PEACE
Ephesians 2: 14-22; 3: 1; 4: 1-4 (to “one Spirit”)
I have read rather extensively, dear brethren, that Scripture may have its own voice to our spirits at this time. The scriptures that we have read have said far more than ever I would be able to or could say in this time, or any time. Scriptures have their own voice, and may they have a voice to us on this occasion. “What says the scripture?”, Gal 4: 30. They say more than I can say, but I read them as having an impression to speak about peace. The psalmist did not find it too easy a thing to speak about. He says when I speak about peace “they are for war”, Ps 120: 7. And brethren, it is not always that we are peaceful, it is not always that we are able to speak about things peacefully. You speak about peace and someone says, Oh yes, but there must be righteousness. You speak about peace and somebody says it is not peace at any price. Of course it is not. But, beloved, peace has been made. That is where I start, that peace has been made. We all get help as coming into the enjoyment of it, but the starting point is that peace has been made. There will be conflict but it is only done rightly with peace in the heart. If there is not peace in the soul in going into the conflict it will never secure the divine end.
It says in the first passage that we read that He has made peace; He has made it, it did not exist before. There can be all kinds of agreements, all kinds of legislation, to try to bring about peace, but the only peace is the peace He has made. It says He has made peace: “having made peace by the blood of his cross”. What a Person He is who made it! O, that I could have a tongue to speak about Him! The passage brings Him forward, the Person who is before all; there is the righteousness for peace, beloved, the glory and worth of the Person who has made it. “He is the head of the body”, “he is before all”, whether thrones or lordships or whatever, before the very creation; He was before all these things. He has come in in His own body and by His own service in love He has made peace. “In him all the fulness of the Godhead was pleased to dwell”; what a dwelling place! There was never a spot on earth before where there was peace in which God could rest. God looked down from the heavens on the children of men; what did He see? Sin. As He looked down on Christ, “in him all the fulness of the Godhead was pleased to dwell”. God had peace on earth then as never before. What came in in Adam had continued—unrest, strife, murder, war, jealousies. “In him all the fulness of the Godhead was pleased to dwell”. Think of the occasion of His baptism. John says he beheld the Spirit descending in bodily form as a dove and abiding upon Him. God had found peace on earth. God had found in Him all that He ever had looked for, found there a dwelling place where He could open the heavens upon a Man in whom all the Fulness was pleased to dwell. That is what God found in Him, and He was pleased to dwell there.
Then it says, “and by him to reconcile all things to itself, having made peace by the blood of his cross—by him”. O, the heart of God! “By him to reconcile all things to itself”. Peace has come in to effect reconciliation. The distance that existed between God and man, the distance that existed between man and his brother, Christ has come in, God has come in, may I say, in Him, “to reconcile all things to itself, having made peace by the blood of his cross”. There could be no other way for peace to be made. That is not peace at any price, beloved, that is not peace at the sacrifice of righteousness; what sufferings (we have spoken of them already) entered into these words: “making peace by the blood of his cross”. I say again, may it be food for our souls, may it bring with it that He has established peace that is never to be broken; never to be broken, because it speaks in the passage about presenting persons “holy and unblamable, and irreproachable before it”. That is the kind of peace that He has made, not a graded peace, not a peace that can possibly lose its value, not a pact that can be broken by the whim of a man or the press of a button, but it says He has made it “by the blood of his cross ... to present you holy and unblamable and irreproachable before it”. Beloved, He has made it; that is the point that we must start from. We sometimes speak as if peace was something that was to be worked up to, but it says it is to be pursued. It says pursuing righteousness, faith, love and peace; we are to pursue all of them together. It is not that I pursue righteousness one day, faith the next day and eventually arrive at peace. No. Peace has been made. We work from the standpoint of what He has done. Righteousness is pursued, so are faith and love and peace together. If in that pursuing peace is not touched, perhaps your righteousness is not right. Perhaps it is unrighteous if peace is not coming in. It says pursuing righteousness, faith, love and peace. The fruit of the Spirit is what? “Love, joy, peace”, Gal 5: 22. These are things in the kingdom, that is what the kingdom of God is: “righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit”, Rom 14: 17.
I only referred to the passage in Colossians to bring out that peace has been made. In Ephesians 2 it has not only been made but He is it. It says that “He is our peace”. O, how blessed to have it in such a Person! Do you know Him thus, beloved? King of righteousness, King of Salem, King of peace (see Heb 7: 2): is that how you know the Saviour? You say, in all those exercises in my life there are many sorrows to be borne. The Prince of peace will be with you as you are with Him—King of righteousness, Prince of peace. “This Melchisedec”: it alludes to His Person, to that One in whom the Fulness was pleased to dwell, that He is my peace. “He is our peace, who has made both one”. It is not only His work; His work has made it, blessed fact to go back to time and time again, that He has made it by the blood of His cross. The sacrifice that we have spoken of entered into the making of it, but the Person is our peace; the Person. Not only do I know His work, blessed, glorious fact, but do I know the Person whose work it is? “He is our peace”. Do I do things, beloved, under His impulse, under His control, as coming from His presence? “He is our peace, who has made both one”. There is His work, but the Person who did the work is our peace. My peace is in Him, the peace that I can enjoy is through knowing Him, it is through being with Him. It says He has annulled all the things that come in to disturb my peace, He has slain the enmity; and then it says, “he has preached the glad tidings of peace to you who were afar off”. How far away you were! “To you who were afar off’’—the apostle puts that first—“the glad tidings of peace to you, who were afar off, and the glad tidings of peace to those who were nigh”. It is one Person. Whatever the difficulty, no matter how great the distance, however much these things may have marked us, that we were strangers, that we were foreigners, it says “he is our peace”. The work has brought us together; through Him we have access by one Spirit, we are no longer strangers and foreigners, we have peace. How peace is needed that strangership, foreign principles, accents, whatever they are, may be gone! He is our peace, all that may have marked us is gone, and we are brought into the great household of God. This passage is very full, as all the Scriptures are—the ones I have read perhaps, in a particular way—but it says “ye are no longer strangers and foreigners”. Mr Darby could speak about that: ‘Stranger thou’, he says, ‘in courts above!’ (Hymn 76). We are no strangers there, beloved.
He, who to His rest shall greet thee,
Greets thee with a well-known love.
What banishes the feelings of strangership that we may well have? What banished the feelings of strangership that the younger son was even carrying with him to the father’s house? Ah, it was the embrace of the father’s love. What peace! “He is our peace”. The One in whom the Fulness was pleased to dwell, the Son of the Father’s love who had made peace by the blood of His cross, He is the Father’s object and He is to be my object. There is the peace that He brings in. So we come into that wonderful company that is enjoying it, where all enmity has been met, met by Him. We “are fellowcitizens of the saints”. The apostles: what a company we are brought into! “Jesus Christ himself being the corner-stone”. So I only refer to these passages that, as I said at the outset, they may have their own voice, their own authority over us. Paul there in prison is speaking about peace because he knew Christ to be his peace. He had a chain, the limitations that a prison brings, perhaps limitations of food, not able to move very far, what limitations he was in, and he is speaking about Christ: “he is our peace”. Oh what refreshment! Paul speaks about persons refreshing him, but I think that those persons who visited Paul in the prison were far more refreshed. They saw a man who was enjoying peace, a man who could rise, as these scriptures speak about, above the limitations in the circumstances, to let his heart expand in the peace of Christ.
But then he is speaking about the conditions that we are in. He says, “I Paul, prisoner of the Christ Jesus”, “I, the prisoner in the Lord”. What could he speak about peace? Well, he says, “I ... exhort you therefore to walk worthy of the calling wherewith ye have been called, with all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, bearing with one another in love; using diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace”. He does not say ‘of love’; “using diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace”. Peace, dear brethren, is to be pursued. It is to be enjoyed in my soul, it is also to be an objective. “Keep”, he says, “the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace”. Peace is something that should be more before us. Yes, exercises have to be met, but they are met in peace. If any actions that I do are done with a ruffled spirit, if any actions of mine are not done in this meekness and lowliness, they are not done rightly. Actions, beloved, flow out from a man who is enjoying peace and we have to use diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit. What is it? Something that the Spirit has established which I can never disturb, but I may for the moment cause these ruffles, I may again bring in these distances, I may for the moment engage the saints with something short of what they should be engaged with. Keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace. Mr Taylor, when asked about keeping the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace, said, if a meeting goes on too long and somebody says it is time we went home, that is keeping the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace. The spirits of the saints become ruffled, he said, if things are being said that should not be said; it is wisdom that may say it is time we should go home. That is an example of keeping the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace. May we be pursuing it, may we have the peace of Christ. Paul says in Colossians in the second scripture I read: “let the peace of Christ preside in your hearts”. It does not just take place once a week. It is not only when you are feeling, perhaps, in better form, but it says, let it preside. The other scriptures we read are full, leading up to these verses I am speaking of in some more detail. It says, “let the peace of Christ preside in your hearts”. Preside: that what you do is done in love, that what we do has peace before us. “Let the peace of Christ preside in your hearts, to which also ye have been called in one body, and be thankful”. It is not without meaning that each time the Lord came in in John He says “Peace”. Were there not exercises to be faced? Was there not a doubting Thomas, as we call him, on one of these occasions? Was it the first thing the Lord did as He came in to say, Thomas, you come here? No, the first thing as He came in was He said “Peace”. I leave that having its own authority and meaning.
But then He says elsewhere in the gospel, “I leave peace with you; I give my peace to you”, John 14: 27: “my peace”. O, what a peace His was, beloved! That peace was a confidence in God. That is what peace is. The Lord in prayer says “Father ... let thy will be done as in heaven so upon the earth”, Matt 6: 10. That conveys something of His peace, confidence in the will of God, and confidence that that will will prevail. It may not be manifest immediately as you are in these exercises, but “my peace” is known in the midst of sorrows, in the midst of exercises. What exercises Christ knew, Pharisees, all fled from Him, no comforters at all, and yet He could say, Thy will be done. His peace was that He trusted His Father. Do we, beloved? Our own energies, our own weapons of warfare, will never effect the divine pleasure. Can we have confidence that God’s will will prevail? Can we rest in peace that it will? Not carelessly by any means, certainly not unrighteously, but can we rest in confidence that the will of God will prevail? Think of Christ on the cross; troubled, yes, sorrow, what exercises in His soul, and yet He was in peace. How else could He have said “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”, Luke 23: 24? He said it as a Man who was enjoying peace. He says, “I give my peace to you”, what I have enjoyed in the sufferings of the way I leave with you. Does it attract our hearts so that we want it, beloved? As I said, I think Christ’s peace was a peace that could rest complacently in the will of God. There may be things to be said, it may be right and just that matters are raised, but, beloved, do not pursue the warfare. If things have to be done, they can be said and left in the conscious sense of peace with the brethren. Paul could leave them in peace; he could raise exercises, could raise matter that had to be raised; then he could say, “Peace to the brethren” (Eph 6: 23) in the confidence that the will of God will prevail.
I only refer to Luke to speak about a son of peace. It is an essential part of every local company that there is a son of peace in it. There is hardly a right representation of the local assembly if there is not a son of peace in it. You could draw that from the way the Lord speaks. He is sending out the disciples; bringing it to our time He is giving ministry; the Lord gives a word of ministry, He gives a word to a locality, His own word, and He says that when they go into a place, “first say, Peace to this house. And if a son of peace be there, your peace shall rest upon it; but if not it shall turn to you again”. The Lord may give a word of ministry and we do not get the gain of it. He says that if there is a son of peace there the word will have its own effect. That is virtually what He is saying. They were not to contend and argue, they were not to do this, or do that, to try and establish the point; they were not to stay a week and hope that they could ram home something into these persons; no. The word of the ministry comes; if there is a son of peace there it will have its own fruits in its due time. May there be an exercise that there is a son of peace, a heart that is ready to receive a word; it may be a hard word but peace can still be enjoyed.
I close with that reference in Matthew which I think is very beautiful. “Blessed”, not now a son of peace: “Blessed the peace-makers”. Would you have called them that? “Blessed the peace-makers, for they shall be called sons of God”. I read that to allude to dignity. “Blessed the peace-makers”. It is greater than a son of peace in some ways, it is a son of God, it is sonship in expression. That is the way the Lord speaks about it; “Blessed the peace-makers”. Men give more medals for fighting battles but the Lord gives a peace-maker the highest title that can be conferred. “Blessed the peace-makers, for they shall be called sons of God”. There is need of dignity, beloved, to be brought into our occasions, there is a need of royalty. We are all “God’s sons by faith in Christ Jesus”, Gal 3: 26. A son of God brings in peace. He does not bring in trouble. As I have said, he may raise exercises, but they are raised in peace—a peace-maker. A son of God can extend the influence and the atmosphere of peace among the brethren. It is royalty, and there is need of more royalty. These baser things that are of the flesh: what warfare and conflict they entail! May the dignity, the blessedness of sonship, lay hold of us; may this be a feature—sonship in expression. Not a way I would have thought about describing sonship, not a way that I would have thought exactly, but when you think of it, royalty, dignity would bring in peace. That is the Lord coming in in John 20: “Peace”. All the apostles raise exercises in their epistles. It would be interesting to look and see how Paul closes certain ones with the blessing of peace. Galatians: would you have expected it there? Corinthians: would you have expected it there? I leave these things to be thought about. But where there are exercises, where there are matters to be gone through, if there is not a sense of peace coming into the times among the brethren, beloved, there is something wrong. There is a need for sonship coming into expression. May we, beloved, join with the psalmist and pray and seek the peace of Jerusalem, for His Name’s sake.
LONDON
21st January 1984