God of Peace

[00:00:00] It's a well known thing about me, about the place. I've had six shoulder dislocations over my life. [00:00:09] The first one was at a church youth event where I jumped over a banister, little railing and I landed terribly because I'm good at my job. [00:00:19] And from there I've been to hospital six, seven times because I had a reconstruction all about this left shoulder. [00:00:29] It's all better now, I think. [00:00:31] And the amount of relaxation and peace I have about lifting, carrying, throwing my adult siblings about with this shoulder is extreme. It's great. I no longer have to worry about reaching my hand up here and something going terribly wrong as it has done in the past. [00:00:52] Today we're talking about peace, certainty, security. [00:00:58] And so when I say peace, what do you think of? [00:01:06] This is not a rhetorical question. I would like someone just to yell out an answer, but if you don't, no, no. Peace and quiet, no arguing, end of war, contentment, technology, doing what I tell it to. [00:01:29] For me, I've been trying to get up when the cat wakes me up by scratching on something. At the moment it's the curtains. We're very upset with her and going on morning walks and occasionally I manage to see one of the lovely members of this congregation out on a bike ride through Perth. [00:01:48] Why you go that far, I don't know, Tony, but there is a peacefulness of being half frozen, walking at around 6:30 in the morning. [00:02:02] No one's about. It's nice and quiet, there's no conflicts except my own internal conflict. It's great. [00:02:12] So when I say peaceful God or God of peace, what do you think of? [00:02:19] This is also a non rhetorical question. [00:02:22] What do you think of Safe in his hands? I love that. That's great harmony. [00:02:31] I like that one too. [00:02:33] Assurance, blessed assurance, Jesus is mine. [00:02:37] If you know that hymn, if you don't, it's a great hymn, you should listen to it. [00:02:43] I think of normally I think of a very relaxed, chilled out guy sitting on the throne, watching us and being very happy or very sad and crying with us. Either way, this God of peace is a person who loves and cares about us. [00:03:09] When we think of peace, obviously our idea of peace is shaped by the culture we're in. [00:03:14] Peace is, as has been said, absence of war or conflict, some nice peace and quiet where there's no more frustration. [00:03:25] Maybe you think of that and then if you've had kids realize just how precious a resource that actually is and how rare it is to come by, maybe you think of peace in a more esoteric way of finding your true self or some sort of Buddhist styled mindfulness. [00:03:48] When we're talking about peace in the Christian context, obviously we're talking about peace. [00:03:53] God of peace, where peace is his very attribute, a fruit of his spirit, something that we cultivate in ourselves, but also a mystery. It's something beyond what we can manufacture. It's something that the spirit brings to us. [00:04:14] The word peace obviously contains a myriad of definitions, but in the Bible, in the two main languages, it's written in Greek and Hebrew. [00:04:24] The two words are shalom and irini. And I don't speak Greek. I studied Hebrew at college. So if I pronounce that wrong, sorry. [00:04:36] Shalom is a word that contains a huge amount. [00:04:41] Its raw meaning is basically what we understand as peace, as quiet, no violence, that sort of thing. [00:04:49] But it also contains a sense of wholeness, of completeness, of something broken or a dislocated shoulder being moved back into position. [00:05:03] That's the idea that shalom brings out when it's used in the light of God. [00:05:10] It's not God being in absence of conflict. [00:05:16] God still sits around conflict. There is still rebellion against Him. But it's a God that brings wholeness and completeness despite that conflict. [00:05:28] If you've ever felt completely settled about something, you have to take a stand about. [00:05:35] That's part of this idea of shalom. [00:05:38] It's not panic, it's, yep, I'm doing the right thing. [00:05:43] That's what I'm stepping into. [00:05:47] It carries the idea that God's presence is one that brings unity even in the midst of conflict and disagreement, which is also reflected in the Greek word erin. [00:06:02] It carries much the same idea. And so when Paul is writing in Galatians about the fruit of the Spirit, as was talked about love, joy and Erin peace, he's not writing about this cessation of conflict, but a flourishing wholeness and prosperity. [00:06:24] Not necessarily of our bank accounts, although that would be nice, but of who we are with God. [00:06:32] That's Paul's idea. [00:06:35] That's what this is, and that's who God is. [00:06:40] God brings peace, wholeness and completeness, both in a spiritual sense, healing us from the illness of sin that brings us into conflict with him. [00:06:51] And in providing a physical way to actually find peace in the chaos of our lives, the anxiety of our hearts, by shaping ourselves, practicing over a long period of hopeful obedience what God is calling us into. [00:07:15] When they relocate your shoulder, as they've done for me, they put you in a very vulnerable position. [00:07:24] They have to make sure there's plenty of nitrous oxide. So you're also giggling whilst they do this. [00:07:30] They lie you face down and then in my case, rotate the arm forward into the correct position. And then there is just this moment that the drugs don't touch of just, oh, my body is right. [00:07:47] It's good, it's back, it's complete. [00:07:51] That relocation is what God is hoping to bring to us here in this life, on this world that will be fulfilled in heaven. We won't see it in fullness, but we get it. [00:08:05] We get to hold a portion of it. [00:08:10] So I'm not going to read the whole of John 14 as that was wonderfully read. Thank you very much. [00:08:17] But I will jump to this portion. Thank you all this. [00:08:24] I have spoken to you while I am still with you. [00:08:28] But the advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. [00:08:42] Peace I leave with you. [00:08:45] My peace I give to you. [00:08:48] I do not give to you as the world gives. [00:08:52] Don't let your hearts be troubled. [00:08:54] Don't be afraid. [00:08:58] In this moment of Jesus ministry, there are two Judases gathered around a table in this passage. [00:09:08] The Judas is also called Thaddeus in other forms of Scripture, in other gospels. [00:09:17] He's an enigmatic member of the apostles. He doesn't speak too much, but he asks Jesus, why are the apostles so special that they get this treatment? But the world doesn't get to see who Jesus is. [00:09:34] Jesus points out that the world will, but it's through the apostles. It's through his disciples. [00:09:42] If we are disciples of Christ, the world sees Christ in us. [00:09:47] That's how it knows. [00:09:51] These are the men gathered around a table in this moment, like we did with communion, who are sitting in the upper room praying for three days because Jesus had died. [00:10:04] And then they kickstart the Church in. In Acts. [00:10:09] These men and women who are close to Jesus then live into his Spirit, not through conquest, but by being peaceful, loving, whole and connected to those around them. [00:10:25] The Spirit that Jesus reveals is the Spirit that binds us all together, resting our hearts. [00:10:35] This Spirit advocates for us to the Father, but also advocates between one another. [00:10:43] Have you ever had a moment where someone has dramatically misunderstood what you were trying to say? [00:10:52] And when they're your spouse, how has that gone for you? [00:10:56] Or a sibling, or your best friend? You've said something and it's just missed the mark. [00:11:05] Have they responded angrily? [00:11:08] Condemnation, Chastising? [00:11:12] Maybe a little friendly teasing. [00:11:17] Common one for me is, I'll go to Make a joke and it just doesn't land. [00:11:23] And then I get the look of. [00:11:27] Really? [00:11:29] That's what you said. [00:11:33] The spirit in this moment is one that allows us to go, yeah, he really said that, but he didn't mean it. [00:11:49] How often do we lean into that spirit in our moments of brokenness, with our traumas, with our difficulties, and try to understand people's hearts from a perspective of what they love and what they care about? [00:12:05] There is a peace that comes for me from when people just let my mistakes roll off their backs. It's beautiful because I make a few. [00:12:18] These are people who, like me, listen to me and serve me, these people of peace. [00:12:25] It brings this wholeness to the gathering where I'm not here to perform. I'm just here for the love of people. [00:12:35] And that's part of what God's peace is. It crosses that bridge where there could be a division, heads it off at the pass and says, nah, we're together, all of us. [00:12:49] A peace I don't have control over, but gives me capacity to not be overwhelmed by fear or social anxiety or anger at my mistakes. [00:13:02] That lack of overwhelm, even in the face of something fearful, is not what this world promises. [00:13:12] This world promises distractions, bread and games, false security. [00:13:17] If I can control this, I will be okay. But God, since the beginning, wants to bring our hearts to clarity. [00:13:27] And that clarity comes from peace resting in him. [00:13:32] The prophet Isaiah talks about this in Isaiah 9. [00:13:37] In this book, he is calling forward this prince of peace whilst in the middle of prophesying about the invading Assyrian army, the hostilities between Israel and Judah. [00:13:55] For to us a child is born. To us a son is given. And the government will be on his shoulders. It's his problem. He's got control. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. The greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. [00:14:25] All right. Imagination time. Imagine that you are a Middle Eastern person and Israel two and a half thousand years ago. [00:14:38] And then someone mentions the word Assyria. [00:14:43] Your blood runs cold. [00:14:47] You know the stories. You've heard how brutal they are. You've heard how they burn cities, how they treat their slaves. The fear and destruction of the brutality is sitting in you. [00:15:00] They're far off, of course. But that night, you make sure you're close to your family. [00:15:06] That night, maybe you hug them a bit more. [00:15:09] You tell them that you love them a bit more. [00:15:18] Then you hear that the Assyrian army has taken the Northern kingdom. [00:15:25] You had cousins up there. [00:15:27] You had family up there, you don't have that family anymore. [00:15:37] Then this prophet Isaiah, this random fella, starts talking about this prince of peace, someone who even in the midst of devastation will be there, will defeat them. [00:15:57] The might of God would be with them and even so they would come from the north, where the Assyrians are. [00:16:10] I have to agree with him. That's really good news in the day and age. Isaiah is talking, he's talking about King Hezekiah. [00:16:21] What Christians began to understand and how we interpret it is it's also written about Christ. [00:16:29] Jesus is our prince of peace, the one who brings to us the very shalom of God. [00:16:37] From knowing deep in their hearts that the people were chosen and safe in the arms of God, shalom would flourish in the midst of crisis, after crisis. [00:16:51] God sends his peace. [00:16:54] That's who God is. [00:16:56] He wants to bring his creation to have that sort of image, that sort of peace. [00:17:04] We are part of that now. Rarely we have faced down terrible foes like the Assyrians. [00:17:14] But even this church with the trials all around it, that it's gone through with the people that you are. [00:17:20] What I have seen is that when something goes down, you gather and you rally and you do your best to bring that peace. [00:17:32] And for some people there is none. [00:17:35] I've heard that story of peace sitting with Pete, talking, talking about the drop in centre or listening to my in laws, talking about the things that they've seen here. [00:17:48] I've seen it firsthand. [00:17:51] I have seen the spirit of God work through this congregation in different ways to bring that peace where it can. [00:18:03] Good job. [00:18:06] Well done. Good and faithful servants of God. [00:18:11] You've done well. [00:18:15] We are not in the same place as the men and women who are waiting for Jesus to go to the cross. [00:18:22] Presently Christ reigns on David's throne, The government's on his shoulders. It's all his problem. [00:18:29] Great, fantastic. [00:18:32] And the Spirit is with us in these moments that the Father says, peace, shalom. [00:18:40] Come and have wholeness. [00:18:43] Come and taste a hint of what heaven will be like. [00:18:49] The church's highest call, I believe, is to reflect a portion of heaven back to one another and to the world. [00:19:01] That's why we need this spirit of peace, because it's not easy. [00:19:06] There is conflict. [00:19:08] And if you know this character from Baz Luhrmann's Romeo and Juliet, there is conflict. There are issues that are all about us. [00:19:18] Hopefully not as dramatic, but I don't know your life. [00:19:24] We can't be distracted from those things. But what peace allows us to do is hold it in its right. Place. [00:19:33] When brokenness exists, the kingdom of God is able to work through that brokenness, to bring wholeness. [00:19:48] Do we ever get to that point in ourselves? [00:19:52] Do we get to a point where we can at least manage our fears, our angers, our concerns, even in a space where we are struggling? [00:20:05] When I get up to preach, I tend to get very nervous. [00:20:11] It's a lot better now, but one of the ways it got a lot better is because Hannah and I were watching Romeo and Juliet and all of a sudden, peace, Mercutio, peace started to become kind of the mantra at the start of a service or something. Hannah would see I'd be twitchy and agitated, stressed, and she'd go, peace, Mercutio. It's like, oh, yeah, it's not my problem. God's bigger than me. [00:20:44] Sometimes that's what we need. [00:20:48] Sometimes what we need is to also train that and live as people of peace, to learn how to change the posture both in body and in heart, to allow peace to settle. [00:21:07] So what is your heart's posture to peace? [00:21:13] There's a bunch of ways to say that, but basically, if you don't get that phrase, what it means is, is your internal world able to accept God's peace in some way? [00:21:32] Have we fitted our feet with. With the readiness that comes from this gospel of peace? [00:21:40] Are we bitter because the world around us is evil and we feel like we can do nothing? [00:21:48] That may be a little bit too big for us to solve. [00:21:53] But are we bitter because we were disturbed over breakfast? [00:22:00] As I was editing this portion of the sermon this morning, my cat elected that it was the right time to jump up onto my lap and dig her claws in. [00:22:10] Can you have peace when needles are being driven into your legs? [00:22:17] Do we have moments where we turn to God or could turn to God, but we turn to other things? [00:22:26] Money, complaining, cynicism, porn, alcohol, useless games. [00:22:33] Instead of turning to God. In those moments with a heart that says, God, I want to receive your peace. [00:22:43] And it's not a magic spell. [00:22:46] It probably won't happen instantly. It might do. Peace Mercutio works pretty immediately, but it's about setting our hearts to be receptive to God and even when we don't really want to. [00:23:02] I used to do martial arts, a couple of different forms, but when I was doing longsword fighting, they teach you how to take a stance and be ready to accept a sword coming at you and work through it. [00:23:20] These postures allowed me to not get hit as often as I would have otherwise been. [00:23:29] Sometimes I even managed to get A hit on my teacher and that was a good day. [00:23:34] But if our hearts aren't willing to receive from God, we will fight him. We will reject him, and in his mercy he will allow that. [00:23:49] But I don't think we should reject Him. [00:23:53] I think there is great peace and great goodness that can come from Him. [00:24:00] When our heart is ready and we've taken good posture, the next step to God's shalom is humble acceptance. We can't do it on our own. [00:24:12] We can't. [00:24:15] God sends Jesus because we can't atone for ourselves. As Craig led us through. [00:24:23] We can't save ourselves. [00:24:28] God works with us because we can't do the work of being God's people without His Spirit in, through and around us. [00:24:39] This means learning to wait and listen, knowing God, but slowing down to let God do the work he wants to do so we can meet with those outside of us. And I am really struggling to learn this pattern day by day. [00:24:59] I like doing things on my own. [00:25:03] This is hard, particularly because there's a mystery here. [00:25:10] We can't just do this. [00:25:12] Philippians 4:4:7 reminds us that this peace is even beyond our capacity to understand and get our heads around. [00:25:21] But following God allows us to know deeper. [00:25:28] Rejoice in the Lord. Always. [00:25:31] Again, I will say rejoice. [00:25:34] Let your reasonableness be be known to everyone. [00:25:39] The Lord is at hand. [00:25:41] Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. [00:25:52] And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. [00:26:05] Rejoice in the Lord. Get your heart right. [00:26:11] The recommendations for this come from a place of listening, of being at prayer and focusing on God. [00:26:21] And then when it gets hard, you do it again. [00:26:25] And then you do it again tomorrow and you do it on Thursday evening when there's nothing on TV and everything is boring and kind of horrible and the weather is trash. [00:26:38] Take the process of long obedience in the same direction with someone else. [00:26:47] In a culture like ours, where it's all about the short term fix, the kingdom of God is a long term solution and it takes time. [00:27:01] Peace is a guard that settles into our minds and over our hearts. But it's beyond us, it's more than us. We cannot do it alone, we have to do it with other people over a long time. [00:27:18] It is the exercise of God's spirit with our life and soul for the glory of our King. [00:27:25] And it takes practice. [00:27:29] In the past I've needed Hannah to Say peace, Mercutio. [00:27:35] Before I could even think, oh, yeah, that'd be a good idea. If I didn't look nervous when I was standing in front of people today, I got up and I was being given thumbs up by the peanut gallery over there. It was. [00:27:53] It's become easier to have that pattern of peace. [00:27:57] Having walked with people, having talked with them, and learning that actually, yeah, God's got this. [00:28:06] It's his business to do work between my lips and your ears. [00:28:12] It's his spirit that's with you. [00:28:16] This is just a part of it. [00:28:18] This is just an encouragement. [00:28:22] So practice God's peace over and over again and when you fail, do it some more. [00:28:33] You can't get it all at once or even fully. We'll never get there. [00:28:42] You can just accept in one moment that God will provide peace whilst you're still panicking. [00:28:51] It's about our heart's posture to God and God's peace actually settling in and making it fertile ground for his fruit. [00:29:05] Getting that ready and right first will help us with with the rest. [00:29:12] God's peace comes for trials and devastations, for willing hearts and his glory. It brings a sense of quiet and lack of conflict, but its main job is to bring us to wholeness and completeness as people. [00:29:36] Jesus leaves it with us. [00:29:41] Jesus leaves his spirit with us so that we can have it. [00:29:45] Will Jesus open our hearts and our minds evermore for that peace? [00:29:54] I reckon so. He's pretty faithful. He does a good job. [00:30:00] So may that be with you. [00:30:03] Let's pray. [00:30:07] Holy and gracious God, the one who is above all things, through all things, around all things, and who solves problems. [00:30:19] Who sits with us and knows us. [00:30:24] Lord, help us to taste just a little bit of the completeness that you offer. [00:30:31] Help us just to know a little bit of the completeness that can be found in heaven. [00:30:38] Help us to know and practice and walk the long journey of loving you. [00:30:47] Lord, I pray for Summerhill as they do that, as they have done that, as they will do that, that you will bless them, that you will care for them, that they will know your peace as a community. [00:31:02] And that peace will sink into each person in different ways, in the ways that you know they need. [00:31:12] So, Lord, we pray all together in your most holy righteous name, Amen.