Search peace

Seek peace and pur­sue it! Peace is the fruit of the spi­rit that is in our hearts. What is the­re to seek and cha­se?! On the other hand, we are awa­re that peaceful coexis­tence does not fall into our laps. But for a cosy home, peace is! Wel­co­me home to our search for peace!

Peace is not so easy to defi­ne. Many peo­p­le spon­ta­neous­ly say: peace is the oppo­si­te of war. But is peace what a war lea­ves behind in a coun­try after peace has been con­cluded? I think of the bom­bed-out cities in Ger­ma­ny after the Second World War. Or of the count­less grie­ving fami­lies after both world wars; and actual­ly after every war.
Others say: Peace is the oppo­si­te of stri­fe? Do you only enjoy peace after a serious quar­rel – or are the­re not still afters­hocks, e.g. a bot­tom­less dis­ap­point­ment that it could come to this quar­rel at all? Or a para­ly­sing fear of the next argument?
Peace has also beco­me a casu­al col­lo­quia­lism: «That’s peace,» – this snow­shoe hike through the fresh­ly snow-cover­ed land­scape. «It was so peaceful, just wal­king tog­e­ther,» a cou­ple enthuses.
Peace can be tat­to­oed on your upper arm; it can be writ­ten in big let­ters on your T‑shirt or on your cap – but you’­re having trou­ble in the class­room, or with your par­ents, and you’­re ran­ting about this evil world. Peace may be writ­ten on the sti­cker on your school bag – but you still whine about your tea­chers and classmates! 
Of cour­se, peace is also sung about in many dif­fe­rent ways. I think back to a song by Nico­le in the 80s, which was at the top of the charts for over 5 months: «A litt­le peace, a litt­le sun… A litt­le peace, a litt­le joy, a litt­le warmth, that’s what I wish for. A litt­le peace, a litt­le dre­a­ming… A litt­le peace, a litt­le love…
That is typi­cal for us humans, we like to «tick­le»! It’s like a gour­met buf­fet. We want to be able to enjoy as much as pos­si­ble, so only a litt­le bit of ever­y­thing! We like to enjoy the who­le of life with all its temp­ting mor­sels. Nico­le then con­fes­ses hers­elf: I know my songs don’t chan­ge much, I am just a girl who says what she feels…

Seek peace and pursue it.…

We suspect that a very spe­cial peace is meant by this call. Divi­ne peace, which is ren­de­red in the Bible with the Hebrew term shalom or the Greek term eiré­né, means: regard­less of all cir­cum­s­tances – I am well, the­re is a peace in my heart; I have enough; I can look God in the eye; I am too-peaceful.
We have lacked this divi­ne peace sin­ce the Fall. From child­hood, we are peo­p­le who never have enough. Wit­hout this peace from God, we are rest­less and dis­sa­tis­fied; con­stant­ly pul­ling others down, get­ting angry with others, etc.. And we are con­cer­ned first with our own well-being and not with the well-being of others.

The peace of God in 3 dif­fe­rent stages from OT via NT to the final peace

1. in the Old Testament, the peace of God was for his chosen people

God’s peace was then in the peo­p­le of God.…
– Pre­sence of God in the taber­na­cle or later in the temp­le; or in the wil­der­ness wan­de­ring with the cloud or in the night the fla­me of fire.
– This peace gave secu­ri­ty, e.g. for a good night’s sleep (Psalm 4:9).
– Expe­ri­en­ced through God’s pro­tec­tion and preservation.
– In the expe­ri­ence of the Day of Ato­ne­ment, and the various feast days
– A good land to dwell in (Psalm 37:11)
– If the king was good and did what is right, the peo­p­le will live in peace (Psalm 72:3)
– Tho­se who lis­ten­ed to God and stood faithful­ly by Him were assu­red of peace (Psalm 85:9).
– Peace was depen­dent on the ful­film­ent of the law (Psalm 119:165)
This was all true for God’s peo­p­le. It was true for the other peo­p­les: «The­re is no peace for the wicked,» says my God. Isai­ah 57:21

2. in the New Testament

Jesus brought a three­fold peace to this earth to us humans: >peace bet­ween man and God, >peace among us humans and the >peace with yourself. 
Now the peace of God is so clo­se to us that it lives in us! 
Jesus said during his fare­well spee­ches: Even though I am no lon­ger here, peace will remain with you. Yes, I give you my peace – a peace that no one else in the world can give you. John 14, 27
He is pre­sent in the child­ren of God through the Holy Spi­rit. Peace is a fruit of the Spi­rit within us. Jesus is the announ­ced Prin­ce of Peace. As Prin­ce, he has this fruit at his dis­po­sal. He can spread it through us, pas­sed on, for exam­p­le, sim­ply through our being and our actions; through what we radia­te and spread. This peace in us has an influence on our who­le being with body, soul and spi­rit. Paul con­nects it with our sanctification:
May the God of peace sanc­ti­fy you through and through. May he pro­tect your spi­rit, soul and body so that they will be int­act when Jesus Christ our Lord returns. 1 Thes­sa­lo­ni­ans 5:23
This pro­cess of sanc­ti­fi­ca­ti­on con­ti­nues until we reach the goal of faith. We are still tal­king about the strugg­le of faith. We are still chal­len­ged, some­ti­mes mas­si­ve­ly. We are suf­fe­ring from sick­ness. We are still suf­fe­ring, despi­te this divi­ne peace within us, from ten­si­ons in the inter­per­so­nal sphe­re, quar­rels in mar­ria­ge, thick air in the fami­ly, bul­ly­ing at work. Suf­fe­ring becau­se of our fail­ures, our self-will, small faith – but all this can­not ground God’s peace in us.
I am con­vin­ced that our per­se­cu­ted brot­hers and sis­ters also expe­ri­ence this deep peace! Even if they are in pri­sons or labour camps, through what they radia­te, even others come to faith.
Just as the apost­le Peter had to admo­nish the Chris­ti­ans then, we still need it today. He wri­tes in his let­ter and urges us: …to focus on the com­mon goal. Be full of com­pas­si­on, love one ano­ther as brot­hers and sis­ters in the faith, be mer­ciful and cour­teous to one ano­ther! Do not repay evil with evil and insults with insults! On the con­tra­ry, bless! 1 Petr. 3,8ff

Seek peace and pur­sue it.…
The Greek word here for seek (zéteo) does not just mean your search for your glas­ses or car keys! It has far grea­ter mea­nings: to seek out, to exami­ne, to explo­re, to pon­der, to pon­der, to pon­der, to miss, to desi­re, to desi­re, to demand, to demand. Think about how you should behave in this ten­se situa­ti­on at work. Reflect a litt­le on why you left the house group, the small group in a stran­ge mood again! I am con­vin­ced that Jesus loves such broo­ders! See­king peace means that you want to give room with all your heart to the peace in you, to Jesus in you, and not to the anger in your bel­ly. Whe­re hurts, jea­lou­sy, envy, dis­ap­point­ments and other things are dis­rupt­ing our inner peace, you can con­sider the good with the help of Jesus!

Thin­king about love!
Actual­ly, in our ver­se of Psalm 34, the first part is miss­ing: «For­sa­ke evil and do good; seek peace and pur­sue it!» You may or may not have much reason to be real­ly angry with someone. Whe­ther your anger is jus­ti­fied or unfoun­ded, do good. Seek the good. Yes, we all know that this is not easy, to give way to Jesus in us. It would only be fatal if we resign our­sel­ves: «I’m just quick­ly on 180! Some­ti­mes I just can’t sit still and I have a poi­so­no­us ton­gue. I’m just sensitive…»

The word «hunt» real­ly comes from hun­ting voca­bu­la­ry. I have never been invol­ved in a hunt, but what I know about hun­ters is that they are pas­sio­na­te. They have only one goal: not to go home emp­ty-han­ded. They put their all into it, they are focu­sed, they sweat or wait pati­ent­ly, they don’t give up – and they are a con­spi­ra­to­ri­al community!
Remem­ber: The peace of God is within you, make room for it in your heart and in your head! Paul encou­ra­ges us to hold on to God’s grace: The God of peace will soon force Satan under your feet and tread him down. I wish you that the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ will accom­pa­ny you! Romans 16:20

In the idea spek­trum of 9 Janu­ary, 9 peo­p­le were asked what this exhorta­ti­on of Psalm 34 means to them. I would like to quo­te a few sen­ten­ces from the answers:
– The more place the hero of peace, Jesus, takes up in me, the more I have cha­sed peace. (Ramo­na Keil)
– I do not aspi­re to live wit­hout con­flict. I want to beco­me a pea­ce­ma­ker in con­flict situa­tions. (Eli­sa­beth Kunz)
– I want to seek peace atten­tively, honest­ly and per­sis­t­ent­ly in rela­ti­onships with my fel­low human beings. This means honest­ly thin­king about rela­ti­onships; cou­ra­ge­ous­ly approa­ching others when uns­po­ken things are in the air; not giving up when others react dis­mis­si­ve­ly. (Chris­ti­ne Grogg)
– A can­to­nal coun­cil­lor: I want to respect my poli­ti­cal oppon­ents as human beings, love them and see them as Jesus Christ sees them: as peo­p­le whom he loves and for whom he came into this world to save. (Erich Vontobel)

3. the peace of God in its ultimate beauty and glory

But even this New Tes­ta­ment high level of divi­ne peace from God is an inter­me­dia­te stage. We will only expe­ri­ence the peace of God in its final beau­ty and glo­ry in hea­ven. Until that time comes, we still have to be pati­ent. Paul descri­bes this wai­ting room in Romans 8:19: Yes, the who­le of crea­ti­on is eager­ly wai­ting for the child­ren of God to beco­me visi­ble in all their glory.
In this lon­ging, we natu­ral­ly also think of the pro­mi­ses of Reve­la­ti­on: no more suf­fe­ring, no more tears, no more pain, no more death – but I find the descrip­ti­on of this time by Isai­ah just as beau­tiful: Then the wolf and the lamb will live tog­e­ther in harm­o­ny; the leo­pard and the goat will camp tog­e­ther. The calf, the lion and the fat­ling will beco­me fri­ends and a litt­le boy will she­p­herd them. Cow and bear will gra­ze tog­e­ther. Their cubs will rest next to each other. The lion will eat straw like the catt­le. The infant will play at the otter’s loopho­le. Yes, an infant puts its hand into a poi­so­no­us snake’s den. Isai­ah 11, 6

Let us rejoice tog­e­ther in the 50 weeks ahead of us this year, which we have – God wil­ling – to grow in peace. I would like to express my per­so­nal faith for all of you and for us as a who­le con­gre­ga­ti­on with the fol­lo­wing ver­se: You will expe­ri­ence God’s peace, which is grea­ter than our human mind can ever com­pre­hend. His peace will keep your hearts and minds in faith in Jesus Christ. Phil­ip­pians 4:7
Amen

Possible questions for the small groups

Read the Bible text: Psalm 34:15

As belie­vers living in the age after Christ, we have many advan­ta­ges com­pared to the peo­p­le of God befo­re Christ! List some things…
2. what are our weak points that often lead to dis­cord and strife?
3) How have you con­cre­te­ly sought peace and hun­ted for peace in dif­fi­cult situations?
What do you ima­gi­ne a heart full of peace from God to be?
Would any of you like to share a cur­rent ten­si­on in your inter­per­so­nal life? (pos­si­bly also as a pray­er request)
How do you do that? What do you do, lea­ve «evil» and do «good» instead?
What do you per­so­nal­ly take away from this ver­se 15 from Psalm 34?