Is Peace Elusive?

Early last month our church held its annual Men’s Retreat – a time for the men to step away from the grind of the day-to-day and to focus ourselves on God and what He has done, is doing and may be preparing to do, in our individual lives. This year’s theme was “Never Walk Alone”, as we spent time together discussing the importance of men having other men in our lives. There is much that could be written in this space about that (and may be soon), but for this post, I wanted to focus on something that The Lord spoke to me and taught me during my time there.

Friday afternoons at the retreat are “free time”. There are several activities you can participate in: golf, shooting, hiking… The North Georgia mountains in the Fall create a beautiful environment for spending some time outdoors. This year, though, I decided to spend the time by myself – reflecting on some things and hoping to be able to get some writing done. It was after I had just a little bit written – mostly for myself, not necessarily for sharing – that God started to speak and move in that little room of mine.

I had just written the words, “Peace… Peace, however, seems to be elusive”. Then, I heard Him speak to my spirit telling me to search all the verses in the Bible that had to do with “peace” because, “there will be ‘answers’ there.” I’d like to share with you what I believe those answers to be, after completing the exercise He gave me.

For the next hour or two, I looked up over 40 verses. (I know there are more, but I just stuck with those listed in the concordances in the back of the Bibles I had with me.) After summarizing each verse and passage, I believe there are three things He wanted me to learn – and ultimately to share with others – about Peace. Here they are…

Peace only comes from God

The Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace. (Number 6:25-26 NIV)

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. (Romans 5:1 NIV)

Jesus is the source of our Peace! He is the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6) after all, so this makes perfect sense. If peace is what we’re looking for, we need only look to Him. This sounds so simple. I think we tend to know this intellectually (in the sense that we know the “right” answer), but, it gets trickier when we aren’t thinking about what the right answer is, and rather just trying to survive and get through life at times. Especially, when we start thinking we can find it elsewhere, which is where the second point below, comes into play.

We cannot manufacture peace on our own

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." (John 14:27 NIV)

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John16:33 NIV)

No matter what we try to do, how we try to manufacture it or the things we attempt to control to find it, peace IS elusive without Jesus. I’ll spare you the detail, but during my “conversation” with Him that day it became clear to me that trying to attain peace through controlling things around us leads to anything but peace. It just makes the situation worse. Instead of resting in a situation and letting His peace wash over us to get us through, we instead spend our time trying to keep all the plates spinning – in our control – thinking that will make everything OK. News flash – it doesn’t work!

We must pray for peace, seek it, and pursue it!

Turn from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it. (Psalm 34:14 NIV)

Flee the evil desires of youth and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart. (2 Timothy 2:22 NIV)

This last point was in some ways the bigger surprise to me. Peace just doesn’t happen (well, that part wasn’t a surprise!), we must be intentional about seeking after and pursuing it! We must pray for it.

He is the Source. We can’t get it by our own doing. And we must pursue it.

All of which drives us closer to The Father. Which is what He wants – more of us.

One final note about all this… God, in His infinite goodness, has this tendency to provide us exactly what we need at precisely the right time. Little did I know that Friday afternoon when He was teaching me about Peace, that less than 72 hours later my world was about to change. A longer, more personal story, perhaps for another post someday, but suffice to say the next three weeks resulted in my wife and I relying on these lessons about pursuing peace in ways that we would have never imagined. With His help, we got through that period – and are depending on Him to help us navigate the new reality we are facing.

God gives good gifts. Peace is at the top of the list.