Shalom!

Peace Verse

John 14:27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.

This morning, we will put a spotlight on this verse of JESUS. And really break it down to understand what our LORD is teaching us. Are you okay with that? Alright, how do we break this down? Simple really, we break it down the way JESUS did it and understand what JESUS meant. So here's how:

Peace I leave with you

My Peace I Give You

I do not give to you as the world gives

Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.

So what is this PEACE that our LORD is talking about? Peace is Shalom in HEBREW. It's an all encompassing word. It is infact one of my favorite words in HEBREW - SHALOM. Lets all say that Shalom.

SHALOM - Is Peace, Its Completeness, its Wholeness. When stretched, Shalom means prosperity and security. What a wonderful word right! It is such a wonderful word that it's a greetings of BLESSINGS to another person!

For the Jews - They Say "Shalom Aleichem" to each other and the proper response is Aleichem Shalom. Peace Unto You and in response Unto You Peace.

For the Muslims the same thing. “As-salaam alaikum” (a-lay-kum). It means “Peace be with you”. In reply, a Muslim will say, “Wa-alaikum as-salaam” – which means “And peace be with you too.”

For Catholics are also familiar with this term as in the holy mass they say Peace be with you and the response is and also with you.

My son has a joke about this, yesterday when I greeted him shalom in the morning. He said for filipinos its not the same dad. Sa mga pinoy, lalo na sa mga babae - ang greetings ay - Oi, any payat mo na ha! Oh, ikaw din ha! In English - You look so fine girl! Or you've slimmed down! Oh you too! That’s the proper response even though its not true! Hahaha. But seriously. Shalom is a beautiful word.

Shalom is mentioned more than 500 times in the bible more than the word GRACE.

And that says a lot. I mean GRACE is a big word but PEACE is mentioned more and I believe the LORD is telling us something here.

So this PEACE that JESUS talks about, the SHALOM is what Jesus LEAVES to US! He said PEACE I LEAVE with YOU! I context, this chapter of JOHN is where JESUS was already telling his disciples that he was going to leave, that he was going to heaven to prepare the rooms for those who believes in him. This is our eternal resting place. So when JESUS says PEACE I leave with you, HE means that he doesn’t leave us as orphans of the world. He leaves the SHALOM That he brought to EARTH to US! He leaves it - he says I leave Peace, prosperity, wholeness, completeness, security - he leaves it with us!

And then, he says MY PEACE I give you! What do you call anything given to you freely? IT's called a GIFT! A GIFT! So Jesus is gifting us with his brand of PEACE! It is MY PEACE - He says! What does that mean? What is the difference between the PEACE he left to us with the brand of PEACE, the JESUS PEACE that he gifts us with! Well, we have a verse reference to help us and that is found in

Ephesians 2:14 - For he himself is our peace . . . . .

So this peace, the MY PEACE that JESUS mentions here is HIMSELF! He gives HIS life to us and for us! HIS life is HIS gift and with it comes the PEACE that only JESUS gives.

There is a fundamental truth that we learn here - WE can never have Peace from GOD when you are NOT AT PEACE with GOD.

Lets look at the first two phrases of JESUS again - Peace I leave with you ; my peace I give you - and we see here is that it is separated by a SEMICOLON! That is not an accident. A semicolon separates these two important phrases and JESUS is telling us that they are very much related. We can never have this PEACE that JESUS is leaving to us - if we do not have PEACE with GOD! And ONLY JESUS can reconcile us with GOD!

Genesis 3 details the beginning of our separation from GOD. When man decided to be like GOD instead of being at PEACE with GOD! PRIDE took over PEACE and SIN was ushered into the world. Like a virus, SIN quickly spread like wildfire. BUT at the same time, in the same chapter Genesis Chapter 3, that GOD set into motion his PLAN to restore PEACE.