What IS Lovely?

​The apostle Paul was one of the earliest practitioners of mindfulness. Some Christians will think that sounds a little too woo-woo. But it makes it no less true.

Paul was in prison when he sent a letter to a Christian community living in the ancient city of Philippi. He founded a church there and had a heart for its people. In the letter he told them he had a secret for a peace that surpasses all understanding.

Last week I found myself in a place where I couldn't begin to locate that kind of peace. Paul's letter felt more like a fairy tale than an invitation. But if this man was writing about a peace he was experiencing in a prison cell, there is no hiding from the invitation within his words.

There is no denying his longing for all of us to experience such peace.

Paul said, "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things."

If I am being real, the source of my distress last week - at the heart of my lack of peace - was my focus on things that were ONCE lovely. It was my focus on how lovely I thought that things could and should one day be.

While going back and forth - yesterday and tomorrow - I spent very little time focusing on all that IS lovely in my life right now - a form of mindfulness.

Steven Furtick often suggest we are time travelers. Minds wandering off into the future or into the past. This is a problem, he suggests, because true peace comes from being mindful of the here and now.

Monday. It's always easy to feel ugh, where did the weekend go?

Monday. It's always easy to look to the week ahead. What can and must be done? And how fast will the next weekend arrive?

But Monday. Peace CAN be found in Monday. It can be found when we don't think of Monday as the beginning of a new week or as the end of a weekend, but as a day full of things lovely in and of itself.

A peace that surpasses all understanding isn't found in fixing yesterday. Or in stepping into a better tomorrow. A peace that surpasses all understanding is found in all that IS.

All that IS right now.

Monday.

Time travel is the great robber of peace. Mindfulness returns us home, to all that IS, to the God of peace so ready to meet us there.

God knows yesterday. God has seen tomorrow. But God is living with us here - today - Monday.

Close your eyes. Think about something that IS lovely. There you will find a peace that cannot be stolen by yesterday or tomorrow.

There you will find a peace that surpasses all understanding.

There is where I need to spend a lot more time this week than I did last.....