Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.
The great Handelian setting of Isaiah’s prophecy (9:6) in “Messiah” thunders out each Advent season from choirs around the world. These titles, attributed to a glorious ancient monarch, come to be attributed by Christians to Jesus. Sometime we’ll work through all four of them, but this week it’s time to focus on the last: Prince of Peace.
The second week of Advent in the Western Church traditionally is devoted to peace. Given a world perpetually at war, the first kind of peace any of us think about is a cessation of armed hostilities.
The second kind is merely the absence of unarmed hostilities, especially among the children this time of year. “A little peace and quiet, please!” I will mildly call out from my reading chair as the adorable little angels go about their play.
The third kind, however, hits the jackpot. Biblical peace is not merely the absence of war and not merely the absence of noise. It is the presence of flourishing. “Peace” isn’t an empty word, a pleasant void. It is a full word: of glorious fulfilment.
Shalom is the Hebrew antecedent to our word “peace,” and shalom means everything existing as it could be and should be. Each flower blooms with unspoiled beauty. Each waterfall roars with unrestrained intensity. Each animal grows to full maturity. Each person reaches her maximum potential.
Not only are individuals to flourish, moreover, but every relationship and every system and every society functions as it ought. Romances, friendships, business partnerships, political alliances—all are conducted with honour, fidelity, and genuine care for the other. Families, churches, organizations, governments, ecosystems—all hum along without friction, foolishness, fraud, or fear.
Above all—and in all—God’s Spirit courses with life and love. All is well.
That is what it means for Isaiah to prophesy about Jesus: He will be the Ruler who brings shalom to all the earth. So said the angels also to the astonished shepherds outside Bethlehem: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests” (Luke 2:14). Shalom will come to all who are favoured by God, to all who will encounter Jesus and receive him gladly.
Jesus himself promised peace to his worried followers: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid” (John 14:27). Jesus’ peace: What a great gift!
How does Jesus’ peace actually come to us, however? Many of us, even longtime Christians, do not experience this time of year as a time of peace. The world certainly seems riven with strife, not blanketed in peace. What do we make of these promises?
Let’s say what we can in this short space.
Jesus’ peace comes first indeed to those “on whom his favour rests.” And how does Jesus’ favour land on his disciples? In the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Immediately before Jesus promises his peace, he promises the Spirit: “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” (John 14:26). Jesus’ peace isn’t just a promise: it’s a Person.
The Apostle Paul promises peace as well, and in similar terms: “The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:5–7).
The peace of God comes to us not in some vague form—like a kind of mood-enhancing drug flowing into our spiritual bloodstream—but in the definite, personal form of Christ Jesus. He is the Prince of Peace. And God gives us the Holy Spirit who filled our Lord and who connects us to him now as the peacemaker in our hearts.
That is why Paul can describe this peace as “beyond all understanding”—or, as Jesus himself said, “not as the world gives.” It is the peace that comes from committing our lives, and especially our fears and needs, to Almighty God who shows us his friendly face especially in the face of Jesus.
This peace “transcends all understanding” because God transcends all understanding, “for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13). We can lean back on God: on God’s power, God’s wisdom, and God’s love.
We can have peace to the extent that we have the resources available for our challenges. If I’m going outside to play hockey with five-year-olds, I’m pretty peaceful. If I’m taking on even a local team of 14-year-olds, my anxiety increases in proportion to how much older I am than 14. (Answer: too much.)
I face a debt, and then God comes along and says, “Here’s a bank. Will that be enough?” Well, yes, Lord, it will.
I face an illness, and then God comes along and says, “How about I resurrect you into a a glorious body that will never die?” Sounds good, Lord.
I face a broken relationship, and then God comes along and says, “I have reconciled family members, friends, even whole nations, and I will one day reconcile the entire earth. I can help you with your problem.” I daresay you can, Lord.
To be sure, suppose God isn’t giving us a bank, or splendid immortality, or healed relationships—at least, not right now. Suppose furthermore that none of these gifts appear under this year’s Christmas tree. We can yet be at peace.
Why? Again, because of Jesus—God’s gift to us at the first Christmas and the prince of shalom: “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8:32).
All things. That’s the language of shalom. Hang in there. Peace can be in your hearts now because peace is coming for the entire world. And until it does, God will take care of you so that you can fulfill your calling before he calls you finally home.
What does it mean to have shalom in your heart right now, even as the world outside is far from peaceful?
It means, as the great American theologian Jonathan Edwards put it, that your soul becomes so deep that it isn’t ruffled by passing gusts of momentary disturbance. Unflappable. Think of how Jesus was always poised—no matter what was happening around him and to him.
Shalom also means resilient. One’s soul quickly resumes its proper shape after having to flex to deal with genuine problems, even after being twisted or torn by today’s insults and injuries.
The peace of Christ means that your nervous system isn’t jacked up by today’s challenge, and especially that your mind isn’t racing over tomorrow’s worry. Instead of going from zero to ten whenever you’re upset, you feel a “4” toward a problem that is a “4.” You see things and feel things as they actually are.
It means that you experience genuine faith and hope and love, you manifest the fruit of the Spirit, you enjoy the qualities of “life in the era to come” (which is an alternate translation of the “eternal life” so commonly promised in the Gospel according to John).
The key is connection: connection with the God “from whom all blessings flow.” Whatever is going on outside, your inner world is centred on God and God’s Kingdom. It is inspired by the loving face of Jesus. And it is filled with the steadying, energizing, and strengthening presence of the Holy Spirit.
“There is no pit so deep that God's love is not deeper still.” Corrie ten Boom’s wisdom, won through enduring the Nazi oppression of her native Netherlands and then the misery of a concentration camp, rings out a peal of Biblical peace.
Why doesn’t God just send Jesus back today to sort things out? Why do we have to keep developing inner peace and make what peace we can around us when the world continues to burn and writhe and harm?
God knows that there is no point sending Jesus to the world as conquering King, as the sort of person Isaiah likely had in mind, until we’re ready to be his subjects. The Prince of Peace must be able to count on us as peacemakers and peacekeepers, and we’re a long way from that yet.
So God puts first things first: change the heart, change the life, change the society, change the world. Then the kingdom of peace can come at last—and last.
Yes, we can and should work with God to change society and change the world as much as we can before Jesus returns. We don’t have to wait for everyone to be converted before we tackle culture- and planet-wide problems, and we shouldn’t wait.
But there is no way we can lastingly succeed in any of our ventures if our hearts aren’t right. We humans will just spoil whatever new order we manage to construct.
That’s why the gospel imperative starts with each individual: repent and believe. That’s why it extends to the church next: “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace” (Colossians 3:15).
Let’s give our anxieties to the great God who loved us all at Christmas in the gift of Jesus. Let’s encourage the world to do the same during this Advent season of penitence.
And then let's get busy as his faithful servants, assured and energized by the Holy Spirit. Then we will see what God’s favour looks like.
Shalom!
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