Christ Is Our Peace (1)

We look again at the wonderful truth of Ephesians 2:14a—For [Christ] is our peace. We first saw this word peace back in 1:2. The Greek (eirēne, which is similar to the Hebrew greeting “Shalom”) means “a state of tranquility; the opposite of rage and war.” But Paul goes still deeper by stating that Christ is actually peace itself. The literal translation of our text is, “For He Himself is our peace.” Again, men hold “peace-talks,” where they try to “achieve,” “promote,” or “enact” peace. But the Word of God declares that the Lord Jesus Christ IS peace. It’s also significant that Paul did not use the Greek word that means “peacemaker” (eirenopoios). What a great Truth! There are a lot of peacemakers today, those who try in vain to bring peace to the world. But the Lord Jesus is far more than a “peacemaker;” He is PEACE. Scripture reveals that there are two major aspects of peace that the believer possesses.

First, there is peace WITH God. Romans 5:1 is the key verse here: “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” In a day when the Gospel is presented as simply something that fixes all our problems or just makes God available when we need Him, the fact of God’s wrath is ignored.

Pastor and author John MacArthur tells of the day he heard a professional football coach say during a pre-game devotional service for his team, “I don’t know if there is a God, but I like having these chapels, because if there is one I want to be sure he’s on my side.” But Scripture declares that because of man’s sin and rebellion against God and His Law, God is actually at war with man; God is, in fact, never on the side of the unbeliever. Romans 1:18 declares: “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness.” That is an absolute.

It was the cross, however, that reconciled man to God, that “made things right between them.” It was, and is, a perfect peace, not one that God looks at one way and man looks at in another. After World War I, a French statesman pointed out that only two types of peace follow a war: first, the peace imposed upon the defeated by the conqueror, and second, the peace accepted by the defeated through surrender. In other words, there’s a vast difference between the peace one party imposes and the one the other party accepts. That was never truer than it was in that same era with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I. The harsh measures imposed upon Germany by the European allies created a seething resentment and made World War II inevitable. It is, in fact, true, as one writer puts it, “when they created the crazy Treaty of Versailles, they also created Hitler.” Some historians even say that every war since World War I has simply been an extension of that war.

But as our Lord declared in John 14:27: “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (emphasis added). Can any of us honestly say that any so-called peace that man has achieved has achieved the promise “let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid?” I certainly can’t find one in any history book. God’s peace is nothing like man’s peace. It is perfect not only for He Who imposed it, but also for those upon whom it is bestowed. As someone has beautifully put it, “As the needle in a compass trembles till it settles in the north point, so the heart of a sinner can get no rest but in Christ.” If I might build upon that, Christ is, indeed, our True North. We’ll continue this thought next time.