Todd Maki | The Voice of Zion May 2023 - What Does the Bible Say Article --
The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. – Philippians 4:7
“God’s peace!” We share this warm, loving greeting with other believers in many languages and cultures. We receive this gift of peace from God and we wonder and marvel at its meaning and implications.
We read in holy Scripture how believers in the past also greeted one another in a similar manner. For example, apostle Paul begins his letters with “Grace be to you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians).
We do not fully comprehend God’s peace, but as believers we experience and share in this blessing He has given. When we greet one another, we mutually confess that we believe the same true doctrine of faith, endeavoring to keep the unity of Spirit in the bond of peace (Eph. 4:3–7).
Through this bond, we know one another through the Holy Spirit. We share joys and sorrows in mutual Christian fellowship and comfort one another with the gospel. When we greet one another with God’s peace, we acknowledge to each other our endeavor in faith and that we believe the same way.
In these two words of greeting, we share with whom we greet our journey in faith and our obedience to our Creator. We aren’t able to comprehend how this deep mutual understanding can exist, but we rejoice that we can experience it.
How does God’s peace keep our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus? This happens through the Holy Spirit, as Jesus reminds us in John 14: “My peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid (v. 26–27). We trust that the Comforter will lead and guide us in faith, and preserve peace among us, all the way to the end.
A World without Peace
We live in a world of tumult, unrest, fear that our planet will not last, and economic crisis, along with many other temporal concerns. These topics are on the news every day, and they cause people to live in fear and anxiety.
We believers are also affected by the state of our society, and we too worry and fear. Planning for our future can be difficult amid turmoil, not knowing what is around the corner. It seems the world has forgotten its Creator and relies on itself for salvation.
In song of Zion 566 we are encouraged: “See the mighty Hero who won the war walks in the midst of His flock as before.” Many comforting words follow this excerpt from verse 1.
Dear brothers and sisters in faith, seek to simply place your trust in the hands of our heavenly Father, as Jesus exhorts us in His Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 6). God knows all our temporal needs before we need them. He will care for us, just as He cares for His creation. Though we struggle in these matters, what is the most important? God reminds us of the correct priority to place on matters in this life: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof” (Matt. 6:33,34).
God’s Word tells us that His kingdom is not meat and drink, but righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost (Rom. 14). When cares of life overtake us, how quickly we cease to remember that the most important thing in life is our gift of faith. Sometimes the duties and worries seem endless when life is busy, but let us remember to trust in the heavenly Father! We can cast our cares and sorrows on Him.
Christ takes our burdens of worry and anxiousness, faults and doubts upon Him, as He promises. We can be at peace, believing moment by moment with hope of heaven in our hearts. We have no continuing city here on earth, but we seek the one to come (Heb. 13:14).
We live in this world, but we are not of this world. As we tarry a short time on this earth through the life we’ve been given, we can fully trust that our Father in heaven knows us better than we know ourselves. We have a wonderful inheritance waiting for us. He has given us all we need for our endeavor of faith. In the care of His grace kingdom, we yet carry God’s peace in our hearts.