The Lord Is Peace Series

If you ever get the experience to go to the holy land, then let me predict how the trip will begin for you. First you will fly to Tel Aviv and go through the tight security. Then soon after you will meet your holy land tour guide. He will look at the group and then say Shalom.

Shalom means peace. It is more than the absence of war, but completeness and wellbeing. We will look at this word at the compound name for God, Jehovah-Shalom. Jehovah-Shalom: The Lord is our peace. (Judges 6:24)

This is in part of looking at these compound names of God that help us understand the character of God:

Jehovah-Jireh: The Lord is our provider. (Genesis 22:14)

Jehovah-Rapha: The Lord is our healer. (Exodus 15:26)

Jehovah-M’kaddesh: The Lord is our Holiness. (Leviticus 20:8)

Jehovah-Nissi: The Lord is our banner, our victory. (Exodus 17:15)

Jehovah-Tsidkenu: The Lord is our righteousness. (Jeremiah 23:6)

Jehovah-Shammah: The Lord is present (Ezekiel 48:34)

The Lord is our Peace. Peace is a popular subject. We have high profile peace talks. Leaders are together and talking about peace. Does this qualify as true peace? The Hebrew word for peace, shalom is not just the absence of war, it means a completeness and sense of wellbeing.

When world leaders gather for peace talks, others are angered by the talks and have vowed to step up resistance and attacks. A response in violence does not even measure up to a secular definition of peace and falls way short of what shalom really means.

Peace is part of the character of God. God revealed himself as the Lord of Peace to Gideon. The Lord is the only true source of real world peace.

But the LORD said to him, “Peace! Do not be afraid. You are not going to die.” 24 So Gideon built an altar to the LORD there and called it The LORD Is Peace (Jehovah-Shalom). (Judges 6:23-24)

The wider context is the entire chapter of Judges chapter 6. The account unfolds as God calls one of our favorite Old Testament heroes, Gideon. We love to root for the underdog. Gideon is someone we can find easy to identify with. He is the ordinary guy used by God to do great things.

It was Gideon who God revealed himself to as Jehovah-Shalom. The Lord is Peace. The background occurs during the period of the Judges.

The Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord. They forgot God and worshipped the gods of the land, namely Baal worship. There were a people with no sense of purpose. They had no spiritual vision. Their apostacy brought the discipline of God.

Their discipline came in the form of Midianite oppression. The Midinettes were superior in the battle because of their use of camels (Judges 6:5 & Judges 7:12). They were possibly one of the first to use camels for a military purpose. I once watched a polo match played on camels by an Asian army. I found out later this was an army drill for improving their skill to patrol their desert boarder on camel.

The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD, and for seven years he gave them into the hands of the Midianites. (Judges 6:1) For seven consecutive harvest seasons the Israelites would plant crops. In would come the Midianites to plunder the land. They are likened to locusts that swarm and devastate the land and then move on.

When the Midianites moved in Israel would flee. They would go to live in caves and shelters up in the mountains. Because the power of Midian was so oppressive, the Israelites prepared shelters for themselves in mountain clefts, caves and strongholds. (Judges 6:2)

With this oppression Israel made a cry for help. The first cry for help was answered by a prophet. I said to you, ‘I am the LORD your God; do not worship the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you live.’ But you have not listened to me.” (Judges 6:10) This unknown prophet did not see response to his message.

Next the Lord would raise up an ordinary young man who would become a hero, Gideon. His call came while he was threshing some grain. It was not in the threshing floor, but in the winepress so that the Midianites would not find him.

A visitor approached Gideon, When the angel of the LORD appeared to Gideon, he said, “The LORD is with you, mighty warrior.” (Judges 6:12). “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the LORD bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the LORD has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.” (Judges 6:13)