PBPC Advent Devotional, Week 2 - Monday
Week Two – Peace
Biblical peace (called shalom in Hebrew) is not just an absence of conflict. Neither is it a state of inner calm. Biblical peace has a corporate sense to it, so it is relational. When relations are right, stable and in order, there exists a sense of well-being and reconciliation which promotes life, prosperity and welfare in the broadest sense. In this kind of peace, all people and all creation live in right relationship with God and with each other. The result is well-being, and harmony, and justice, and flourishing.
Monday
Isaiah 2:3-4
3 Many peoples shall go, and say;
Come, let us go up to the mount of the Lord
to the house of Jacob's God.
that He may teach us of His ways,
and that we may walk in His paths.
For from Zion's shall teaching come forth
the Lord's word from Jerusalem.
4 And He shall judge among the nations
and be arbiter for many peoples.
And they shall will grind their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation shall not raise sword against nation,
nor shall they learn war anymore.
(translation by Robert Alter)
Think of the numerous conflicts happening in our world today. How many can you list, in the Americas, in Europe, in Africa, in Asia?
Now imagine Jesus stepping into one and bringing the leaders together over a big feast. They talk. They listen. They find mutual understanding and common ground. They let go of their grievances. They look each other in the eye and shake hands. Then they each go out to their soldiers and their people and bring them to an understanding of reconciliation with their former foe. Feel the weight of anger and anxiety lift. Pray that reconciliation into a conflict you know.
Daily Practice
Find a nail. Look at it and recall that this is what it cost Jesus to bring that reconciliation to fruition. Now bend the nail with a hammer, and smash the head as well. See how its shape resembles a plowshare. Our bitterness and ill-will are so much harder to re-form than a nail.