"Do you have a peace about it"?

Often when I'm wondering about a decision to make, well meaning Christians will tell me to wait until "God opens a door" and ask me "Do you have a peace one way or the other?"

I'll leave the 'open doors' discussion for another blog post. Let's think about what people meanwhen they ask: "Do you have peace one way or another?"

Ostensibly, the unvoiced idea is that "You will have peace about the right decision, and you will not have peace about the wrong decision." That's an interesting idea. I think advocates of that often tacitly adopted assumption would quote Bible versus about God saying "This is the way, walk ye in it" or about "the peace of God which passeth all understanding will rule in your hearts."

Now, I think a strong case can be made that if you trust God enough to obey his ideals (like to not care whether or not you're recognized/promoted at work, but simply to do your best simply because that exemplifies the fruits of the spirit) you will have peace. But I cannot think of any example of where God promises that you will never lack peace about the correct decision. I can't think where God says to someone making a decision: "wait, look at how you are feeling - which makes you feel most calm. There, that's the right one." Obviously, that's an unfair characterization of how an advocate of waiting for peace would put it, but you get the point.

Leaving aside for one moment of whether or not looking for "peace" to guide decisions is biblical, let's think through the logical perspective. Obviously, if you make the decision you believe is the moral one, you will likely not be smitten by your conscience. So it is really possible that if you are trying to decide whether to do a wrong action or a right one, then you will feel a certain 'peace' (or lack of guilt) about one of the options. But usually, people are searching for peace about a) which trip to go on b) which school to go to c) whether to date a girl or boy d) whether to accept a job opportunity - and usually the options are morally benign. (None of them is really evil.)

Let's think a little further. Do we really believe that in every decision (or perhaps just every major decision - although that seems slightly ad hoc) God gives baptizes one option with peace? It would seem a stretch for a number of reasons. First, you must believe that everyone who made the right decision admid turmoil did so only because they missed the peace they could have had if they were just better adjusted with their emotions (but isn't the peace supposed to be a divince message, if so isn't God holding out on them but not giving them peace about the right decision). Second, there are people who have made decisions to divorce their spouses, leave for the mission field, and take degrees because they did have peace, and yet the decision was the wrong one. I met a guy in my first year of seminary who was working at a rock shop. He believed God had called him to youth ministry. He had a peace, and the door was open. Funds were available to support him through school. But then the funds dried up part way through school, and there, five years later, he was selling rocks. (You could say "God is just testing him." But again, you can't pull the 'everything works out in the end' trick. There are girls who get raped and killed. There is no happy ending for them. This story might have a happy ending, but others do not.) Not everyone who has peace about a decision gets it right. Maybe they didn't have the 'right kind of peace.' But that begs the question: what kind of peace is the right kind of peace? Are there really different 'kinds'?

But I think one of the biggest problems is that good decisions are often not peaceful. Normally, you feel peaceful about decisions that agree with the things you believe. My wife and I felt peace about investing a large chunk of money. We knew it was wise to save up for our kinds college fund and our retirement. We knew that the market was doing well, and we knew we had money. But we invested right before a global recession. Should we really expect that every believer would get a discomfort about investing right before the global recession - a collective spider sense about impending diasaster? I mean, this is important stuff. It is money that could be used for the Lord's work, to take care of our family. Its a major decision - why shouldn't this qualify as a place where the LORD speaks via peace?

It seems to me that a more realistic view is that we are not exempt from the problems that hit the rest of the earth. When it doesn't rain, the Christian farms dry up and die. When a global recession hits, the Christians don't have an early warning that prevents them from investing.

Honestly, it would seem that if you are trying to make good decisions based on kingdom principles, then your decisions are not going to be 'peaceful.' As I said earlier, people are most at peace when they do things that are most align with their beliefs and personality. But what about when you're trying to make a decision that based on Heurtz's three kingdom principles "I am NOT what I have" "I am NOT what others say about me" (and a third one I currently forget). Part of me strains against letting someone else take credit for my work. I don't have a peace about keeping my mouth shut. But that is the right decision.

So where does the peace come in? When I learn to be content with what I have, when I learn to value goodness more than accomplishments - well, somehow life is less stressful. The days when I can just not care about 'stuff' and instead take whatever I have left and give to the poor out of a generous heart: on those days, I feel a peace and joy.

The peace promised is not an ouija indicator on life's decision board. The peace is a direct result of a counter-cultural ideal - abandoning the rat race to put others ahead of ourselves and God principles and priorities and character ahead of it all.

What do you think?