Peace is one of the most illusive commodities on earth. You wake up one morning and you discover another bus, another plane, another police station another school’s been blown up a by suicide bomber. There are over 40 wars going on around the globe, and if you’re not directly involved in one of those there’s the threat of bird flu or that pain in the neck of a person at work, or that situation at home. Stress, pressure. That’s not to say that life’s all bad, clearly its not, but somehow we learn to just accept , we learn to live with all this stuff, so we loose our peace, you know that quiet joy and assurance in our hearts, we loose our peace, and we just live with that. If God is God does he have a plan, not just for the world but, but for you and for me? And if he does, does that plan involve peace?

Over the last few weeks on A Different Perspective we were looking at the subject of Affluenza. You know, how we try and find our joy and contentment in things but it actually doesn’t work. All the secular research says that you and I know that it doesn’t work. And we kind of talked about peace in passing. This week on A Different Perspective, it’s time to put peace under the microscope. If God is God does He have a plan for peace in your life and in my life? What do you want in your life? Probably joy, peace, contentment, fulfillment. I’m not talk about a 24/7 holiday on the beach, we have hard work and we have holidays we have the cut and thrust of life and we have quite times. But through all of that wouldn’t it just be great if we could have some joy and contentment and peace in our lives?

Over the last ten years of my life, ten years being when I came to a faith in Jesus Christ, I remember back to before I made that commitment, before I took that step of saying “Lord I want you, I believe in you, I want you in my life.” I had no peace in my life. I had a lot of money, I had a big house, I had a big car, but I had no peace. And over the last ten years I’ve been traveling a journey and some good things have happened along the way, and some bad things have happened along the way to as they do in life right? And yet I look back over that journey of ten years and I can truly say to you over the last, probably seven or eight years of that journey, I have developed a real joy and contentment and peace in my life. I wouldn’t be anywhere else, I wouldn’t be doing anything else, I wouldn’t be anyone else, I have peace. I still have to work hard; I still have to work long hours and some days lousy things happen to me in my little world. But those things don’t rob me of my peace.

Not from a text book but from my life, from my experience, I’d like to say to you today, God has a plan for peace in our lives. In your life and in my life. One of the wisest men who ever walked the earth, Solomon, wrote this. You can read it if you have a Bible, you can open it up to the Old Testament, Proverbs Chapter 19 verse 21, He said, “We have so many plans in our hearts, but it’s God plans that are going to prevail.” We do have plans in our hearts, we do don’t we, we plan we dream we hope. Maybe it’s new clothes, maybe it s a new relationship, maybe its ending a relationship, maybe it’s a holiday, maybe it’s a new job, but our hopes for the future are so important to us. Our hope for a better future.

One of the worse things about divorce is that plans lie shattered on the ground, hopes and dreams for the future are lost, and when somebody’s robbed of their hope, when someone is robbed of their dreams, it’s terrible. And we make plans for this direction or that direction all the time, but I love the second part of what Solomon wrote here. The second part says that even though we may have so many plans in our hearts it is Gods plans that will prevail. It kind of makes sense, if God is God, He wins, otherwise He’s not God. And even though you and I might have hopes and dreams and plans for our lives here’s a challenging thought, God has hopes and dreams and plans for our lives. God has a hope and a dream and a plan for your life.

I was sitting praying for someone this morning in the early hours of the morning. He’s a dear friend of mine, a man by the name of Joseph Kebbie. He’s in his early thirties, he lives in Cape Town in South Africa. He’s doing wonderful things for us in our ministry, right across Africa, and yet I know he’s going through some though times too at the moment. And so there was I this morning in my study praying, and God just gave me a sense, He said you know Joseph right now is asleep (because of course we’re some hours ahead in Sydney compared to where Cape town is) and God said to me Joseph is asleep but I’m in that room with him too. That’s how personal, how wonderful God is. God is everywhere. God has a hope and a dream and a plan for Joseph’s life. God has a hope and a dream and a plan for Berni’s life. God has a hope and a dream and a plan for your life. We’d better believe it.

And so here are these two different perspectives on our life. What you and I want for our lives and what God wants for our lives? And sometimes we can be heading off in one direction but God actually wants us to head off into another direction. Is it any surprise that in the middle we feel tension? Is it any surprise that we don’t feel any peace, when we’re trying to pull against God? Its Gods plans that are going to prevail. I see this so often. You know that great statistic, 70% of people believe in God – great. But the majority of those are pulling in the opposite direction. Now maybe you say to me “Berni I think you’re a defeatist, great I have to do it Gods way, how is that a good plan?”

One of my favourite authors of all time, he wrote at the end of the nineteen century, late eighteen hundreds, is S D Gordon. I remember in one of his books Quiet Talks on Power, he writes that if God came to him and offered him anything he wanted S D Gordon said I’d say “God, no, you choose. You know me better than I do, you know how to bless me better than I do, no, God I don’t want to choose, I want you to choose”. Doesn’t that give you a different perspective on a relationship with God? If God is a God who wants to bless us, if God is a God who loves us and has dreams for us and knows our potential and knows everything that’s going to happen to us. If God loves us that much, isn’t Gods plan better than our plan? Doesn’t God know better than we do how to bless us?

The only difficult thing about this is just taking that step of letting go. Some people are control freaks. I like to be in control of my life. I’m an organised person, I plan, I look forward, I strive for things, I achieve things, that’s just who I am. And so for me that first step of letting go and letting God be in charge, should’ve been a difficult step, but you know something, it wasn’t. Because God brought me to a place where it’s just everything I wanted to do was to have Him in charge of my life. And today I am right in the sweet spot of Gods will for my life. And it’s the only place that I have discovered peace. He knows, He actually knows what I need, what I want, what I enjoy, what I’m good at what will fulfill me. Jesus knows!

What if God wants to bless your socks off? What if God has a plan for you? What if that plan really does fit you like a glove? Where are you going to find your peace?

It’s just great that we can be together again today. If you ask anyone, “do you want peace in your life?” The answer is, “well of course I do”. But when someone asks us, “well exactly what is peace?” We have to stop and think about that. Our first reaction might be to get rid of all the things that are ruining our peace. Maybe its debt, maybe it’s an unhappy home life, maybe it’s sickness, maybe it’s a thing at work. But you and I both know that those things are just a part of life, we have good seasons, we have tough seasons. Now I think peace is a quiet contentment, a gentle and solid assurance that no matter what life throws at me I’m safe. We all have battles in our lives, maybe peace is being in the middle of a battle and knowing that however it turns out I’ll be OK. What do you think?

The hardest thing about a tough situation I think, is not knowing how it’s going to turn out. Will I loose my job, will I loose my child, will these teenage kids ever turn out ok? Uncertainty means stress and stress robs us of our peace. Now there is nothing new under the sun, the nation of Israel has been at war, well, for as long any of us can remember. But about three thousand years ago not only were they having wars with other nations they were having a civil war. There were two kings of Israel the northern tribes grouped together, there were ten tribes, and they called themselves Israel. The southern two tribes that lived around Jerusalem in the province of Judah, their names were Judah and Benjamin. And so when you read through the Old Testament you often see a reference to Israel, which is referring to those ten tribes in the north; and Judah which is referring to the two tribes in the south.

Now the south, they kind of oscillated in their relationship with God. Sometimes they walked closely with God and sometimes they rejected Him. The north on the other hand, well they turned to other Gods and they just rejected God altogether. Solomon’s grandson, King Solomon was one of the greatest kings that Israel ever had, son of David. Well Solomon’s grandson was called Abijah and Abijah’s uncle was called Jeroboam. Abijah was the King of Judea and Jeroboam was the King of Israel. And it came time that they were going to have a war, it was a massive war. Jeroboam, the kind of Israel, the northern tribes had eight hundred thousand soldiers, and Abijah, the legitimate king, the descendant of David, he only had four hundred thousand soldiers. Not exactly even odds are they? You can read about it in the Old Testament 2 Chronicles, Chapter 13 verse 18. Berni, why are you talking about all this old fashioned stuff? I’ll get to the point in a minute.

This is a really story. Abijah and Jeroboam are going to war against one another. Jeroboam has eight hundred thousand; he’s turned away from God. Abijah only has four hundred thousand soldiers. Pretty descent army though for a little pocket handkerchief nation though isn’t it? One point two million soldiers going to battle with one another. In 2 Chronicles 13 verse 18, it says this. The Israelites that’s the northern tribes, were defeated and the people of Judah prevailed because they relied on God. A profound little verse. The Israelites, the Northern tribe, the crowd who had rejected God but had eight hundred thousand soldiers were defeated! And the people of Judah prevailed because they relied on God. The odds were stacked against them two to one.

When you read about it, if you go to 2 Chronicles Chapter 13 you can read about the battle. They had eight hundred thousand soldiers in front of them, but Jeroboam was no fool, he sent some soldiers in behind them as well to have a trap, to have an ambush. He was a pretty cleaver tactician as well, and yet in the middle of all of that, in the middle of these odds being stacked against them, they put their trust in God. From my experience that can be really hard because when the odds are stacked against you two to one, what can we see? We see the physical odds don’t we? We see the stuff in front of our eyes; like Abijah saw the eight hundred thousand soldiers and we say “wow that is really scary”. But Abijah and his people Judah, trusted in a powerful and loving God. A God you can’t see, a God you can only have a relationship with by believe in him through faith. And yet it’s when the odds are stacked against us that we discover and experience how faithful this God is over and over and over again.

There have been so many times in my relatively short ten year walk as a Christian, when I look back and I think I was so scared, I was so petrified and all I could do was trust that God would show up. God does more than show up; God goes ahead of us and sorts it out. God walks behind us and cleans up our mess. God works through us, God strengthens our hearts. I remember some years ago, I used to do a daily radio program call Handbook for Living, this is really early days of me doing this sort of stuff in radio. And after a little while I thought I really think that this is Gods plan for me. And then all of a sudden the man who was the head of our ministry at the time decided to take us off radio altogether. I can’t tell you how distraught I was, I can’t tell you how the odds seemed to be stacked against me. You know when you believe that God is calling you to do something and it gets taken away from you and you get put on the shelf for three or four years which it was for me, that is really disheartening.

But God had a plan, and I just quietly, as well as I could, believed in God and walked with him and believe that God had a plan, and here we are. With the program and a couple of other programs I do today that go to sixty countries and three hundred radio outlets and growing. God has a plan, when the odds are stacked against us, we don’t have to run around like chooks with our heads cut off, we don’t have to be afraid; we don’t have to slash our wrists, because God has a plan. And as long as we put our trust in him, it is the most exciting way to live. We just do the best we can and God does all the stuff that we just can’t do. Judah in the middle of their battle, cried out to Israel “Do you think you can beat us, because you have a two to one advantage? You’ve deserted God, you’ve gone and worshipped idols, we on the other hand have stuck with Him. We haven’t abandoned Him, so He won’t abandon us.” There’s the truth.

If we just stick with God day by day, get out of bed, say Lord I love you, I just want to do the best I can with you today, I want to enjoy you, I want you to work through me, I want to hear from you. If we just stick with God day by day God will not abandon us. He will not abandon us when the odds are stacked against us two to one, that’s the truth. There’s so many people who say “Well yeah I believe in God, I believe that God is God, I believe that Jesus is the Son of God,” but they don’t have a relationship and they don’t trust Him in the tough times. My life over the last ten years as I walk with God, I’ve been called to take some steps of faith, this ministry is a huge step of faith and someone once said to me when I was feeling some doubts, “So Berni which particular need do you think that God’s not going to meet for you, which particular need do you think that God just can’t deal with?”

We have a right to put our trust in Him, to walk gently and quietly and lovingly in a relationship with Him, to be prepared to take those steps and risks when He calls us. Peace means I’m not afraid anymore when the odds are stacked against me because I know from experience God is in this place, God went ahead, God prepared the place. And when I make some mistakes God will come along behind and clean up after me and compensate. Not because I’m such a good guy, just because I believe in Him, just because God is a faithful God. So many people believe that His is God, but don’t believe in Him, trust Him, have faith in Him and experience the peace that comes from that. God has a plan, that plan in your life is for peace.

It’s so good to be together again today. Wouldn’t it be great if people just left us alone sometimes? Have you ever felt that? No matter what direction you turn in, there’s someone there to get under your skin, to block you, to frustrate you. At work, at home, at the local football club where all you want to do is coach the kids, in the group where you meet for coffee every other week. There’s that one person that just drives you nuts. There’s conflict on every side, what’s going on, why is life like this? I just can’t take this anymore. We’ve all been there and it seems like there’s nothing we can do about it. Well, what if there is?

If you have an Asian or Eastern heritage, chances are you keep the natural and the supernatural very close together in your heart and in your mind. In fact they’re almost aspects of the one thing – life. On the other hand if you come from the West well, you probably keep them in completely separate boxes. Many of us Westerners lock and hide the supernatural box and we only get it out now and then. Some people just kind of pray when they experience a tragedy, some people sometimes dabble in the occult. And we go through life and we have sometimes so much physical strife. Have you ever noticed that when you’re going through life, and as I said before, there just seem to be battles going on every direction that you’re turning? Today I’d like to share a supernatural principle with you on this whole issue of dealing with the battles in life. A supernatural principle that actually works.

To explain the principle we need to share a short historical story and it’s the story of Israel back in the days when they were fighting wars. Now Israel had been fighting wars I guess for a long, long time. We’re talking way, way back about 950BC, when Israel had split into two parts. The northern ten tribes called themselves Israel, and they largely turned away from God. The southern two tribes, Judah, were actually Judah and Benjamin but they were referred to in the Bible and other historical documents as Judah. They were faithful sometimes. Sometimes they swung to being faithful to God and sometimes they were unfaithful to God. And Solomon’s grandson Abijah had a son called Asa, and Asa was faithful to God.

Yesterday we looked at the battle between Israel and Judah where Israel had twice as many troops as Judah and we saw that Judah won because they had a relationship of trust with God. They trusted Him, and God helped them to win the battle. Trust is about faith, when we believe that God will help us, when we have faith in Him we get this peace. No matter what happens we’ll have a victory, no matter what happens we’ll be ok. Today I’d like to take one step on, we’re not talking now about the battle when Abijah was king of Judah, we’re talking about when his son took over – Asa.

You can read about it in 2 Chronicles Chapter 14. And in verse two of that chapter it says this about Asa. “In his days as King, the land had rest for ten years because Asa did what was right and good in Gods sight.” He knocked down the alters to idols and foreign gods, he built cities and fortification. And here’s the supernatural principle “As we sow, so shall we reap”. As we sow so shall we reap – sometimes people can see this whole Christianity thing as a bunch of rules. See I knew it would come to this, if you do what God tells you, you get blessed. Gods promise to Israel was that if Israel stuck with God he would give them peace and he would bless them. Gods plan for you and me as we saw yesterday is rest, its peace, its blessing. Not a long holiday on the beach but a kind of a fruit of life, a joy, a peace in everything we do, hard work and rest. He wants to bless us.

But so often we try and get our jollies elsewhere, we build our own alters, we have our own idols, we chase down other things, we go looking elsewhere. But look at what Asa says, “We have sought God and he has given us peace on every side.” Isn’t it interesting, we can have battles going on in our lives on every side we can have someone having a go at us and we go through times like that in life. I’ve been through times like that in life. You’ve been through times like that in life. Maybe you’re going through one of those times in life now, where you turn in any direction and people are driving you nuts and they’re standing against you. And what Asa says is we have sought God and He has given us peace on every side.

Sometimes we think that the way to get peace is to fight all the battles and win. And when we’ve defeated all these people who are driving us nuts, you know that person down at the kid’s football club, who just wants their way all the time, or that committee that you’re involved in or those friends that you have coffee with or those people in your family and the in-laws or the people at work. You know we think that if we just defeat those people we’ll have peace. But let’s have a revelation, there’s a queue, you know people are queuing up to frustrate us. Have you noticed? You just have to drive your car down a busy street, someone will blow their horn at you, someone will stick their finger up at you, someone will run out across in front of you and have you slam on your breaks. There is a long queue of people who want to drive us nuts.

I’m sorry but its true, right? They’re everywhere! And so if we think that we are going to have peace by continually fighting these battles and winning we’re deluding ourselves. It’s not going to happen; the queue will never run out. I don’t know how many billion there are on the planet but they’re all queuing up for you and me. And Asa said, the way we got peace is we sought God and He gave us peace on every side. There is a supernatural principle, there is a principle that takes some guts to follow, but it’s the place where we find peace. We’re not meant to fight all these battles. Instead of fighting battles they sought God, and God bought them peace. Then in that peace they built cities. In other words they prospered. We can choose to fight battles or we can choose to seek God. A relationship to listen, to pray, to read, to hear. And little by little the battles will cease supernaturally. Little by little peace will break out, because Gods plan for us is peace. Pursuing peace is about pursing God, not winning battles, not beating people over the head.

Can I just ask you to think in your life now, who are the people that are driving you nuts? Who are the people that are hurting you, who are frustrating you, who are getting in you road? Who are they? What if instead of trying to beat them you drew close to God? What if you said “God I actually don’t want to beat them, I actually don’t want to defeat them, what I want to do is I want to start praying for them, I want to start praying your blessing on them, I want to see you bless them. Show me God, how I can bless them and Lord in all of this, no matter what’s going on I want to know you. I want to get close to you, I want to seek you, I want to see your face. I want to hear your voice, I want to experience your love, I want to know your wisdom and Lord I want to live my life for you. I’m going to put you first, even though these battles are going on, because I know God I can’t change them. And I know God, that there’s a queue waiting at the door so if I beat this one the next one will come in. So I’m not going there any more. I’m going to seek you”.

Seek God, and when we do he can, and he does bring peace. I’m not giving this to you from a text book I’m giving it to you from a life that’s been changed. Gods plan for you is a plan for peace.

Over the years I’ve listened to a lot of people telling me who God is and who he isn’t, what he will do for me and what he won’t, what he expects of me and what he doesn’t. I’ve heard some people make some really amazing promises about what God will do if only I have faith. I’ve heard some people give amazing testimonies about what God supposedly has done for them. Well great… but all along you know what I was thinking? Would he actually do those things for me? I’m no Billy Graham or Brain Houston, I’m no big shot, would God actually show up in my little dung heap of a life, and do some of those things for a little person like me? I don’t know if that’s ever run through your mind, but would God just please turn up and give me peace, used to weigh heavily on my mind.

Maybe its because we live in a celebrity focused world, I remember just after the 2000 Olympics the really well known Australian swimmer Ian Thorpe, there was a picture of him four stories high on the side of a sky scraper in the middle of the city. Now all that spin makes us want to be rich and famous, but in our hearts we know we can’t. In our hearts we know we’re just ordinary people. Sometimes we see ourselves as little people. Does God do stuff for little people too? This week we’re looking at peace from a different perspective and I truly believe that God has a plan for peace in your life, for peace in my life. And if you’ve missed any of the programs on peace you can listen to them again at our web site, I’ll tell you where that is at the end of the program. I’d really encourage you if you’re struggling with having peace in your life to go and visit that website and listen to some of these programs on peace. They just have a powerful impact on telling us what Gods plan is for our lives.

There are some supernatural principles about peace. You know sometimes we hold the natural and the supernatural in completely separate compartments in our lives. We focus on the natural, on the here and now, the things we can see and touch and feel, but there’s a supernatural dimension too. People who have grown up in Asia know that they see that the supernatural is really just a part of life, and sometimes when we have battles all around us and everyone wants to get into us and every way we turn something’s going bad, all we need to do is trust God. All we need to do is draw close to God and God will fight those battles for us. God will bring peace, peace will break out.

We looked yesterday at a king called Asa who obeyed God and God gave him peace on every side. But just when they thought they had peace the Ethiopian army of a million men marched against them. Now Asa the king of Judah, the southern provinces of Israel, Asa only had five hundred and eighty thousand men in his army. Not a bad army, but it’s a bit shy when you’ve got a million men marching against you. The odds weren’t quite two to one but they were pretty lousy. And all of a sudden Asa’s thinking hang on I’ve been doing all this stuff that God wanted me to do, I’ve been honouring God, I’ve been pulling down the temples where we were worshipping other Gods, I’m suppose to have peace, and now there’s a million men marching over the hill who want to fight me and take my peace away.

It’s just the way sometimes isn’t it? You know we’ve been walking with God, we’ve been walking with Jesus, we just quietly, lovingly living out a life with him and one by one the battles have gone away and we have peace and we have joy, because that’s what happens. If you’ve never been there that’s what happens with God. God is wonderful, we honour him and God takes the battles away. And just when we think everything’s going fine every now and then out of the blue the Ethiopian army walks over the hill. Out of nowhere. That’s life, it happens to all of us.

But listen to what king Asa prays. If you have a Bible you can go and look it up in 2 Chronicles Chapter 14, and verse 11. He prays this, “Lord my God, there is no difference for you between helping the mighty and helping the weak, help us oh Lord, because we are relying on you.” Does he run around in a flap? Does he panic? Does he blame someone else? Does he give up? Asa has obviously been walking with God. He obviously has a relationship. This guy knows that God shows up. This guy knows that God doesn’t leave his people alone. This guy knows that when the odds are stacked against him, when he’s suppose to have peace and someone comes in and breaks that peace, God is in that place.

Ok, Asa was a king, but in the face of a million strong army don’t you think he felt a bit small? Kind of the way that you and I do? God shows up for kings, and God shows up for mums changing dirty nappies in the middle of the night. God shows up for presidents and God shows up for paupers. God shows up for big people and God shows up for small people. All God wants you and me to do is to walk quietly and faithfully with him every day. All God wants is for him to be our God and for us to be his people. Not a bunch of rules. It’s not a religion. It’s a relationship with a God who loves you. It’s a relationship with a God who loves me. God doesn’t have favourites, God isn’t focused on celebrities. You know in my little dung heap of a life I could have an image of celebrity success, same is true for you. And we look at our life and we say wlell our lives don’t measure up to those images of success. But that’s not how God sees things.

One of my favourite all time shows on television, you may have heard me talk about it before is Yes Prime Minister. I don’t know if you’ve ever watched any of the programs, it’s a British comedy and it’s about the tussle between politicians and public servants. And there’s an episode where the Prime Minister asks his private secretary Bernhard Woolley, “Bernhard, whose side is the civil service actually on?” and Bernhard says, “Oh Prime Minister, the winning side”. I love it. It’s not what God does, you know God doesn’t sit back and see who’s going to win and back the winner. God has a different economy.

When you and I choose to walk day by day, quietly, faithfully, honestly, decently for Jesus. When you and I decide to do that what’s going to happen is people are going to come against us some times. The devil is going to come against us sometimes, because he wants to rob us of the peace that Jesus died to give us. And when we do that, when we walk quietly and the devil comes against us or people come against us or somehow temptation comes against us in that space, we have the opportunity to discover again and again and again that God is faithful. That Jesus is there, that he understands, he knows, he’s with us. Especially in circumstances that don’t look good enough, or important enough or salubrious enough for him even to show up. Actually in those circumstances he already went before us. He’s already made the arrangements, he’s already made sure that whatever happens, whatever his plan is, we’ll be ok.

And when we understand that, because we experience it time after time after time, that’s when we have peace. When things are going brilliant well as they did for ten years for King Asa, and when the Ethiopian army of a million people marches over the hill against us, in our unimpressive little corner of life, Jesus is there. And he means to give us peace. Absolutely he’s there, he has a plan, he has a plan for your life, and that plan is peace.

This week we’ve been looking at the whole subject of peace, from a different perspective. There’s not one of us who doesn’t want peace in our lives. I truly believe that Gods plan for your life, Gods plan for my life, is to give us peace. This week we’ve been looking at how he takes the battles away, how he gives us a sense of peace in the middle of battles and how when we do have that peace, a peace is so illusive for so many people it seems, it gives us the opportunity to get on and live, I mean really live. If you missed any of those programs you can listen to them again at our website, www.chrisitianityworks.com. Now life’s not perfect we can be living smack bang in the centre of this peace from God and something comes at us out of the blue and we experience fear and disappointment in our hearts. Then what?

People say to me, surely Berni that doesn’t happen to you, you teach this stuff on radio, you sound confident you sound articulate; you look like you’ve got it all together. I just smile to myself because no ones got it all together, if I didn’t have the odd hiccup and wrinkle, if I didn’t have the odd disappointment, the odd day where I feel down, you know something I probably wouldn’t need God. Just today, you know I’ve had the most difficult few days these last few days, I’ve been so exhausted and tired. I was just sharing with someone a little while ago if God hadn’t shown up today; we wouldn’t be doing this program. Every now and then we need some extra strength, we need some extra encouragement, we need some assurance from God, it’s going to be ok. You might say to me, but Berni if God’s perfect shouldn’t he give us a perfect peace? And the answer is, He does, but we don’t live in a perfect world, and you and I aren’t perfect either. Sometimes we doubt, sometimes Gods stretching us and growing our faith.

Yesterday we looked at King Asa and he had this faith and he had this peace from God in the middle of a battle. He had ten years of peace and prosperity, but then he made some mistakes. Then Asa lost the plot. What happened was after this ten years of peace after God had given him victory over this massive Ethiopian army that had almost twice as many soldiers as what he had. You know sometimes when those odds are stacked against us we look at the odds and I could never, never do that, you know something that’s Gods plan, that’s the whole idea. God wants us to rely on him; God wants us to have a relationship with him that’s real. God wants us to experience His faithfulness, His support, His strength, His power, in situations where if we don’t have that we’re not going to get though.

So Asa has peace, Asa beats this massive army of a million Ethiopians and then he makes a mistake. Then another army’s coming against him and instead of going and saying “God, look at what’s happening, I need your strength, God I want to rely on you, God show me what to do.” Just off his own bat he goes and makes a military alliance with the Aramites. They’re another nation and he makes a military alliance with the Aramites to fight the other tribes of Israel, his people. He didn’t rely on God. It was a mistake, and yet still he won.

You can read about it in 2 Chronicles Chapter 16, if you have a Bible. If you don’t have a Bible there’s a really good website out there called www.biblegateway.org. And you can go and read any part of the bible you want at that website. Anyway, he still wins the battle even though he’s made a mistake. And God sends a prophet to him, and the prophet has basically this message. You done wrong, you shouldn’t have done what you done. Asa thinks well, so why did I win? If I did wrong, how come God let me win? And this is what the prophet says, this is a beautiful verse. “Because the eyes of the Lord range through the entire earth to strengthen those whose hearts are true to him.” Isn’t that beautiful?

See God knew about Asa, but even though he made this one mistake, basically Asa’s heart was right with God. Asa wanted to follow God and he had for many, many years. So when the king makes one mistake, get this God didn’t judge him, God doesn’t punish him God compensates for his mistake because he knew this mans heart. And not only that he strengthened him, because the eyes of the Lord range throughout the entire earth to strengthen those whose heart is true to him.

Have you ever made a blunder and you kind of believe in Jesus and you think, “I’m never going to recover from this, what’s God going to think?” God is not surprised, God is already there in that space, when God got you he wasn’t surprised with you when God got me he wasn’t surprised with me and he knows our hearts. He knows your heart and if your heart is good and your heart is for him he will catch you when you fall. He’s done that so many times for me, my heart is for God and yet some days I make mistakes. Some days I get it wrong and when I do I have a God who compensates for me. And some days he lets me live out the consequences of my mistakes, but more often than not, because he knows I love him and because he loves me, and because peace is his plan for my life, he catches me when I stumble. And when we feel disheartened, you know when were lying in bed late at night and you can’t let go of a problem and you’re tossing and turning and you think “I trust in God so I should have peace, what’s wrong with me?”

I’ll tell you wants wrong with me… we’re human and some days its hard, and right at that moment when we’re struggling with a problem and we feel weak inside, when we just don’t know, remember this little verse. “The eyes of the Lord range throughout the entire earth to strengthen those whose heart is true to Him.” Right at that moment his eyes are on you. His heart is to strengthen your heart. God is such a realist; his plan for you in every circumstance is to give you peace. He knows what we’re made of, he knows we’re weak some days and that what Jesus said to his disciples. “My peace I give to you, my peace I leave with you.” Gods plan for your life is peace, he’s with you, he’ll hold you, he’ll carry you, he’ll catch you, he’ll give you peace. That’s his plan. Do you want to lay hold of that peace in your life, given exactly where you are right at the moment? ‘Cause it can be hard you know we see what’s around us we see that Ethiopian army and we think I don’t know whether I can actually have this kind of peace. If you would like that kind of peace in your life, I’m going to pray right now for you.

Father we know that your plan is for peace. We believe you sent Jesus to die for us that we could be reconciled with you in relationship experience your love experience your faithfulness so that we can have peace in our lives. I pray that you would pour your Holy Spirit into us that you would take every situation in our lives that’s robbing us of your peace. And that supernaturally you would flood our hearts with the peace that surpassing understanding, and father we know that faith is a gift from you too. I pray that specifically you would give each one of us the faith to believe in your plan of peace for us, in every circumstance, in every moment, in every place and in the coming days, weeks, and months, I pray that we would see your peace. Father we pray this in Jesus Christ’s’ name AMEN.