How do I find my way to peace with God?

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.  Psalms 119:105 NIV84

God’s Word – the Bible – shows us the way to go, the obstacles, and how to overcome the obstacles.

The lamp of the LORD searches the spirit of a man; it searches out his inmost being.  Proverbs 20:27 NIV84

His Word – the Lamp of the LORD – also shows us what is within us…

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.  

Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.  

But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it – he will be blessed in what he does.  James 1:22-25 NIV84

…and how to overcome what is within us.

The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. Jesus quoted in John 6:63a NIV84

  We are born with dead spirits… dead toward God.

The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.  Jesus quoted in John 6:63b NIV84

Jesus replaces our dead spirits with spirits that are living… alive toward God!

Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”     John 6:28-29

Jesus said that we will be born again with new spirits from God, not when we do good works to earn God’s approval, but rather when we repent or turn away from our sins and trust Jesus to have paid for our sins in full when he died on the cross for us.  

“Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit.”  Jesus quoted in Matthew 12:33 NIV84

The fruit of our lives, after being born again, proves if we have been born again by God, or not.

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. I John 3:16 NIV84

Love, the good fruit Jesus is looking for, is following Jesus’ example of giving up what I want for what God wants.

If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?  Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. I John 3:17-18 NIV84

The practical working out of loving  – the laying down our life for our brother or sister – is not just to talk about love but to actually meet the needs of those who are powerless to meet their needs themselves.

This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence…  I John 3:19 NIV84

And when we actually love in this way we are assured we belong to Jesus, and that we are right with God His Father.

Author: james bruce mcnaughton

I became Seriously Mentally Ill at age 18, ten years later I got and took the right meds, I accepted Jesus, and my recovery began. View all posts by james bruce mcnaughton