Perfect peace (2)
Cruden’s Complete Concordance shows approximately two hundred references to the word “peace” in the Old and New Testaments. Many people today have no interest at all in what those references might teach or reveal. They are interested in more practical knowledge that will help them with their jobs or the everyday necessities of life. They are also more interested in fame, money, power, wealth, entertainment, or in the various pleasures and enticements life has to offer.
There are some who are interested in social peace, such as may be brought about by political means, or in world peace, to be brought about by various schemes and strategies – but not knowing what real peace means, they often succeed only in creating more problems and making things worse than they were before. If I can paraphrase the philosopher scientist Paul Feyerabend in Farewell to Reason, their “wonderful dream castles” are built from ideas uncontaminated by reality.
The peace with God and our neighbors and fellow citizens that the Bible describes is something very different. It is realized first and foremost within the individual human heart, and it does not attract the interest of those seeking quick fixes, immediate material benefits, or novelty and sensation. It leads not to popularity and the admiration of the world, and exists for the most part within the little frameworks of outwardly ordinary and unexceptional lives.
That the “peace that passeth all understanding” referred to in Paul’s letter to the Philippians is not of interest to the world at large is only to be expected, for we read in I Corinthians that “the wisdom of the world is foolishness with God.” Parenthetically, this verse does not say that the knowledge of the world is foolishness with God. It doesn’t say that mathematical or medical or technical scientific knowledge is foolishness with God. These subjects have their place, along with knowledge in many other areas (languages, history, cookery, mechanics, whatever). Merely human wisdom, on the other hand, which seeks to offer deep explanations of the origin of the cosmos and of human life, and of the meaning of life, many of them purely imaginary, and made without regard to the Creator of the universe and of all things that are in it – this is all foolishness with God.
Biblical teachings on peace represent a higher level of wisdom that merely human intelligence and even genius cannot attain to – but unfortunately this is found in a realm of higher truth that many churchgoers and even people that have the name of “Christian” do not care about. There are many who attend church primarily as a social activity. They hear a gratifying speech or lecture (I don’t want to call it a sermon), see some friends, hear some music, have some vague ideas about the goodness of God, and feel some obligation to obey the rules, but have no real interest in the Bible. Many don’t even bother to read it.
There are others who have more of an interest in the Bible, and may even read or study it to some extent, but have reduced Christianity to a very simple business transaction in which their sins are forgiven and paid for, and that is enough. They are now confident of going to heaven, and are blissfully indifferent to any higher spiritual awareness and calling. They are described in the book of Revelation, in the warning to the church at Laodicea, which says: “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked . . . .”
Paul said, “Let the peace of God rule in your hearts.” Like many other biblical teachings, this is more easily said than done. How is this peace of God attained? Where does it come from, and how it is nourished and sustained amid the trials and tests and pressures of everyday life? And what if greater tests than any we have yet experienced should come upon us? What if the future brings us not the uninterrupted continuation of American prosperity, but rather some of the severe hardships and trials that many other nations in other parts of the world have experienced? Will we be able to stand when the floods come, and the winds blow, and the waters rise, and when “there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken”?
If none of these things should come in our lifetime, where and what is the peace that can overcome the ignorant noise and trivia and pettiness of our drab and increasingly confused lives? Where is the higher truth that gives us access to that higher spiritual reality which is our real origin, and our real spiritual home?
***
In these two posts I have spent more time on preliminaries than I intended. In the 3rd and final post on this subject, I will look at some more specific biblical teachings, concluding for now with this saying of the Lord Jesus Christ: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.”