Advent Week 2: Peace

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”––Luke 2:14

Where do you find peace? Stop and think about it. What are the spaces and places and people and circumstances that bring you peace? All of those are likely good things. Good gifts from a good God meant to give us a taste of the shalom that was here before the world began. Places of calm. People that love us. Good news and good circumstances that bring us relief and joy. Praise God for those kinds of good gifts this Advent season! We should rejoice in God’s kindness to us in these everyday blessings. 

But we also know those things can’t be counted on for perfect peace. It doesn’t work. People fail us. We fail people. Relationships hit bumps in the road. Circumstances change. Suffering surprises us. And while we should praise God for those good gifts––they can’t be the place of ultimate peace for us or we will find ourselves regularly filled with anxiety and unrest. 

This verse, telling the story of the coming Savior and King of the world in a dingy manger, tells the story of a better peace. Peace with God through Jesus Christ. How are we “among those with whom he is pleased”? We trust in him. We turn away from self-dependence, circumstance-dependence, or others-dependence, and turn to Jesus. We confess our inability to save ourselves or run our lives better than him, and turn to him to save us from our sins and lead us in paths of righteousness for his Name’s sake. Jesus came to die so that we might live. Jesus came to die so that the hostility between God and man could be absorbed in his body on that tree. Jesus came to die so that we might have peace with God. 

And that peace with God through Jesus means that we are forever at peace and will forever experience the delight of fellowship with God forever. Our sins are paid for. Our future is secure. Our ultimate peace is unmovable. So, let me ask you again, where do you find peace? 

All of the good gifts that bring us a measure of peace are a pointer beyond themselves to a day that’s coming when sin is done away with and all suffering is destroyed––which comes to those at peace with God. All broken things over sin and all suffering point us to the reality that we’re not quite home yet, but force us to remember where our ultimate peace must be––in Jesus. 

So enjoy God’s good gifts today. And let good and the hard lead your heart to long for ultimate peace in Jesus that is unshakable in all circumstances––and rejoice that you have it now and will have it forever in increasing measures. And as we remember what God has done for us in Christ, what else can we say but, “Glory to God in the highest!”