Finding ‘inner peace’ is the express longing of many people. Life not only makes physical demands, but also emotional and psychological.

Scripture is clear; we choose to live by the flesh or by the Spirit. The flesh, in essence, is to live from a worldly point of view. It excludes God, or at least reduces God to a pattern of belief to which we only pay lip service. Our mortal lives consist of an ongoing battle between flesh and the Spirit.

God’s promise and purpose as we respond to His invitation is to meet us in our pursuit of inner peace; rest for our soul. The Centre for Mental Health, following a spending review, reported the cost of mental health difficulties at a record level of £119 billion in 2019– 2020.

Words that sound so comforting were spoken at a time of Judah’s greatest pain and confusion. Exiled to Babylon, defeated, humbled and apparently abandoned by God. Prosperity, hope and a future seemed far from assured. Yet, God promised this was simply a staging post on the essential course of their God experience.

God can make me feel quite uncomfortable. I am very aware of the many fractures in my life. Scripture speaks of the power of the gospel to transform our lives (Rom. 12:2; 2 Cor. 5:17). Transformation means to change from one thing to something completely different, something better.

The close of our day is an excellent time to pause and reflect on where we’ve travelled in the past 24 hours. So much can happen in a day; so many encounters and experiences to review.

For most of us, good intentions are less the problem than the distractions of life’s realities that hijack the best of them! The wisdom of God’s Word makes sense, yet is too often lost in the many demands of our day.

For most journeys we know our destination from the outset. We make many journeys daily. We visit a neighbour, drive to the shops or take the dog round the block. Most of the time, our mind is anywhere but present with us on our travels but captured by our next task or filled with unresolved issues we know we must settle.

Journeys introduce us to people we haven’t met before. On pilgrimage, we encounter and engage with a group and experience things together. Travelling alone, we still interact with people along the way.

We all prepare for a journey in different ways. On pilgrimage, where we daily have to carry all our own luggage, it’s best to travel light. In some ways, what we insist on including in our luggage will reveal a lot about where our security lies.