Jehovah Shalom – The Lord Who Is Peace
Judges 6:22-24
Martin R De Haan II in his booklet: “Surviving the Storms of Stress”, tells a story of a woman named Nancy. Nancy’s glass of stress is full and overflowing. Wedged between the demands of single-parenting, a rebellious son, and managing an office, she has just about had it. When she heard that Martin was writing a book on stress and peace, she said, ‘Oh, I’m reading something right now about how to cope with stress. I hope I find it in time!’”
Most of us pressure cooker people would consider it a success just to cope with our stress. To cope is to struggle or contend on fairly even terms. In other words, to cope is to be satisfied with keeping your head above water, so to speak.
But, does God call us to live in peace or just to cope.
We’re living in a time with so much tension. Bad economy, violence, drive by shouting, potential layoffs, insufficient employment benefits, wars and rumors of wars. Stress seems to be all around us; in our homes, relationships, jobs, church, and even in our sleep. Sleep is supposed to be peaceful. But it seems our sleep is filled with the nightmares of daily stressful activities. When we do wake up we wish we never did or we’re just has tired waking as the night before.
Stress, anxiety, frustration, pain, and worry, just to cope isn’t enough. As a matter of fact we cope in all the wrong ways. We cope with alcohol, drugs, sex, eating, lying, fantasy, television, sleeping our lives away, feeling sorry for ourselves, spending money we don’t have, ignoring the realities of life, hanging out with the wrong people, taking prescription drug medication, moving to another state, or whatever we can find to cope with stress and worry.
There once lived a King who offered a prize to the artist who would paint the best picture of peace. Many artists tried. The King looked at all the pictures, but there were only two he really liked and he had to choose between them.
One picture was of a calm lake. The lake was a perfect mirror for peaceful towering mountains were all around it. Overhead was a blue sky with fluffy white clouds. All who saw this picture thought that it was a perfect picture of peace.
The other picture had mountains too. But these were rugged and bare. Above was an angry sky from which rain fell, in which lightening played and thunder roared. Down the side of the mountain tumbled a foaming waterfall. This did not look peaceful at all.
But when the King looked, he saw behind the waterfall a tiny bush growing in a crack in the rock. In the bush a mother bird had built her nest. There, in the midst of the rush of angry water, sat the mother bird on her nest. He declared the second artist the winner because his picture was the perfect peace.
The King explains that "peace does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble, or hard work. Peace means to be in the midst of all those things and still be calm in your heart. That is the real meaning of peace." - Author Unknown
Peace is not the absent of life’s realities. Peace is not coping. Peace is not ignoring problems and frustration.
Peace is God holding you together when everything around you is falling apart.
There are three (3) essential truths about God-giving peace that we would do ourselves good to hold onto during stressful times:
I. God Presents Peace To All Men – v. 1-22
The book of Judges picks up the story of an Israel at rest and takes us into the tormented centuries that followed. When the leaders who served with Joshua died, the commitment of the Israelites to the Lord relaxed. Rather than drive out the remaining Canaanites as the Lord commanded, the Israelites, set defeated foes to forced labor, or simply refused to attack enemy strongholds. Soon the Israelites were intermarrying with the people of the land, and many adopted pagan gods and customs.
The OT traces the spiritual and political deterioration of Israel. The bulk of the book tracks a pattern cycle that characterized the era of sin, servitude, supplication, salvation, silence, a period of rest during which the judge helps Israel remain faithful to the Lord. The tragedy is that this cycle is repeated over and over again, with each swing downward more serious than the other. Yet in this book is bright hope. Despite repeated failures, God remains willing to give His straying people repeated fresh chances, and to send them deliverer after deliverer.
Despite Israel’s failure God is willing to extend them a fresh new start. To understand the nature of Jehovah-Shalom we must understand that peace starts with a relationship with God.
- God presents peace to all men with Himself: The Old Testament concept of peace ascends into a theological vision. It is a vision of a new relationship between God and us, and with each other: a relationship of friendship.
One cannot live in peace without first being at peace with God. The Israelites are struggling in their relationship to God. They are left to their own devices and in the midst of it all they forget about God and start living in total disobedience and rebellion to the God who brought them into the promise land.
How do we lose peace with God? Sin!
Judges 6:1 says; “Again the Israelites did what was evil in the Lord’s sight”. Over and over again the children of Israel kept messing up! Time and time again they keep doing what they want to do rather than maintaining a pure relationship with God.
Romans 5:12 says: “Through one man’s sin entered into the world and death through sin and so death spread to all men because all sinned.”
The ultimate disturbance to our peace is un-confessed sin!
Israel sounds like many of us today, we keep messing up! For some we try to do good but we end up missing the mark and for others we don’t try at all.
No matter how you look at it, to be at peace with yourself and others it starts with being at peace with God.
Verse 1 of chapter 6 starts the tension between God and man, sin and God holiness. The “B” clause of chapter 6 says; “The Lord handed them over to the Midianites for seven years, Israel sins and God acts. Why? To get their attention. Don’t you know that there are some God produced stress, frustrations, and anxieties for the sole purpose of bringing us into right relationship with Him? Israel forgot about God but God didn’t forget about Israel.
Isaiah 57:20-21 says; “But the wicked are like the tossing sea for it cannot be quiet and its waters toss up refuse and mud. There is no peace, says God, for the wicked.”
The Israelites are going through tough times with these Midianites (read v. 2-6). Let’s we become to hard one the Israelites, they did do some things right, v. 7 says: “They cried out to the Lord…”
Bottom-line: if you’re going to live in peace, it starts with being at peace with God.
- God presents to all men peace within ourselves: In response to their cry God sends the prophet Gideon as the chosen leader to give leadership during some tough times. But upon initial contact with God, Gideon wasn’t having it. Gideon couldn’t understand how they were experiencing so much trouble when they heard the stories of ancestors of how God brought the children Israel out of Egyptian bondage and into a land flowing with milk and honey. Gideon responds like many of us who’s been chosen for a task that seems unsuccessful; “No way, Lord, chose somebody else!”
God assures Gideon that all things will work out. In verse 12, God calls Gideon, a man of valor (mighty hero). And then in verse 14 God says; “Go with the strength that I give you…I am sending you!” Gideon still wasn’t having it! Gideon starts with excuses. “My clan is weak. I’m a nobody, we can’t and won’t win if you chose me.”
One of the biggest peace distracters is you not believing in yourself. God recognizes in Gideon something that Gideon does not seem in himself. God see our potential! He sees us for what we can become, as He works in our lives. He is in the business of taking nobodies and transforming them by His power in their lives. He begins with us where we are. He knows our weakness, faults, strengths, and shortcomings. But the good news is that in the midst of all of that God knows our potential.
What this text teaches us that we can’t expect others to believe in us if we don’t first believe in ourselves. Things may not look good, yes they may have treated you bad but you’re still somebody. Yes, he may have left you all by yourself for a young tender but you’re still somebody. Yes, you’re parents may have told you that you will never amount to anything but in God’s sight you have potential. You’re past maybe messed up with all kinds of stuff but God knows what you’re capable of.
Bottom-line: Be at peace with what you can become and not with others say you are! God chose you for a purpose and only He can determine your destiny.
Illustration: You can’t beat me being me!
- God presents peace to all people in the pressures of life
Point: Israel is experiencing God induced pressure because of their relaxed attitude towards God. And we need to recognize that God will allow pressure in our lives to get our attention and put us back on track with Him.
We may not like and we surely don’t understand it. But God knows what He’s doing when it doesn’t make sense to us.
II. God Promises Peace to All men – v. 23
Gideon’s encounter leads him to question if his conversation was really with God and if what He promised Gideon to be victorious would really happen. Gideon says if this is true, show me something. Gideon leaves to prepare his offering for God. Shortly, thereafter God appears to Gideon and burns up his offering. At this point Gideon recognizes that this is God and fear came upon him because he saw God face to face.
This encounter between God and Gideon teaches us:
A. God promises peace in His person – v. 22b – “Sovereign Lord…”
In the OT God promises peace in His person as Jehovah-shalom but in the NT, God promises peace in His person as the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ. Isaiah prophesied in Isaiah chapter 6:6: For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us & the government will rest on His shoulders & His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace"
He is the Prince of Peace promised in the Old Testament (Isa. 9:6). Before His birth Zacharias announced Him as the Dayspring ("Sunrise" NASB) from on high who had visited His people "to guide our feet into the way of peace" (Lu 1:78, 79), while at His birth a multitude of the heavenly host sang "peace on earth" (Lu 2:14). Jesus also preached & promised peace. To a woman He had healed He said "Your faith has saved you; go in peace." (Lu 7:50) & to another "Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace." (Lu 8:48) How He wept over Jerusalem which would reject Him, saying: "If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace ! But now they have been hidden from your eyes." (Luke 19:42). His first words to His fearful disciples after rising from the dead are, "Peace be with you." (Jn 20:19,21)
The burden of Peter’s first message to the Gentiles was "the preaching (of) peace through Jesus Christ (He is Lord of all)" (Acts 10:36). Paul adds that Jesus "came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh" (see note Eph 2:17). He accomplished that peace for us. "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ," (Ro 5:1[note]). "...While we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son (Ro 5:10 [note]), for "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself," (2 Cor 5:19) continues Paul, "through Him (Jesus) to reconcile all things to Himself, having made PEACE through the blood of His Cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven." (Col 1:20 [note]). By His own precious blood He broke down the barrier of sin that stood between us and God and opened for us that new and living way into the holiest of all (Heb 10:19-23). And we who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ may enter there with boldness in the full assurance of a perfect reconciliation and peace. But the measure or degree of our sanctification to Him and our continued trust in Him (manifest by our obedience) is the measure of our peace in Him (Read that sentence again for it is the key to the unbroken peace OF God). "The peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." says the apostle (Php 4:7 [note]), but he suggests in Php 4:6 (note) that it depends on the measure of our trust, and in Php 4:9 (note) on the measure of our obedience ("Practice [continuously] these things").
B. God promises peace with His presence – v. 22c – “…I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face.”
Gideon feared for his life in God’s presence. He may have known of God’s warning to Moses in Ex 33:20 "no man can see Me & live!" In any event Gideon displays a reasonable response of sinful man in the presence of holy God, an attitude that is all too lacking in modern man. But, again, God meets his need by speaking peace to him. Gideon’s response to God of reverence was an appropriate response. However, God did not come to Gideon in anger but in peace.
C. God promises peace in His comfort – v. 23: “It’s all right”, the Lord replied, “Do not be afraid, you will not die.”
III. God Protects Our Peace – v. 24
a. Through Prayer - "The Power of Peace" – Philippians 4:
b. Through Guarding our minds - "The Principles for Peace"
c. Through the Persistence of Peace – “The Practice of Peace”
Judges 6:24 (note) Then Gideon built an altar there to Jehovah & named it the LORD IS PEACE. (Jehovah Shalom) (LXX = Eirene Kuriou)
This act would memorialize this event in Gideon’s mind for there would be times in the near future when he needed to remember that Jehovah Shalom was with him to give him peace & wholeness even in the most distressing, impossible circumstances.
When confronted with the storms of life, do you recall the times in your life when God said "Peace to you"?
Jehovah Shalom signifies that the Lord is peaceful, friendly or well-disposed toward Gideon. Gideon is able to confidently name the altar this because the Lord had just said shalom or "peace," to him prior to assuring him that he need not fear and that his life would be spared. The Hebrew word for “peace” (shalom click here) means much more than a cessation of hostilities but carries with it the ideas of well-being, health, and prosperity. Gideon now believed the Lord was able to use him, not because of who he was but because of who God was.
