His Name Shall Be Called…“The Prince Of Peace” Series

His Name Shall Be Called…“The Prince of Peace”

Chuck Sligh

Series: His Name Shall Be Called

December 16, 2018

A PowerPoint slide presentation of this sermon is available upon request at chucksligh@hotmail.com.

TEXT: Isaiah 9:6 – “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.”

INTRODUCTION

We have been in a series on the titles Isaiah assigned to the promised Messiah in Isaiah 9:6. Over the last few weeks, we have investigated the meaning of the four names given in this text: Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God, and The everlasting Father.

We’ll close the series today with the final title: “The Prince of Peace.” But I found that this was a difficult one to deal with because it seems on first investigation that we receive mixed messages when it comes to Jesus and peace.

On one hand, Isaiah, clearly speaks of the Messiah as the Prince of Peace, and when the angel host announced the birth of Jesus to the shepherds, their message was: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.”

On the other hand, Jesus Himself said in Matthew 10:34-36 – “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. 35 For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. 36 And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.”

Not only that, it’s clear to see that as we look around today, there is no peace on earth. Year after year we see the absence of peace in our world. Man’s inhumanity to man grinds endlessly onward.

So how do we reconcile this? The answer is found in our understanding of the word “peace.” In the West, the term peace is mostly connected with the absence of conflict. There have been protestors calling for peace in every war in every war in our country’s history, and especially since the Viet Nam War. But you don’t have to be a pacifist to want peace. The truth is that even soldiers and their families long for peace in our world.

So, in our minds, peace is connected with quiet, or a lack of conflict. It’s almost as if we define peace by what it is not—war. If there is no war, there is peace.

But the Hebrew word Isaiah used for peace—shalom—is very different from that. Shalom is indeed used to describe the cessation of hostilities, but the word itself also pictures health and wholeness. It denotes harmony and completeness. To have shalom is to have not only a quiet life but also to be fulfilled in every way. In fact, it’s possible to have shalom spiritually and personally in the midst of war or conflict or problems or troubles.

So how is Christ the “Prince of Peace”? Using Isaiah’s understanding of peace as shalom, I see two distinct ways that Christ fulfills His title as Prince of Peace now, and we’ll also see the promise of a third future shalom as well.

I. FIRST, JESUS IS THE PRINCE OF PEACE BECAUSE HE OFFERS LOST SINNERS UPWARD PEACE, THAT IS, PEACE WITH GOD.

The message of salvation the Bible teaches is sometimes called “the Gospel of PEACE.”Paul says in Romans 10:15 – “…How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace…!”

In Ephesians 6:15 Paul commands the believer to have his “feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace.”

Why is the salvation message called the “gospel of PEACE”? You see, the Bible teaches that man is at war with God, and more worrisome— God is at war with man. Why?—Because of a nasty three letter word—S-I-N.

We’re told in Romans 3:23 – “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.”

Because of our sin, Isaiah tells us that “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way…” (Isaiah 53:6)

We have all turned away from God and disobeyed God’s commandments. This waywardness has separated us from God who cannot look upon sin and who must judge all sin.

That’s where Jesus comes to the rescue! At Christmastime, we’re reminded that Jesus came to earth as a tiny baby—but that’s not where the story ends. That babe was GOD THE SON who grew up, lived a sinless life, and died on the cross to pay the penalty of your sin in your place.

Listen to a prophecy about Jesus by Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, in Luke 1:79, who said Jesus came…“To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”