1 - Introduction - Living like a real Christian PEACE | Page 8

gets God’s attention to such a point that our prayers get answered. It is righteousness that,
at the end of the day, pleases God.
Can I also point out that there can be no peace where there is a prevailing spirit of
complacency. Matthew 10 v 34 is one of the toughest sayings of Jesus. At first reading it
would appear that Jesus is advocating that we should hate our parents and family, but
obviously Jesus is not saying this. He is saying, however, that our love and commitment to
Him should totally supersede the love that we have in any human relationships. This high
ideal of our love for God, speaks of an unqualified allegiance to the person of Jesus and the
cause of His kingdom. Please bear in mind that, even though God has set for us a high
standard, He has given us the power to live up to that standard and it is this endeavouring
to do so that pleases God and brings to us the supernatural experience of God’s peace.
Prayer Thought: Our attaining arighteous position before God is not determined by our
trying harder and exhausting ourselves with self-effort, but it is found in a quiet dependence
on the power of the Holy Spirit within us. Won’t you contemplate this as you pray today and
my prayer for you is that you will experience a greater measure of God’s peace as you submit
yourself to a greater measure of God’s power.

SATURDAY
Luke 1 v 76 – 79
Today and tomorrow’s devotions will be focused on PEACE DEMONSTRATED.
Verse 79 of our reading today speaks of a “Path of Peace”. This is the path that people of
peace, over the course of their lives, walk on. You will firstly notice that it is a narrow
path, in that not many people walk on it. The people who do find the path of peace are
people who evidence certain characteristics.
Firstly, people of peace follow well against their better judgement. All too often in life
we live according to what we would consider to be common sense. I am reminded
however, that faith is sometimes the sixth sense that doesn’t make sense. If the great
characters of the Bible were to lead according to their common sense, how boring would
have been the Bible stories that we hold so dear. We would never read of Moses striking a
rock and getting water; that just doesn’t make sense. We would never have the story of
David, as a young teenager, defying a great giant; that just doesn’t make sense. We would
never have Esther defying all logic and common sense crossing the threshold into the
presence of the king unannounced; that certainly doesn’t make sense. But people of peace
are often called to dem ?????????????????????????????????????????????????)????????((0