Pastor Joel Osteen of Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas says God calls on His children to live at rest in Him. When God says "rest," it does not mean that people should go on a vacation and not do anything else since everybody has to work and face challenges.
"We all have to interact with different people, but we're supposed to do it from a place of peace; not stressed out, worried or fighting everything that we don't like," Osteen explains on his blog.
When people "enter into the rest of God," they are letting God take control. Unfortunately, there are many "peace stealers" in one's life that threaten people's "rest in God," so Christians have to make a conscious effort to stay in the zone of peace.
"If you're going to live in peace, you have to put up some boundaries. You can't watch the news 24 hours a day and expect to stay at rest," says Osteen. "Your mind wasn't meant to take in all the tragedies, accidents and killings over and over. That's going to pull you out of the place of rest. Do yourself a favour; turn it off. Be careful what you meditate on."
Osteen recalls an incident one Friday evening when he and his wife Victoria saw a war movie together. The pastor says they only wanted to be entertained, but the movie was so depressing because it showed a lot of people being tortured and families torn apart. In the end, he said he had nightmares about the film. That experience opened Osteen's eyes about maintaining peace.
"Always remember that what you see and hear eventually gets into your subconscious mind," warns Osteen. "If you're taking in all the negative, violence and discouragement, that's going to depress your spirit. We have to constantly be aware of what might pull us out of rest. Sometimes it's our own choices. But just like your choices can pull you out of rest, your choices can lead you into rest."
