Advent Series 2004
The Word Made Flesh
The Word “PEACE” Made Flesh
Ephesians 2:11-18
He Himself is our Peace
Like hope, Peace is a prevalent theme at Christmas. We see the word everywhere – cards, banners, billboards…
Rightfully so – Peace is proclaimed around Jesus all the time – in Isaiah 53 that we read at the lighting of the candle, Isaiah 9 calls Him the Prince of Peace, the angels proclaim to the shepherds “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”
The Biblical concept of peace is far larger than just lack of conflict – Shalom includes everything that would contribute to well-being
Jesus in born into the world where there is very little peace –
Roman occupation
Poverty – stable
Slaughter of the innocents
Refugee in Egypt
By the time he leaves the world, not much has changed – the Romans & the Pharisees are still in charge, the Church that He leaves is horribly persecuted by both groups.
2000 years later what is the state of peace?
A web site called flashpoints.com lists 43 countries in the world where there is some sort of armed conflict, by my estimation, about 30 of those are full out war.
In the next 24 hrs, just at about the time when you will be having your second cup of coffee tomorrow, 8,000 people will die in Africa of AIDS The bombing of the twin towers killed an estimate of 5,000 people, that’s a little over what AIDS kills in a half a day in Africa
20 years after live Aid brought to the news the problem of hunger in the Ethiopian famine, an estimate of 840,000 people are living with hunger today.
In North America, Every 9 seconds a woman suffers abuse from her partner.
U2 wrote this song after the Omaugh bombing in Northern Ireland in 1998
Peace on Earth – U2
Heaven on earth
We need it now
I’m sick of all of this
Hanging around
Sick of sorrow
Sick of pain
Sick of hearing again and again
That there’s gonna be
Peace on earth
…
Jesus could you take the time
To throw a drowning man a line
Peace on earth
Tell the ones who hear no sound
Whose sons are living in the ground
Peace on earth
Jesus this song you wrote
The words are sticking in my throat
Peace on earth
Hear it every Christmas time
But hope and history won’t rhyme
So what’s it worth?
This peace on earth
On their latest CD they have a sort of follow up song called “Love and Peace or Else”
So what do we do when, as their song says “hope and history won’t rhyme?” When we do not experience the peace that the Bible proclaims.
To do that, I want to look at Ephesians 2
Peace with God through Jesus – He is our peace
On the surface, it may not seem that the greatest trouble in the world is our lack of relationship with God, but all this other lack of peace stems from that first problem.
You may remember that when Adam and Eve turned from God in the garden, It first impacted their relationship with God – they hid themselves from him. It impacted their inner relationship with themselves – they felt shame for the first time. It impacted their relationship with each other – they blamed each other for the sin, their conflict gave birth to their son killing his brother & wars began. It impacted their relationship with the environment – Thorns grew up and word became toil, our environment no longer cooperated with us, so that the seed of disease was born in our sin.
On the day that Adam and Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, Peace died. Or, we died to the peace that we could have had.
Romans 5 MSG
The Death-Dealing Sin, the Life-Giving Gift
12You know the story of how Adam landed us in the dilemma we’re in--first sin, then death, and no one exempt from either sin or death. 13That sin disturbed relations with God in everything and everyone, …18Here it is in a nutshell: Just as one person did it wrong and got us in all this trouble with sin and death, another person did it right and got us out of it. But more than just getting us out of trouble, he got us into life! 19One man said no to God and put many people in the wrong; one man said yes to God and put many in the right.
In a Parallel passage to Ephesians 2 in Colossians 1, Paul describes our state this way: 21-22 Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation.
Jesus is the prince of peace because, through his obedience, he makes up for our rebellion and brings us back together with God. He is like the older brother who wants so much for us to be reconciled with our father that he pays for all the damage that we have done, helps us get cleaned up and then goes to bat for us with dad convincing him that we have changed and deserve a second chance.
We need to step into that peace that he has bought us.
Romans 5:1
Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, let us have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
If we come back into the household, but continue to rebel, all the work that Jesus has done is useless. We need to return to God through Jesus, but we also need to stay away from the things that put us at war with him in the first place.
Inner Peace
Jesus not only deals with the wrong doing in our life, he also deals with the shame that we can experience because of that wrong doing – even the shame that comes from being wronged ourselves.
Psalm 25:3
No one whose hope is in you will ever be put to shame.
There is much more to be said about the inner peace that Jesus brings – but not here – you can read the Book “Shame & Grace” by Lewis B. Smedes, or listen to the series I preached on it a few years ago.
Peace With Others - 2:11-18
The Peace that Jesus brings deals with the core issue, but it doesn’t leave us alone to work out all the other issues on our own.
Paul is dealing with this great divide between Jews and Gentiles – that divide is very evident in Israel today & even throughout the world – and it had crept into the church. Paul says how Jesus takes these two warring people and makes them no one.
Because it is no longer that Jews are God’s chosen people, and the gentiles are not, but both groups come to God in the exact same way!
14For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, 16and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. 17He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. 18For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.
But just like our peace with God must be worked out, so our peace with others must be. The peace that Jesus brings is not a silver bullet magically taking all discord away – if it was there would be no conflict in the church!
But Jesus not only buys our peace with his body, he gives us a way to continue in that peace – he gives us ways to work through conflicts as they arise. In Matthew 18 he teaches us not to bury our hurt feelings, but to bring them out into the open and confront the offender in humility. Much of our conflict deals with our worries over our own well being and power, but Jesus says: 31So do not worry, saying, ’What shall we eat?’ or ’What shall we drink?’ or ’What shall we wear?’ 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matthew 6)
He calls us to focus on our own forgiven-ness and therefore find it easier to forgive others.
He gives us his Holy Spirit who grows within us the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. If we had more of these fruit in our lives, it would be harder to war with even the fruitless people around us.
This peace he gives us and the power he gives us to walk in is supposed to start with us, but it is also supposed to grow.
"The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. 32Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches."
33He told them still another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount[2] of flour until it worked all through the dough."
– Matthew 13
The Church is supposed to bring peace to the world – we are supposed to be known as people of peace, reconciliation, harmony, unity so that the world comes to us looking for the peace we have! But we are more often known for strife & disunity. The mustard seed cannot grow into the great tree if it is rotten, the yeast cannot infect the whole loaf if it has died.
We must be people of Peace.
Jesus is the prince of peace – but we need to step into that peace, we need to partner with God in peace – we must commit to the ministry of reconciliation in our own lives, and we must teach peace, and the ways of peace where ever we go.
Peace with our Environment
Just a brief comment on how this relates to the environment
Last week I pointed to Romans 8:19 says that the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.
In fact, it says that creation is groaning like a woman in childbirth for this to happen. That groaning is made evident in the disease, the natural disasters, the inequity of resources. The earth is groaning – for what to happen? For the children of God to be revealed! How are we revealed?
9Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called sons of God.
When we make peace with God & with others, when we break down the dividing walls of hostility between people, we are being revealed as children of God – and the earth reajoices!
Once again we are to step into the peace that Jesus has bought us with the environment when the kingdom comes, the whole earth will be redeemed – we pray “thy will be done, thy Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. We pray for it, we should also work for it. – Through care of the environment, through ministries of compassion, when the earth’s groaning affects other human beings in disease, famine & natural disasters. Through God’s power breaking through in us in healing, and miracles
Jesus, arguing with the Pharisees says, 28But if I drive out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. (Matthew 12:28)
When we pray for healing, miracles, and deliverance, and the power of the Spirit moves in power, the Kingdom of God comes to that place.
Peace is not Just a pretty word for Christmas – Jesus bought us peace at the greatest price, and he calls us to walk in that peace, for the sake of our relationship with God, for the sake of the people around us, for the sake of the peace of the world – for the sake of the creation itself. We are people of peace, we must become people of peace.
Benediction
2 Corinthians 13:14
May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (NIV)
