(Philippians 4:6-9 NIV) 6 Do not worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7 Then you will experience Gods peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. 8 And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. 9 Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me--everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.

OBSERVATION
The scripture suggests that we tell God everything and thank him for all he has done. This is what it means to "give it to God in prayer." Not only giving it to God in prayer but even in the midst of our life's mess we are to express thanksgiving to God. The scripture clearly expects that if we do this we will experience a peace that passes understanding and protect our hearts. Therefore, we need to focus on the good stuff. We need to meditate on all that God has provided from the breath that we breathe to, yes even the messes in our lift that draws us to depend upon God further.

APPLICATION
People, who worry, do not pray enough. They need to learn how to pray with thanksgiving. Worry is the opposite of the peace of God. We speak about giving it to God. This is a matter of trusting God to work out His will in a situation one is worried about. Trust is hard. It doesn't take too long in life before we encounter life's betrayals. We get wounded and some of those wounds are difficult to heal. Because of those life hurts we find it difficult to trust. To trust others, to trust ourselves as well as to trust God. Therefore we tend not to leave whatever we place in Gods hands alone because of a lack of trust. Yes, but this is God we are talking about. Shouldn't we trust if we have faith? That makes sense but where does that distrust come from?

The next instruction of Paul gives us a hint of where the distrust comes. The lack of trust comes because we do not remember how God has been faithful in the past. That is why the second instruction is to express thanksgiving for all God has done. In order to leave whatever is troubling us in Gods hands we need to thank God for how He has proven himself trustworthy with our worries in the past. That becomes a great reminder of who God is to us and reminds us of God's faithfulness. Then and only then is our peace secure and God guards our hearts and minds.
Even beyond learning how to give thanks we need to be intentional about focusing on good stuff. Good stuff like truth, honor, rightness, purity, whatever is lovely or admirable anything excellent or worthy of praise.

PRAYER
Dear Lord:
Help me to walk in such peace of mind that I will trust You more. Help me to trust in ways I have not dared. Help me to trust You for today and tomorrow and what ever holds me back. Thank you Jesus.