In the past year I have been doing a lot of inner healing, working primarily with soul fragmentation (An Introduction to Soul Fragmentation is here), and the process been full of ups and downs—with a lot of downs. While the journey has been difficult, I have begun to experience the fruit of it in the more recent past, which has been a nice change. During this journey I have learned a lot more about the process of inner healing as a whole, which has been educational, but the Lord quickened something in my spirit one day that not only brought comfort but a fascinating revelation—on bringing peace that bypasses understanding.

Philippians 4:7 is one of the more often-quoted Bible verses, and it says, “. . . and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (NKJV). I was listening to a podcast, although I forget by whom, and they mentioned that verse. What I realized at that moment was that in order for us to have an understanding of something, it has to flow through our conscious mind. Yet, if God is bringing us peace that bypasses that understanding then it is dealing with the subconscious or unconscious mind—the realm of fragments and alters.

The reason this is significant is because fragmented parts have a moderate influence on how we feel—and yet when those feelings are negative it can be difficult to access and address them in a healthy way, helping those hurting parts to cope, heal, and move beyond the things that broke them off in the first place. And yet, Philippians 4:7 tells us that Jesus has a solution for us even when we don’t feel able to fix those issues ourselves. He will bypass our understanding, our conscious mind, and minister to those hurting parts directly to bring them peace.

While I understand that the verse is typically translated as “surpassing” is the word “hyperechō” which according to BlueletterBible.org means “to stand out, rise above, overtop, to be above, be superior in rank, authority, power, to excel, to be superior, better than, to surpass.” While I recognize that “surpassing” something means to move past it in a superior manner, the truth is that to “surpass” is essentially still bypassing—especially when we are talking about the conscious mind.

The encouragement here is that for those who are dealing with any kind of anxiety, depression, fear, or literally any other life problem, it doesn’t matter if we have the ability to understand why we are experiencing that issue in the moment. While understanding is often helpful in the inner healing process, the Bible tells us it isn’t an issue to Jesus—our understanding isn’t required for Him to share His peace with us. So, for everyone reading this, everyone struggling, and anyone who has fears or concerns, my prayer for you is this: May the peace that bypasses understanding guard every area of your soul, your mind, will, and emotions, in and through the power and love of Jesus Christ. Amen.