Peace

PEACE
Peace is total well-being, prosperity, and security associated with God’s presence among his people. Linked in the Old Testament with the covenant between God and Abraham’s descendants, the presence of peace was conditional, based on Israel’s obedience. In the prophetic writings, true peace was part of the end-time hope of God’s salvation. In the New Testament, this longed-for peace was understood as having come in Christ to be experienced by the believers.

IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
“Shalom,” the most prominent Old Testament term for “peace,” held a wide range of connotations (wholeness, health, security, well-being, and salvation) and could apply to an equally wide range of contexts: the state of the individual (Psalm 37:37; Proverbs 3:2), the relationship of person to person (Genesis 34:21; Joshua 9:15) or nation to nation (1 Kings 5:12; Psalm 122:6-7), and the relationship of God and people (Psalm 85:8; Jeremiah 16:5).
The presence of shalom in any of these contexts was not considered ultimately as the outcome of human endeavor but as a gift or blessing of God (Leviticus 26:6; 1 Kings 2:33; Job 25:2; Psalms 29:11; Psalms 85:8; Isaiah 45:7). It is not surprising, therefore, to find “peace” tied closely to the Old Testament notion of covenant. Shalom was the desired state of harmony and communion between the two covenant partners-God and his people (Numbers 6:26). Its presence signified God’s blessing in the covenant relationship (Malachi 2:5), and its absence signified the breakdown of that relationship due to Israel’s disobedience and unrighteousness (Jeremiah 16:5, Jeremiah 16:10-13).
Shalom becomes a pivotal term in the prophetic writings. The “false” prophets, forgetting the conditions for national well-being within the covenant relationship, assumed that God’s loyalty to Israel (Psalm 89:1) would guarantee political peace forever (Jeremiah 6:14; Jeremiah 8:15; Micah 3:5). Against such popular but false security, the prophets before the exile proclaimed the coming judgment precisely as a loss of this shalom due to Israel’s persistent disobedience and unrighteousness (Isaiah 48:18; Micah 3:4, Micah 3:9-12).
The prophets did, however, point beyond the crises of exile and the setbacks it caused to a time when shalom, characterized by prosperity and well-being (Isaiah 45:7), absence of conflict (Ezekiel 34:28-31), right relations (Micah 4:1-4), restoration of harmony in nature (Ezekiel 47:1-12), and salvation (Isaiah 60:17) would again return. Often this eschatological (or end-time) expectation of peace in the Old Testament was associated with a messianic figure, as in Isaiah 9:6, where the future Messiah is termed the “Prince of Peace.” Moreover, his reign would be one of “peace” not only for Israel but throughout the whole earth (Zechariah 9:9-10). The Old Testament ends with this hope of peace still unrealized in its full sense.

IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
The Greek term for “peace” used predominantly in the New Testament is eirene, a word expanded from its classical Greek connotation of “rest” to include the various connotations of shalom discussed above. As with shalom, eirene could be used as a greeting or farewell (as in “peace be with you”-Luke 10:5; Galatians 6:16), or could signify the end of conflict (national-Luke 14:32; or interpersonal-Ephesians 4:3), or the presence of domestic tranquillity.
The chief issue concerns how Jesus incorporated the Old Testament hope for the eschatological peace of God into his ministry. In the benediction of Zechariah in Luke 1:67-79, the coming of Jesus as the Messiah is expected to “guide our feet into the way of peace.” So also the angelic testimony to the shepherds proclaims Jesus as the bringer of God’s peace to people. That is, Jesus as the Messiah would usher in God’s reign of peace. Jesus’ self-understanding as expressed in the fourth Gospel corresponds to this association. This long-expected peace of God is Jesus’ farewell gift to the disciples (John 14:27); it is given to them when he breathed his Spirit into them (John 20:19-22).
The nature of this gift of peace brought by Jesus may be easier to explain by stating what it is not. It is not an end to tension or the absence of warfare. It is not domestic tranquillity nor anything like the worldly estimation of peace (Luke 12:51-53). Its presence may, on the contrary, actually disturb existing relations, being a dividing “sword” in family relations (Matthew 10:34-37). Jesus’ gift of peace is, in reality, the character and mood of the new covenant of his blood that reconciles God to people (Colossians 1:20) and forms the basis of subsequent reconciliation between divergent people (Ephesians 2:14-22).
The early church understood “peace” to be the final, end-time salvation of God given already through Jesus Christ (Philippians 4:7-9). This understanding of “peace” altered the content of the common greeting “go in peace” as it was taken up in the Christian community. In Paul’s common “grace and peace” greeting (1 Corinthians 1:3; 2 Corinthians 1:2; Galatians 1:3; Ephesians 1:2), it is no longer a mere wish for peace that Paul extends to his readers but is a reminder of the messianic gifts available in the present time through Christ to the man of faith. In accord with this, Jesus is described as “peace” itself (Ephesians 2:14), while God, too, because of his act of reconciliation through Christ, is known as a “God of peace” (Philippians 4:9; Colossians 3:15).
This gift of peace or reconciliation with God, made available through Christ, places an ethical demand on the Christian; it calls for the exercises of “peace” (as reconciliation between persons) within the church. Peace, as a fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22), is to be the goal of the Christian’s dealings with others (Hebrews 12:14).