HOW TO BE AT PEACE NO MATTER WHAT

THE THREE KEYS TO BEING AT PEACE NO MATTER WHAT

by Ray Mossholder

Smith Wigglesworth not only had a funny last name, but he was one of the most famous healing evangelists of the 20th Century. Massive amounts of people were constantly healed in all his meetings, and he was known for breaking up funerals by raising the dead.

Wigglesworth had a saying that may strike you as audacious. He said: “If the Holy Spirit isn’t moving, I’ll move Him!”

To Smith no crowd was “too cold” to minister to with GREAT results. He knew Christ’s will was to heal and to raise the dead (Matthew 10:1,7-8; Mark 16:17-18; Luke 10:1,8-9; John 14:12-14, Acts 3:16; 4:29-31) And because it was God’s will, He knew that the Holy Spirit would minister through Him to transform and resurrect lives – spirit, soul, and body – no matter how he or the crowd felt. Wigglesworth died while ministering at the age of 88.

For forty years during his ministry Smith had hideously painful bleeding kidney stones. THEN he was healed.

It is on solid record that Wigglesworth prayed and the Lord brought more than twenty corpses back to life. He often did this at funerals of his friends. Yet when his wife died he could only raise her long enough for her to tell him where some important papers were. Then she died again.

Why didn’t Smith Wigglesworth grow bitter towards God and constantly complain about his kidney stones and his dead wife? Why didn’t he quit his ministry altogether?

In studying my Bible this week two passages of Scripture leapt out at me and made me ask deep questions about myself:

Revelation 2:4: “I have this against you, that you have left your first love.”

Revelation 3:15-16: “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth.”

I will be 77, January 31st. Georgia and I couldn’t have a stronger marriage. I enjoy life every day and have a ministry that is going into all the world through my computer. I am content. But when I tell you I am content, I don’t mean at all what the apostle Paul meant when he wrote from prison: “for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstance I’m in” (Phil. 4:11).

I WOULDN’T be “content” to be in prison on and off for eight years during my ministry years like Paul was ,– especially if I was a powerfully anointed evangelist like him, called to travel; assigned by Christ to get God’s Word, healing and wholeness out to everyone, and without a computer!

Part of his time in prison he was my age. At this present moment in my own life I’d be nothing but unhappy as a prisoner. But the apostle Paul wasn’t frustrated at all. He’d get out, they’d put him back in. He’d get out, they’d put him back in, etc. And in all that time he witnessed to all the prison guards in whatever prison he was in at the time (Philippians 1:13), and he wrote several books of the New Testament that continue to transform you and me today.

I WOULDN’T be “content” to be “jailed often, beaten up more times than I can count, at death’s door time after time; flogged five times with thirty-nine lashes, beaten by rods three times, pummeled with rocks, shipwrecked three times, immersed in the open sea for a night and a day, in constant rugged travel over land year in and year out, fording rivers, fending off robbers, struggles with friends, struggles with enemies – constantly at risk in both the city and the country. Endangered by desert sun and sea storm, betrayed by those I thought were my brothers, in drudgery and hard labor, lonely and without sleep, missing many a meal, blasted by the cold, naked to the weather. And that’s not the half of it, when you throw in the daily pressures and anxieties of all the synagogues and churches he ministered to. “When someone gets to the end of his rope, I feel their desperation in my bones. When someone is duped into sin, an angry fire burns within my gut” (2 Corinthians 11:23-29 The Message). If THAT was MY Christian life I’d wonder how a loving God could allow all those things to happen to me and I’d throw the biggest self-pity party you’d never want to attend.

Why didn’t Paul throw pity-parties? Why didn’t Paul get bitter and sulk at various times, especially at the end of his ministry like Jonah did? Why did Paul keep telling everyone about the LOVE of Christ and kept on healing the sick (Acts 28:1-10) and raising the dead (Acts 20:9-10?) Two reasons stand out:

(1) Paul NEVER left His first love – Jesus Christ – and stayed focused completely on Him; and

(2) Paul was hot for God no matter where he went or what was happening to him. He knew how to allow Christ to occupy his time so that whatever was happening, he knew he was in the midst of God’s will for him.

(3) Paul forgave those who despitefully used him and replaced the bitterness you might expect of him with unconditional love.

In Matthew 18:21, Peter was really ticked off, most likely at one of the other disciples. He asked Christ, “How often do I have to keep forgiving this jerk? I’ve forgiven him seven times.” Peter had counted on his fingers and had the makings of a good fist, ready to sock the jerk in the nose.

Then Jesus blew Peter’s mind. He answered in verse 22, “490 times!” Peter couldn’t count that high on his fingers and toes. That’s Christ’s whole point.

In the parable that followed (Verses 23-34), He told the story of a slave who owed the king an unpayable fortune. The king ordered that slave to be sold in the slave market along with his wife and children and all that he had. But that slave fell at the king’s feet and begged for mercy, promising what the king knew he couldn’t do – that he would repay the debt. The king in compassion forgave him everything he owed.

Immediately that same slave went out and found another slave who owed him very little. He grabbed that slave and began choking him, demanding “Pay back what you owe me!” That slave fell at the forgiven slave’s feet and begged for a little time so that he could pay back his debt to him. But the forgiven slave threw this other slave in prison “until you pay me everything you owe me.”

All the other slaves ran to the king and told him what the forgiven slave had done. The king immediately called for the forgiven slave and when he came to him said, “I forgave you a full fortune because you asked for mercy, Shouldn’t you have had that same kind of mercy for someone else?” Then the king “handed him over to the torturers” in prison and added the unpayable debt back on him, a debt he’d never be able to pay.

Christ then concluded, “My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his (or her) brother (or sister) from your heart.”

Matthew 6:12 – “And forgive us our trespasses, as we also have forgiven those who trespass against us.”

Is there anyone in your past or present, including God, whom you need to forgive? (Matthew 6:12). You’ll never have lasting peace without forgiving everyone for everything.

Look at the three keys to peace. How’s that working out for you?

Ray

HOW TO BE AT PEACE NO MATTER WHAT