If this day you only knew what makes for peace–
but now it is hidden from your eyes.
What makes for peace? Is it hidden from our eyes as well?
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid (see John 14:27).
Jerusalem only knew about peace that the world could give, and this, Jesus lamented, was not true peace. How does such faux peace work? When all circumstances line up perfectly so that we have everything we want and nothing we don't want we experience it. But this never happens perfectly. And even if it did, there would still be the lingering sense that we couldn't hold onto it. We cannot rest in the peace the world gives.
For he is our peace, who has made us both one (see Ephesians 2:14).
Jesus himself is our peace. This does not mean a merely spiritual or affective peace that has no consequence in the material world. He is rather the place where our hostilities toward one another can finally cease. He is the place where we can finally let go of our own need to be God, to surrender our need to make things happen, to give up on winning battles that are ultimately beyond us, trusting that the Lord himself will fight for us once we finally choose to be still (see Exodus 14:14).
Without Jesus the scroll of the good news remains sealed and unopenable. Yet this scroll contains the words that every human heart desires. Without this scroll sealed peace is unattainable. Instead the best we can hope for is cessation of hostilities, though such respites are always temporary.
I shed many tears because no one was found worthy
to open the scroll or to examine it.
Jesus did simply come and impose peace from above. Rather he earned it by his victory. The enemy did its worst to him. All of the peace hating forces of darkness allied against him and did everything they could to silence him. Therefore, in his victory, he reveals that the enemy does not have the last word, the peace that world cannot give is possible.
One of the elders said to me, “Do not weep.
The lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, has triumphed,
enabling him to open the scroll with its seven seals.”
The Lord is inviting us into a Kingdom of peace. He desires us to kings and priests for God who will reign on the earth, but not as earthly kings reign. The reign of earthly kings, the path to worldly peace, is an doomed endeavor.
For the days are coming upon you
when your enemies will raise a palisade against you;
they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides.
But in Jesus, through the Spirit, true peace is not only possible, but immediately available to us if we but desire and ask. Let us be "eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (see Ephesians 4:3).
For the LORD loves his people,
and he adorns the lowly with victory.
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