Prince of Peace

Our Ever-Present Prince of Peace

Isaiah 9:6 (ESV)

6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Jesus is our Prince of Peace.

And in a manger some 2000 plus years ago.

I can’t imagine there was much peace the night of our saviors birth.

We always imagine it as this tranquil, calm night. I think it has to do with the Christmas songs.

But I can’t imagine Mary- A Virgin- giving birth- in a barn- with no epidural- was a quiet peaceful occasion.

I witnessed the birth of my son- who was early- and my wife had 2 epidurals- and it was not pleasant.

So I imagine all was not calm.

But that doesn’t mean peace wasn’t there.

In fact, the Prince of Peace was born.

Just like truth isn’t a feeling- truth is a person and that God-Man is Jesus.

Peace isn’t a feeling- peace is a person and that is the God-Man Jesus.

True peace doesn’t come from our circumstances but from our relationship with Jesus.

And some people have peace because of there bank account or they are in good health.

Both of those things can be changed by one phone call from a doctor and we can be left scrambling.

As we face struggles and anxieties, we remember that Jesus offers us peace. A peace that can transform our perspective and give us hope in difficult times.

Christ is the source of enduring peace. Understanding Jesus as our Prince of Peace allows us to navigate life's challenges with confidence, its an anchor to our very soul.

In the larger biblical narrative, Jesus fulfills the prophecies of peace and comfort foretold in the Old Testament.

He embodies the reconciliation of God and humanity, offering peace through His sacrifice and ongoing presence in our lives.

And God is glorified through this event.

It’s the wonders of wonders, how God is a child.

And in our time together this Christmas eve I rejoice with you that we have a great Savior, the Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace born on a day in a city to save us from our sins—our many sins.

Luke 2:13–14 (ESV)

13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,

14 “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”

Evidently, one angel can bring the news, but it is not sufficient for one angel to respond to the news. The meaning of this news, the ultimate outcome of this news—that demands an army of angels.

The joyful news that on a day, at the perfect fullness of time, in the perfect prophesied city, a Savior was born, who was Christ, the Lord—that news has two great outcomes.

Two great purposes. “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”

The coming of this child will be the greatest revelation of the glory of God even among the heights of heaven, and the coming of this child will bring peace to God’s people—who will one day fill the whole earth with righteousness and peace.

Isaiah 9:7 (ESV)

7 Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end

But Jesus has come to usher in that peace among God’s people.

And there are three relationships in which he wants you to pursue this peace and enjoy this peace.

First- Peace with God. Peace with your own soul. And peace with others.

And by peace I mean not only the absence of conflict and animosity, but also the presence of joyful tranquility, that despite your circumstances. You know that everything ends up for your good and for God’s glory

So let’s look at each of these three peaceful relationships briefly and make sure that you are enjoying as much as you can. The key to each of them is not to separate what the angels kept together: the glory of God and the peace you long for. “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace.”

What’s the main point of Jesus being our peace. Whats the main point of peace.

God’s purpose is to give you peace by being the most glorious Person in your life.

Five times in the New Testament he is called “the God of peace” (Romans 15:13; 16:20; Philippians 4:9; 1 Thessalonians 5:23; Hebrews 13:20).

And Jesus said, “My peace I give to you” (John 14:27).

And Paul said “Jesus himself is our peace” (Ephesians 2:14).

What this means is that the peace of God, or the peace of Christ, can never be separated from God himself and Christ himself.

If we want peace to rule in our lives, God must rule in our lives.

Christ must rule in our lives.

God’s purpose is not to give you peace separate from himself.

His purpose is to give you peace by being the most glorious Person in your life.

So the key to peace is keeping together what the angels keep together: Glory to God, and peace to man.

A heart bent on showing the glory of God, will know the peace of God.

And what holds the two together—God getting glory and us getting peace—is believing or trusting the promises of God obtained by Jesus.

Romans 15:13 is one of those fundamental texts pointing to this crucial role of faith.

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing.”

Another way of saying that is when we trust God’s promises that become real for us and produce peace in us and through and its done “in believing.”

Pausto- Trusting- believing. We know that we can trust God’s Words and God’s promises without doubting.

Its the same way, a person comes into the family of God. By believing in their hearts and confessing with their mouth.

They believe in God for salvation and everything else.

Thats true whether we are talking about peace with God,peace with ourselves, or peace with others.

1.Peace with God

The most basic need we have is peace with God. This is foundational to all our pursuits of peace.

If we don’t go here first, all other experiences of peace will be superficial and temporary.

The key passage here is Romans 5:1

Romans 5:1 (ESV)

1 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

By faith- there’s the pivotal act of believing.

We are justified by believing- by believing that Jesus is who He says He is.

Justified means that God declares you to be just in his sight by imputing to you the righteousness of Jesus.

And he does that by faith alone: “Since we have been justified by faith.”

Not by works. Not because you go to church every Sunday.

Not by tradition. Not because you go to church every Christmas and Easter. You know when to stand, when to kneel, when to pray, when to Amen.

Not by baptism. - Baptism is an outward confession of an inward change.

You are telling the world its no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.

Not by church membership. Your name on a church membership directory does not save. Your name in the book of Life saves you. And its only on there by Faith alone.

Not by piety. You can memorize the book of Leviticus.

You can pray each morning for four hours like Martin Luther.

You can be the most religious person on the planet and miss heaven.

Not by your parents or grandparents faith. There are not grandchildren in Heaven. Meaning no one gets in because of there parent’s faith.

Some people believe that praying for the deceased can help their souls reach heaven faster by lessening their time in purgatory.

It can’t. Purgatory is not found in scripture.

But by faith alone. Faith alone in Christ alone through Scripture alone.

When we believe in Jesus as Savior and as Lord and the supreme Treasure of our lives, we are united to him and his righteousness is counted by God as ours. We justified by faith.

And the result is peace with God.

God’s anger at us because of our sin is put away.

Our rebellion against him is overcome.

No one is too bad to be justified by faith. Paul was killing Christians and went on to write 2/3s of the New Testament by the Holy Spirit.

You are never too far gone. You cannot out sin, God’s love for you.

God adopts us into his family.

You become a son or daughter of the great high king.

And He has accounted for all the sins, all the stupid things we are going to do in our life.

God can never be disappointed in you because nothing will catch him off guard.

He is never in Heaven going “what in the name of me is Jordan doing now. I cannot believe I called him to be a pastor.”

And from now on all his dealings with us are for our good. Even the hard parts. Even the difficult parts.

He will never be against us. He is our everlasting Father. He is our peace.

This is foundational to all other people.

2. Peace with Ourselves

And because we have peace with God because of being justified by faith, we can begin to grow in the enjoyment of peace with ourselves—and here I include any sense of guilt or anxiety that tends to paralyze us or make us hopeless.

Here again believing the promises of God with a view to glorifying God in our lives is key.

Philippians 4:6–7 (ESV) is one of the most precious passages in this regard

6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.

7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

The opposite of anxiety is peace and God wants us to roll our anxieties on to God

The picture here is that our hearts and our minds are under assault.

They are under assault by our own thoughts, or own dumb actions, and sometimes its an assault by the enemy.

But a lot of times- its just us walking in our sin and getting comfortable with our sins.

Sin guilt is a blessing from God- because that is the Holy Spirit trying to work in and through us.

But worries- Worrying is like a rocking chair, it may give you something to do but it won’t get you anywhere.

Jesus talked about worrying.

- Matthew 6:25-34

Matthew 6:25–34 (ESV)

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?

27 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?

28 And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin,

29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

31 Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’

32 For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.

33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

34 “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

Seek first the kingdom of God- seek God first and everything else falls into place. Seek God and those worrys will fade.

But Guilt, Worry, confusions, uncertainties—they all threaten our peace.

And Paul says that God wants to “guard” your hearts and minds.

He guards them with his peace. He guards them in a way that goes beyond what human understanding can fathom.

Don’t limit the peace of God by what your understanding can see. He gives us inexplicable peace, a peace that surpasses all understanding.

And he does it when we take our anxieties to him in prayer and trust him, that he will carry them for us (1 Peter 5:7) and protect us.

When we do this, when we come to him—and remember we already have peace with him!—and trust him as our loving and almighty heavenly Father to help us, his peace comes to us and steadies us, and protects us from the disabling effects of fear.

Because the opposite of Faith is not unbelief. The opposite of Faith is fear. Because Faith moves us to action while fear paralyzes us in our anxiety, in our worry, in our confusion, and guilt.

And then we are able to carry on and our God gets the glory for what we do, because we trusted him.

Do that this Christmas.

Take your anxieties to God. Tell him about them.

Ask him to help you. To protect you. To restore your peace. And then to use you to make peace.

3. Peace with Others

The third relationship where God wants us to enjoy his peace is in our relationships with other people.

This is the one we have least control over.

So we need to say it carefully the way Paul does in Romans 12:18

18 If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.

For many of you when you get together with family for Christmas, there will be some awkward and painful relationships.

Some of the pain is very old. And some of it is new.

But let me just add this- Peace with others and peace with family- does not mean forsaking what God tells us.

As Christians- we are to spread the gospel. We should start at our dining room table tomorrow.

Your faith does no get loved ones into heaven. Only their faith in Christ.

Do not sit silently- as you watch your family and relatives live a life that only leads to death.

You can buy them the greatest Christmas gifts on the planet but there soul is still damned to hell then whats the point?

Well, because I love them.

If you really loved them, you’d tell them about Jesus every opportunity you have.

But in some relationships you know what you have to do, no matter how hard it is.

And in some of them you are baffled and don’t know what the path of peace calls for.

In both cases the key is trusting the promises of God with heartfelt awareness that God forgave us through His son.

I think the text that puts this together most powerfully for me again and again is Ephesians 4:31–32

Ephesians 4:31–32 (ESV)

31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Continually cultivate a sense of amazement that in spite of all your sins God has forgiven you through Christ.

We can fix our eyes on what Christ has done for us that is the only way that we can release the pain based on what God based on what others have done to us.

And we hear these dumb things like well you just got to forgive and forget- forgive and forget- well that's just dumb- you can't forgive and forget some awful things have happened to you.

You just can't forgive them in fact the Bible would say that we should forgive and remember that we have forgiven.

The other problem is that we try to forgive over and over and over but we get really confused about our feelings and forgiveness.

feelings, your feelings, you can't control them sometimes. You don’t know how you will react in a situation until you are in that situation. So feelings- they're all over the place but forgiveness is a decision.

What the enemy tries to do say somebody's done you wrong and it's a big deal I mean it's awful and you try to like get over it.

You don't get over when you've been sinned against- you get over the flu- you have to forgive so that you can continue on in your life and if I were the enemy, I would try to get you to doubt forgiveness and if we associate a feeling.

Then that's a problem especially at Christmas because Christmas is all about feelings

That's why there's so many Christmas traditions because Traditions are supposed to stir in us some old feelings. Some positive feelings so that we remember things.

I mean that's what it is that's why you have family traditions at your house.

In fact, if you are married you might remember your first Christmas as a married couple.

We went to her parents house and they sit around and watch each other open gifts.

I was like what kind of pagan cult… that’s a Christmas morning thing but with family, its every man for himself.

You had to figure that stuff out you- got to work that stuff out.

Here's the thing about Christmas man it's full of feelings because it's full of traditions and sure enough you you watch you watch Elf or Die Hard or home alone or you bake that gingerbread house or you go caroling

whatever that thing is that stirs up some of those feelings you had back in the day not only does it stir up those feelings it stirs up all those other feelings about the pain that you had in your life.

Let me tell you what I would do if I were your enemy what I would do if I were your enemy I would try to get you to believe your feelings instead of believing your forgiveness.

If I could convince you that forgiveness doesn't work because you still have these feelings and I could undermine forgiveness. I think I can undermine the whole point of the Gospel.

That God sent his son on a rescue mission to forgive you and to have you begin to believe well gosh if I can't forgive her how in the world Could An Almighty God forgive me and when that happens the enemy wins.

But you see forgiveness is not a Feeling.

If somebody's done you wrong and you need to forgive them whether- they're in your family or your friend- or whatever- you got two options you can either replay the pain or you can release the pain -those are your options.

If we replay the pain, and you know what I mean, you rehearse it in your mind- over and over and over= you replay that time you went through it and what they said to you and how they did you wrong and when you replay the pain- you relive the pain and then what begins to happen is you react to the situation.

you react to the situation and you justify why we can hate those people because they have done you wrong.

That is an option. The other option is that we release the pain- the only way to release the pain is this it's because you're not remembering what they have done to you- you are choosing to remember what Christ did for you-

it's the only way to release the pain and the moment you look at them and you think well they don't deserve this then you remember what Jesus did for you because we didn’t deserve His forgiveness but He forgives us for all of our sins over our entire life.

here's the way C.S Lewis says it he says to be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.

Be amazed by that.

Be amazed that you have peace with God.

It’s this sense of amazement, that I, a sinner, have peace with God, that makes the heart tender, kind and forgiving.

Extend this to others seventy times seven. Thats not God asking us to do math- that was Jesus telling us to forgive others perfection times perfection and 7 in scripture is the number used to display perfection.

It may be thrown back in your face.

It certainly was thrown back in Jesus’ face on the cross.

That hurts and it can make you bitter if you are not careful. Don’t let it.

Keep being more amazed that your wrongs are forgiven than that you are wronged. Be amazed that you have peace with God.

You have peace with your soul.

Your guilt is taken away.

Keep trusting God. He knows what he is doing.

Keep his glory as the supreme in the treasure chest of your heart.

not your success or your effectiveness in peacemaking or your relationships. Thats not the main thing.

When you keep the main thing- the main thing- meaning His glory-

And then you will be like the angels: Glory to God in the highest is the first thing.

Peace among his people is the second thing.

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”

This is why he came—on a day, to a city, as the Savior, Messiah, and Sovereign.

That God would get glory, and that you would know peace.

For to us a child was born- for to us a son was given. The Prince of Peace

May the God of peace give you peace, and get his glory.

Lets pray.

Communion

At this time- I want to invite our deacons to the front as we enter into a time of Communion.

I could not think of a better time than to take the Lord’s Supper than on the eve of His followers celebrating His birth.

This is a High holy moment where we remember the gospel.

The Child was born, the son was given, so we could have relationship through Him for life everlasting.

The Child grew up and put the weight of the world’s sins on His shoulders. Nailed on a cross for them and willingly gave up His Spirit so we could be forgiven.

The broken body and the shed blood of Jesus Christ are at the center of everything we believe and everything we are.

In 1 Corinthians 11, starting in verse 23, Paul says this: 'For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, "This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.' (ESV)

This is a call to remembrance, but it’s more than that.

It’s also a proclamation of the gospel every single time we take communion.

We are declaring that Christ’s body was broken for us and His blood was shed for us. And we’re proclaiming this until He returns. So let’s not come to this lightly. But realizing what was done for each and everyone of us who call upon the name of the Lord.

At this time- the deacons will pass the bread.

Deacons Prayer

This is the body of Christ, broken for you. Take and eat.

His Body

Now, as we take the cup, we’re reminded of the blood of Jesus that was poured out for the forgiveness of sins. The Bible says without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. It’s His blood that establishes the new covenant—a covenant of grace, a covenant that we didn’t earn but was freely given.

This is the blood of Christ, shed for you. Take and drink.

His Body, His Blood, for me.

As we close, I want you to hold onto this truth: communion isn’t just looking back at what Jesus has done—it’s also looking forward to His return.

We are celebrating the birth of our Lord and Savior but when we take communion, we are proclaiming the Lord’s death until He comes.

So may we live with that expectancy, may we walk in that freedom, and may we continue to proclaim that good news until we see Him face to face.

I’d like to remind you that tomorrow morning would be a wonderful opportunity to start one new family tradition if you do not already- if you do not read the Bible before opening gifts. I’d encourage you to read Luke 2 as a Family before doing that.

Let’s keep the main thing- the main thing.

Before we dismiss- we are going to close with one more song- Silent Night.

At this time, I’d ask that you grab your candle and turn it one.