The household of those who do not live by faith chases an earthly peace consisting of the affairs and advantages of this temporal life. - Augustine, City of God.
It is so easy to become obsessed with the pursuit of an earthly peace. I try to micromanage my earthly affairs in an attempt to fulfill the dreams God has placed on my heart. But in vain I have struggled to secure temporal peace for my eternal soul.
It is painful to chase the ever-elusive earthly peace. Success is infrequent, fleeting, and uncertain. I am left weary, longing, unfulfilled.
Augustine was a wise man. He understood that the Christian life is not constrained to achievement here on earth.
The household of human being living by faith, on the other hand, looks forward to the future, to those things which are promised as eternal, and makes use of temporal and earthly things like a traveler.
I must remind myself that the achievement of temporal and earthly things is not the end. Such things are merely a mean. They are tools to be used for God's glory. As such, a perspective limited to the temporal only robs me of the hope found in "an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading." (1 Peter 1:4)
Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth ~ Colossians 3:2
