Gift Number Twenty — JC's Village

Christmas is just a few days away friends - but never fear - I have MORE gifts for you to unwrap.

Today’s gift is peace and calm.

Jesus is our Prince of Peace - and just remembering that, saying those words calms me and soothes my soul.

How does that work?

Prayer is calming. Usually, when we’re younger in the faith we excel at telling God what we want. The more we seek Him, and desire that He grow our faith deeper the more we listen as we pray and ask Him to tell us what He wants. I honestly think prayer is how God disciples us. The more we practice listening prayer, the more we see that though things might not be comfy and cozy to our way of thinking - more often than not - God’s timing and answers produce some pretty incredible results. Imagine that.

So prayer is pretty calming.

Scripture is also pretty calming - especially those go-to verses that are so tried and true. I don’t necessarily mean the super common ones that marketers plaster on all kinds of stuff - but rather the ones that are special between me and God. Verses like Psalm 27:4 for instance - which doesn’t hold some special promise - but it doesn’t have to - I just love it and it reminds me of everything I love about God and His word. Of course - there’s nothing wrong with loving Jeremiah 29:11 for lots of reasons too, right?

A while back during a really stressful season I did a little experiment - I wanted to have more calm - so I read up on some ways to reduce stress - and soon not only was I limiting how much time I spent on social media, but limiting how much time I spent in stressful situations, and how much time I allowed myself to feel that stress. It was also helpful to not rehearse, repeat in my head, vent, rant, talk about, or in any other way repeat that stressful moment in my head after the moment of stress itself. Let’s be honest - we can’t eliminate all stressful situations from our lives - but we can change how we respond to them. So, if I felt stress - I’d write it down (that was just what worked for me), and then review, re-read, listen to a few of my favorite scripture passages. I’d refuse to let the stress cause me to flip out though. Or at least that was the goal.

When I first cooked up that plan - I was unsure if it’d work at all.

You guys! It was SO effective. There wasn’t much change in the first week or so. But after that - big changes began to happen. Within a couple of months - it just kept getting easier and easier because new ways to keep stress at bay kept coming to mind - and a year or so later I realized that this process had made me resistant to stress.

And then I started noticing that there’s something really seductive about stress.

What’s more - our culture almost connects feeling stressed out and pressed to your limit - and or beyond - with success, importance, and being a meaningful adult. Think I’m kidding - imagine walking up to your friend circle and telling them that you’re not stressed at all. Eeek. Maybe don’t do that - but you know what would happen if you did. It might seem like this was a lot of work/effort - but it really wasn’t. Instead it was like going from living life with my shoelaces untied and then figuring out how to tie them. It made everything smoother. I’ll go into this more in posts in 2022.