Week 2 | Peace
The biblical concept of peace is an interesting one. It feels very distinct from our current cultural associations with the word peace. It isn’t so much a tranquil stream at sunrise, a stillness of mind, or the enlightenment of self actualization that can only come through silent retreats or very complicated yoga exercises and poses.
The Hebrew word for peace is “shalom” which means complete or whole. When used as a verb it’s to make complete or restore. This seems to me to be far more active than meditative. And probably more uncomfortable.
When we participate in the peace that Jesus demonstrated when, through his death and resurrection, He restored to wholeness the broken relationship between humans and God, we too create peace by taking what is broken and restoring it to wholeness in our lives, our relationships, and in our world. And that takes humility and patience and vulnerability and growth.
Scott Erickson in Honest Advent points out that the presence of Jesus was, at some point in her first trimester, likely revealed by Mary’s morning sickness. The process of growth doesn’t come from comfort, so let us not be hindered by unease and uncomfortableness of peacemaking. The presence of God is in the process, not just in its completion.
— Kala
Historical Reading
“Our God is truly ‘the God of peace.’ We are constantly called to peace by God who himself is peace. His calling is not in timidity or weakness or in some show of strength. God is at peace with himself to such a degree that he even allows sins to be committed against him when he could certainly, by the terror of his manifested power and ineffable greatness, force even the unwilling into subjection. But peace of this kind is that of the world, not that of God, whose very nature is peace.”
— Ambrosiaster (4th Century)
Prayer
Precious Lord Jesus! Oh for grace to love you, who have so loved us! You stoop to call such poor sinful people your own, and love them as your own, and consider every thing done for them and done to them as to yourself.
Show my poor heart a portion of that love, that I may love you as my own and only Savior, and learn to love you to the end, as you have loved me and given yourself for me, an offering and a sacrifice to God.
Precious Lord, continue to surprise my soul with the tokens of your love. All the tendencies of your grace, all the evidences of your favor, your visits, your love-tokens, your pardons, your renewings, your morning call, your mid-day feedings, your noon, your evening, your midnight grace.
All, all are among your wonderful ways of salvation, and all testify to my soul that your name, as well as your work, is, and must be, wonderful.
Jesus, you put forth your hand and touched a leper! Deal with me the same way, precious Lord. Though I am polluted and unclean, yet reach down to put forth your hand and touch me also.
Put forth your blessed Spirit. Come, Lord, and dwell in me, abide in me, and rule and reign over me. Be my God, my Jesus, my Holy One, and make me yours forever.
Yes, dearest Jesus, I hear you say that you will be for me, and not for another. So will I be for you. Oh! You condescending, loving God, make me yours, “that whether I live, I may live to the Lord; or whether I die, I may die to the Lord; so that living or dying, I may be yours.”
— Robert Hawker (18th Century)