Today, we're going to take a posture of peace
by not delaying joy.
Hi, I'm Lindsay VanZale.
Posture is a podcast that serves a short, audible fist bump
to remind you that God is in everything.
Together, we're gonna be emboldened
to take a daily posture of perfect peace.
In Mark 4, starting in verse 35,
there's the story of Jesus and his disciples.
They're out on the boat in the middle of the sea
and it says, a great windstorm arose
and the waves were breaking into the boat
and the boat was filling with water.
And it says, Jesus was asleep in the stern.
And so his disciples came to wake him up
and they said in verse 38,
teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?
And so Jesus wakes up and it says, he rebukes the wind
and says to the sea, peace, be still.
And the wind ceased and there was a great calm.
And then he said to his disciples, why are you so afraid?
Have you still no faith?
And it says his disciples were filled with fear,
probably shock and awe.
And then they said to one another,
who is this that even the wind and the sea obey him?
Now this week, we have been talking about joy
and joy and peace, they partner together
in raising our expectation of God's goodness in our lives
and in developing a deeper trust in him.
Peace and joy create this like beautiful rhythm in us.
When we are at peace, joy rises up.
When joy rises up, we are at peace.
The fruit of the spirit is who God is.
So joy and peace, patience, kindness, gentleness
and so much more, those are already present within us
because he is present within us.
So we're not dependent on anything external
or even our own ability to produce joy and peace.
Instead, we are learning to connect with
all God already is within us.
Second Peter one verse three really illuminates this truth.
It says, God's divine power has given us everything we need
for a godly life.
There are days I honestly just need to let that sink in.
I have everything I need for a victorious life.
Now in yesterday's episode, we talked about the power
of joy and its fullness.
When joy expands within us, it expands our capacity.
And your enemy knows this, which is why our joy,
much like our peace is often under attack.
Now he can't touch our joy because he can never empty
any fullness of Christ, he can't undo the work of Jesus.
So what he tries to do instead is diminish joy
in our own eyes so that we don't see it
for the powerful force that it is.
And there's many ways that he does this.
There are two that I'm seeing a lot of right now
and I shared one of those yesterday.
I shared in yesterday's episode a lie
that he tells us about joy.
And today I'm sharing an accusation that he uses.
By the way, the enemy's language is lies and accusations.
The Bible says he is the father of lies
and the accuser of God's people.
So we can always recognize his language
if it's a liar and accusation.
And an accusation that the enemy uses to diminish joy,
diminish the definition of joy in us,
is that he says being joyful,
especially in the midst of hard times, is being naive.
I mean, it has been said to me before by other people,
you're just being overly optimistic.
You don't know how bad it is.
If you understood how bad it was,
you wouldn't be so insert calm, peaceful, joyful.
Or I've even been asked, how can you be so calm
even when all this is happening?
Do you even care?
Which is an accusation.
Now, this type of accusation got me thinking
about the story in Mark 4.
Do you think that Jesus was unaware
of the damage a storm could do to a boat
in the middle of the sea?
Do you think he was naive to the fact
that people die in shipwrecks?
I think he understood the severity of storms,
and yet he slept.
And then when he was awakened, not by the storm,
but by his disciples who were freaking out,
Jesus faced the storm.
He didn't ignore it, he faced it.
And he said, peace, quiet, be still.
Jesus' peace influenced the storm.
The storm did not influence Jesus' peace.
And you could argue, well, yeah, but he's Jesus.
Like, of course he could be calm.
Yes, He is Jesus, and 1 John 4, 17 says,
As He is, so we are in this world.
All He is, is already in you.
In times of stress, uncertainty, pain, confusion, frustration,
I have so many times said, I will be glad when this is over.
But why wait when you already have the joy of Jesus in you?
Why wait to be glad? Why wait to be joyful?
Don't delay the very thing that strengthens you.
Let joy rise up in you. Let its fullness take up space in your
head, in your heart, in the peace and the joy that is in you.
It's greater than any trouble you'll ever face in this world.
The promise of perfect peace is found in Isaiah 26 3,
and in Hebrew it is shalom shalom, meaning complete wholeness,
nothing missing, nothing broken. This is who you are in Jesus.
Let's declare this together. Today, I am kept in perfect peace. With my
whole heart, I trust the Lord. I am strong,
I am victorious, I am whole. Remember friend, you are a living testimony of
Jesus's ultimate win. Not because of anything you did, but
because of what he did for you. With every step you take today, you're
putting Jesus's victory on display and Satan's defeat on replay.