE God has available to the Christian. By staying our mind on God.
The verse concludes by stating that the man who stays his mind on God does so because he trusts in God. He has faith in God. Staying our mind on God is evidentiary of a man who has faith in God.
Little Faith -> Little Staying -> Little Biblical Peace
Mature Faith -> Consistent Staying – Consistent Biblical Peace
In conclusion, what a man thinks on, what occupies his mind and his thoughts, what he stays his mind on, has great implications on his daily walk with Christ and how he experiences his life and life’s circumstances.
Are you living in PEACE or fear? What are you staying your mind on?
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