Advent: Peace

When mom comes…she always brings cookies

I love it when my parents come to visit.

I was the baby and so I’ll always be a momma’s boy to some degree.

As much as I love seeing my mom…

I love what she brings with her!

My mom almost never shows up to my house or lets me show up to her house without a tupperware container full of brownies and a box of cookies!

I celebrate my mom coming to see me…but man I’m grateful for the stuff she brings with her!

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Introduce the Advent series

We are in a season called advent

Advent: simply means “arrival”

Over the next few weeks we will be looking at the arrival of Jesus.

But more specifically we will be looking at what He brought with Him

Peace

Hope

Love

Joy

Today we are looking at the fact that when Jesus came…He brought peace.

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Not just any kind of peace

Isaiah 9:6 NKJV

For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

We tend to think of peace in terms of it being the absence of war or conflict.

{You experienced peace when you left your in laws at thanksgiving.}

While these are accurate portrayals of peace…there is a more rich definition for the term peace we find at the end of Isaiah 9:6.

PEACE IS MORE ABOUT A PRESENCE THAN AN ABSENCE

The peace we are talking about can be present even in the midst of war.

Psalm 23:5 NKJV

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; My cup runs over.

If you are waiting until there is not struggle or strife to declare that you have peace…you’re missing the point and the value.

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A peace that is so much more!

Shalom: peace,

prosperity, i.e., an intact state of favorable circumstance (1Sa 1:17); 2. LN 59.23–59.34

completeness, i.e., the state of a totality of a collection (Jer 13:19); 3. LN 21.9–21.13

safeness, salvation, i.e., a state of being free from danger (Ge 28:21); 4. LN 23.129–23.141

health, i.e., a state of lack of disease and a wholeness or well-being (Ps 38:4[EB 3]); 5. LN 25.80–25.84

satisfaction, contentment, i.e., the state of having one’s basic needs or more being met and so being content (Ex 18:23); 6. LN 34.1–34.21

friend, companion, i.e., one who has an association with another with affection or regard (Jer 20:10); 7. LN 88.66–88.74

blessing, i.e., the content of the act. of giving kindness to another (Jer 16:5); 8. LN 12.1–12.42 unit: יהוה שָׁלוֹם (yhwh) Yahweh is Peace, i.e., the name of an altar (Jdg 6:24); 9. LN 12.1–12.42 unit: שַׂר שָׁלוֹם (śǎr šā·lôm) Prince of Peace, i.e., the name of messiah (Isa 9:5[EB 6]), note: for niv text in Ps 69:23[EB 22], see 8936

There is a robust meaning within the word shalom

But one of the generalized meanings is completeness.

The picture is a block wall that has had pieces missing.

When Jesus came, he brought completeness to the incompleteness of our world.

I want us to consider the fact that Jesus doesn’t just bring with Him the absence of conflict but is actually an insertion of shalom: (prosperity, completeness, safeness, health, satisfaction, friendship, and blesisng)... that has been missing since the introduction of sin!

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Jesus brought peace to us.

A world distant from God

The earth was absent communion with God immediately prior to Jesus arrival.

Between the OT prophets and the gospels is a four hundred year gap known as the “silent years.”

This produced A group of people functioning in dead religion based on nothing more than a promise of what is possible!

When we’re not hearing from God…we are susceptible to falling into the motions of dead religion.

PEOPLE WHO OPERATE IN RELIGION ARE HOPEFUL FOR A CONNECTION WITH GOD.

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In the midst of their dead experience they were hopeful of a child that would be born who was the prince of peace.

This peace was a restoration of what was broken!

UNDERSTAND THAT REALITY…THE GOD OF HEAVEN DIDN’T FIX THE BROKENNESS OF MANKIND FROM AFAR…HE BIRTHED HIMSELF INTO IT!

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The God who arrived…is still arriving.

One of the most beautiful aspects of the gospel is the present application of the past narrative.

Through what God has done we are given a glimpse of what God will do.

If you are in a state of feeling distant and dead…The Jesus who brought peace over two thousand years ago is still bringing peace today.

The longing inside of you…the missing part that you are looking for is accessible through the fact that Jesus came.

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It can happen today

The peace that Jesus brings is not a peace of process.

He doesn’t need a few weeks to change your life...

Look at the announcement the moment He arrives on the earth.

Luke 2:14 NKJV

“Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!”

The shepherds were told that a child had been born…The child who would be the prince of shalom.

The peace the angels announced was not something in the future tense.

In that moment…in that field…at that stable…peace had arrived.

His birth was an onset of completeness on the earth and a reminder that God’s will towards men is good.

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Don’t forget He’s a God with good plans

Sometimes in the midst of a broken world we forget that the will of God towards us is good.

Even when our patterns are bad…His plans are good.

Even when we haven’t been living up to the relationship He has called us to....HIS PLANS ARE GOOD!

This message was to Israel is after the REPEATED FAILURE of the people of God...

God dos not disown us in our chaos but rather He gives His son to be the prince of shalom and bring completeness.

God desires to insert completeness into your life!

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The gospel - The enemies become children

The gospel centers around the fact that we who were enemies of God…are now at peace with Him.

Romans 5:1–2 NKJV

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Never forget that in the midst of a world that is chaotic and tumultuous that we have a savior that came to bring peace to us.

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2. Jesus left peace with us.

Do you ever find yourself wishing you could have been around when Jesus was here?

It seems like it would have been a lot easier to believe when you were...

in the crowd having their meal provided.

seeing lame legs receive strength again

watching dead bodies come back to life..

But you and I are left with goose bumps in worship and a guy in skinny jeans teaching us about the Bible.

It can become easy to think that the peace Jesus brought was more present when He was here than it is now.

John 14:27 NKJV

Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

This is the greek word: eirēnikos, adj., peaceful; peace. 49× +NT +AF

It refers to a state of health, welfare, friendliness, salvation, deliverance...

It’s a close greek equivalent to shalom’

Jesus didn’t just bring shalom so the earth could taste it and then long for heaven...

Jesus brought shalom and then left a path that we could experience it even after He was gone!

If you have been living a life absent of peace…that’s good news for you today…It’s avialable

HONESTLY - I’ve let productivity and urgency steal my peace.

I just walked around this room and cried last night as I heard the invitation into peace.

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He doesn’t leave you like He found you

Remember Jesus comes to the earth that is broken, silent, weary, scared, in turmoil

But when He leaves he says He is leaving His “peace”.

He is leaving the earth that was broken with access to wholeness

He is leaving the earth that was in silence with access to communion

He is leaving the world that is weary in a state of health

Jesus has never and will never leave things the way He finds them!

Friend, we must understand that the Prince of Peace welcomes us just as we are…But he Has never left anyone or anything that He has encountered the way He found it.

The Prince of Peace who brought hope to the hopeless, healing to the broken, salvation to the distant, and relationship to the lonely is available to you and I this season!

Because Jesus came and brought peace, we have access to life change through Christ!

When Jesus arrived He brought peace...He left peace...

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3. We now have been tasked with bringing peace

Ephesians 2:14–22 (NKJV)

For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation,

having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace,

and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.

And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off and to those who were near.

For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.

Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God,

having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone,

in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord,

in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

We are building upon the foundation that Jesus laid when He brought shalom.

The gospel is complete - but the gospel story is not!

The world that is incomplete is waiting on you and I to continue building with the shalom that we have been given access to through Jesus.

We were afar off and have been brought nigh by Jesus.

Those who have been brought near have been tasked with being the one’s who bring near.

As we celebrate the Christmas season we must not simply celebrate the fact that Jesus brought peace or the fact that Jesus left peace...

We must honor the fact that Jesus brought peace by being carriers of peace.

Colossians 1:19–20 NKJV

For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.

2 Corinthians 5:18 NKJV

Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,

The ultimate plan of God is the reconciling of the earth to Himself. We have a role to play in that.

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I love the Christmas season because it has the power to bring peace to a world that is absent of it all year around.

May we be an outlet for everything this season is all year around.

May our families feel more peace because of our presence.

If you have Jesus…you have peace…and you are a propagator of peace to your circle of influence.

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Prayer for this week: “Father, How can I be a carrier of Shalom’ to my world today?”

For you spouse

For your kids

For your waitress

For your boss