Seeking True Peace

Scripture: For Christ himself is our way of peace. He has made peace between us Jews and you Gentiles by making us all one family, breaking down the wall of contempt that used to separate us. By his death he ended the angry resentment between us, caused by the Jewish laws that favored the Jews and excluded the Gentiles, for he died to annul that whole system of Jewish laws. Then he took the two groups that had been opposed to each other and made them parts of himself; thus he fused us together to become one new person, and at last there was peace. As parts of the same body, our anger against each other has disappeared, for both of us have been reconciled to God. And so the feud ended at last at the cross. And he has brought this Good News of peace to you Gentiles who were very far away from him, and to us Jews who were near. Ephesians 2:14-17

Observation: Paul discusses peace within the church - those who have faith in Jesus - showing that Jesus even breaks down the Holy conflict between Jews and Gentiles. In his day, this was the greatest division, as the Jews declared their status and laws separated them from all other people. However, simply by faith in Jesus, that division is completely gone. Every believer is at peace, fused together, part of the same body. All people now know God whether they were before far or near to him. All anger had disappeared, and the feud ended.

This is directly in line with Psalm 110:1-4, where Jehovah says to Messiah that he is a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek, the priest of peace, who was honored by Abraham as an extension of his faith. In other words, every "believer" acknowledges that Messiah is the ruler of the world, and in that honors him as we partake in his peace. It is also in line with Jesus' own words from the sermon on the mount, blessing the peacemakers, who are those with a true maturity in their faith.

Application: Oh, that this were all true! Within the body of Christ, we bicker and fight, we gossip and complain, and we create conflicts. We extend that outward to fight with others. And we fail to influence a world that is being torn apart by anger, hate, and division.

Faith in Jesus Christ delivers peace. However, even within the faithful we fail at that. Perhaps if we sought true peace within the church, we could influence peace in our society. Or at least we could declare that the division in society could be healed by a revival of faith.

Paul knew that faith should heal even the greatest division in society. Today, our faith fails to resolve even local political differences. Oh that we could find the peace of Jesus in our hearts.

Prayer: Lord, I ask for your forgiveness of our church, beginning with me. We, and I, have failed to uphold your promise of peace, by fighting with each other over both trivial and settled matters. We are not a light of peace to all the rest of society, and thus have lost our ability to help heal the divisions in our society. Please forgive us. Please forgive me. May your spirit of peace rest upon us again. Amen.