Terri's BlogChristian perspective on today's issues.

PEACE

This is a subject I’ve been wanting to share for several weeks, but unfortunately health issues have postponed it. Now I’m ready to rock n roll! In this lesson I get to share a few of my all-time favorite scriptures, beginning with John 14:27, where Jesus gives us His gift of Peace. He says (in part): “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you.”  What’s so awesome about this is that it’s HIS Peace! HIS!  There can be no better peace than that. It’s peace about everything. Understand why: 1) He was there at the very beginning, at creation. He saw everything put together.  2) He came to earth where He began giving it so freely to all who asked, and to many who didn’t: the blind, the sick, the lame, the possessed.  3) Through His sacrifice all Christians have access to it every day. He overcame sin and death to provide it.  4) And He knows how everything on earth will end.  Because He knows everything, there is nothing but peace in Him.   And this scripture says He GIVES IT TO US.  How about that?  If we knew how situations, trials and troubles would turn out, would we worry? Would we have any real concerns? And THAT’S what He’s GIVING us! PEACE.
At this point He is sharing with the disciples that He would be leaving soon but would see them again (after His resurrection).  He encourages them to “remain in Me”, where they would obviously have His peace.  “…you will become sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn to joy.” And He was sending them the Spirit of truth to guide them once He’s gone. He was giving them knowledge that would result in their complete peace, as promised in verse 27.  Then He takes it further in John 16:33 – “I have said these things to you so that in Me you may have Peace. In the world you will have tribulation (no, it won’t be easy). But take heart; I HAVE OVERCOME THE WORLD.” How do those last five words make you feel? It should overwhelm us with Peace, right?
Does it?
My next favorite scripture confirms the first one.  Proverbs 3:5-6. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding: In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths.”  If that sounds like a promise, that’s because it is.  These words give assurance of making right decisions, and that’s a “Peace-ful” thought, right? But to get there, we must acknowledge His presence in all our daily activities. And if we Trust Him.  These two things, like the practice of prayer, need to become a habit. A repeated performance, so to speak, in order for us to become proficient.
Let me tell you a short story about one way to create a habit of trust.  We all have passwords on our computers and creating new ones can sometimes be a challenge. One day I was asked to create a password on a new site I was using, so I just threw in one of my old standby’s, Pro356. (Get it?) But it didn’t work. This time I needed eight characters/symbols. After a little thought I just added two letters to my first try, and it worked perfectly: Prove356. That was easy. However, as I wrote it down in my records I did a double-take. “Prove”? It wasn’t just two more letters to a password; it was more of a challenge.  (Hmmm… Nice one, God.) So, if I’m to believe those two verses (:5-6) then I should “prove” I will acknowledge Him daily, and “prove” I will trust Him with all my heart.  Now though I try daily, it just doesn’t always come to mind as often as it should. But when it does, I’m finding more of His Peace as a result.
When I sit to write a lesson, I usually start by listing a bunch scripture, and I also use a lot of reference books and commentaries.  For today’s subject I looked up Peace in several indexes, wrote some scriptures down, and then looked up John 14:27 in the MacArthur Bible Commentary. There I read a statement that I wasn’t sure I agreed with at first. It noted that “at the individual level this Peace is unknown to the unsaved”.  That was actually a new thought for me. It became an obvious truth as I read through the many scriptures I had accumulated, confirming that this holy Peace could only be owned by knowing and believing in the Father and the Son. I’ll just list a few words from a few verses: Proverbs 16:7, When a man’s ways please the Lord…, Psalm 34:17, when the righteous cry for the Lord…, Isaiah 26:3, the mind that is dependent on you…, and Romans 5:1, Therefore, being justified by faith…
Why, you may be asking, have I brought this up? Because I’ve heard so many of us Christians wonder amongst ourselves how the people of the world cope with tragedy without knowing the Lord? This world is in dire need of knowing our Savior. Romans 10:14 says in part: “How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard?”
If you had the cure for cancer, would you keep it to yourself? Of course not. Are we Christians telling anyone where our Peace comes from, and how they, too, can have it? We have the answer for Peace in our hearts, and are we sharing it? Which brings me to my absolute favorite scripture, John 3:16. It’s the verse to bring Peace to anyone and everyone. It is an easy verse to learn and thus to share. It’s what the world needs to know. Jesus was our perfect example for living here, and He said I came to seek and to save the lost. Are we following His example? Maybe we aren’t called to travel the neighborhood, the state, or the world, sharing the gospel. But we can live and act in such a joyous way, having a Peace in our hearts, that others will want to know what we’re smiling about. Amen?
If you’ve never witnessed to another, and helped that person accept the Lord, you’re missing one of the most joyous moments of your life. And theirs.
And while you’re at it practice the Peace that Christ offers: HIS Peace!

 

Mike Jared, TCM board member