The news tells us of many major trouble spots in the world. After the
death of Yasser Arafat, are we now going to see more
work on the so-called “road-map to peace”? Initial reports of conflict between
Palestinian factions haven’t been encouraging. Can
We need peace in our world. But what do we mean – what is peace? The
dictionary gives two definitions of peace. It says first that it is “a state of
calm and quiet” and second that it is “an absence of war or strife.” Both need
to happen in the parts of the world we have been talking about. There need to be
calm and quiet, a laying down of arms, the giving up
of war and anger and strife.
The mother tends to think of peace when all the children are in bed. The
cane farmer may think of peace when the crushing is over for the season.
But in the Bible peace is a much more active quality. The Hebrew word shalom
is a positive quality of well-being, wholeness, prosperity.
A few years ago I had a couple of spots of bother with our car – the
uncertainty that you get when you turn the ignition key and wonder whether it
is going fast enough to start the engine. Then it wouldn’t even turn the engine
but I was able to roll it out onto the street and started it down the gentle
slope. I was fairly confident that the battery would charge up and all would be
well. I reached my destination. But when
I was due to return – barely even a click! The car was at peace! Or was it?
Our idea of peace is rather negative – when nothing is happening. And
yet the Biblical view of peace is when that car is humming along the road – not
rattling, but going a hundred percent as it should – when the family is living
and working together harmoniously, when the harvesters, haul-out trucks and
sugar mills – and their operators – are all functioning as they should. That’s
peace, that’s shalom! Not the negative view that peace is when
everything is quiet and still.
One of the typical gravestone epitaphs is “R.I.P.” – Rest in Peace. We
assume that life is one big struggle and that peace comes when, like my car,
everything stops. Not so! Peace is wholeness. It’s when things are going the
way they should.
How can peace be achieved? What is the “path to peace”?
We need to recognise, first of all, that we are living in a state that
can’t really be described as peace and that the root problem is what we call
sin. We aren’t taking off our realistic hat and putting on our religious hat at
this point – sin really is the problem in our world.
We have become isolated from God and from one another. We have tried to
live a life that is separate from God, perhaps even in active rebellion against
God. But this doesn’t just affect our relationships “out there” – it is
something that brings turmoil within and all the questions of who we are,
because we desperately want to be ourselves and do our own thing. But that
doesn’t turn us into the people we would like to be – it doesn’t work out that
way!
Separate from God, we are under judgment – we experience the wrath of
God. Sin has consequences, here and for eternity.
But God isn’t satisfied. It’s true that he is just and holy. But his
desire isn’t stop rebellion, nor to remove from us the possibility of choosing
– even though one of the results of our ability to choose is that we may choose
the wrong way. God’s wants to win us back, to forgive us, to restore us into
his family.
So God chose a man, Abraham. God said to Abraham, “all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you” (Gen. 12.3). Through Abraham and his descendants,
God was revealing his nature – the sort of God that he is – and his purposes of
mercy, rescue and redemption.
As part of God’s relationship with his special people, there were set up
a special group of people who were priests. They offered sacrifices which
represented among other things the seriousness of human sin and the need for
something to be done to restore a right relationship with God so that there
could be peace.
As time went on, it became clear that God was promising a special
deliverer who would be the Messiah, the anointed one, the chosen one.
Zechariah, who spoke the words of today’s reading, was the father of
John the Baptist. John had only just been born. Zechariah was speaking this
wonderful prophecy which included what the baby John was going to do. “And you, my child,
will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for
him, to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of
their sins” (Lk. 1.76-77). Isn’t that a wonderful promise? John, you are the one
who is going to prepare the way for the Lord.
Why is God doing this? God is making peace – “because of the tender mercy of
our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those
living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path
of peace” (vv. 78-79).
We think of Jesus for whom the prophet Isaiah said, “He will be called
Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince
of Peace” (Isaiah 9.6).
We are preparing ourselves for Christmas. Let us prepare ourselves to
welcome the Prince of Peace!
©
Peter J. Blackburn, Home Hill & Ayr Uniting Churches, 21 November 2004
Except where
otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the New International Version,
© International Bible Society, 1984.
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