Rick Warren - What is True Peace ?

I will tell you this, not everything that happens in

the world is God's will. God hates the evil, and

a lot of evil's done in the world. And God

could easily take away evil, really, or simple take away

your freedom to do it, and mine too, because you've

done some evil things in life, and so have I.

And he could easily get rid of all suffering by

taking away your choice and my choice and turn us

all into puppets. But He wants us to voluntarily love,

so he puts up with the pain that evil cause

in order to give you the freedom of choice. And

you're gonna go through life and a lot of things

in life. You're not gonna understand losses. You don't understand. Hurts,

you don't understand rejection, you don't understand. Problems you don't understand.

But here's the thing, you don't have to understand them

to be at peace. In fact, an explanation doesn't give

you peace anyway. When someone you love dies, if somebody

told you the explanation for it, it wouldn't make you

any happier. You still have the loss. Explanations don't comfort.

What you need is not peace, I mean not in

an explanation you need presence, the presence of God in

your life. And what you need is what the Bible

calls the peace that passes understanding. Look up here on

the screen. Philippians four to seven says this, the peace

of God, which passes all understanding, will keep your hearts

and minds through Christ Jesus. Now, what is the peace

that passes understanding. It's when you feel at peace even

though you don't understand what's going on. You have no reason,

no explanation, no discernment. You just don't know why it's happening,

but you're still at peace. And that is a supernatural

peace that comes from God. Is that peace that passes

understanding because I don't know why this is happening, but

I do know this. I do know God is a

good God, and I do know that he loves me,

and I do know that he wants what's best for

my life, and I do know that I can trust

him even when I don't understand it. That's the peace

that passes understand and it comes from feeling the love

of God in your life.