Peace is such a difficult thing for us to achieve. We always seem to be seeking it, yet it always seems to be that one thing the lies just over the next hurdle. In 1938, Neville Chamberlain, the Prime Minister of Britain hailed the Munich Agreement with Germany as a document ensuring “peace for our time.” Yet less than a year later, the world was once again embroiled in a war that rivalled the Great War in bloodiness, but far eclipsed that war in terms of scope. Peace never seems to last. Yet in our reading from the Gospel of St. John, Jesus promises His disciples, and you and I, a different kind of peace. His peace. Christ gives His disciples, and each one of us, a completely different kind of peace than the world offers to us. Today on Pentecost, we celebrate that peace coming to the disciples and being spread by the power of the Holy Spirit through the Church to the entire world.
I. In the Gospel reading, Christ and His disciples are in the Upper Room where Christ instituted the Lord's Supper and is teaching the disciples one last time before He goes to His suffering and death. Jesus knows the persecution and hardships that the disciples will have to endure on account of their faith, so He gives them this promise:
A. “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” (v. 27). The peace that Christ gives does not pass away, precisely because it is not enforced by political or military means, nor is it acquired through money and the acquisition of worldly possessions. Rather, this peace is as Paul describes in the book of Philippians, “the peace of God which surpasses all understanding, [and] will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phil 4:7). The peace that God gives us focuses in on Christ and the gift of salvation that He gives to us, a gift that is absolutely sure and can never be taken away from us despite all the conflict that swirls around us, both out there in the world and even right at home, all too often, in our closest relationships.
B. Yet despite the peace that we are given knowing that our salvation is guaranteed through the Christ's death on the cross and glorious resurrection, it can actually be quite surprising how little we depend on it. Think about it. Think about how, rather than depending on the peace that Christ gives to us, through His Word and sacraments and the entrance into His heavenly kingdom that is guaranteed for us, we instead focus on what is happening in the world around us. Now I'm not talking about persecutions and suffering, God has blessed us with a nation where we can worship freely and don't have to face persecution. But the fear that the world attacks us with here is more insidious for its ability to slip under the radar. What's going to happen to me tomorrow? What will I do tomorrow? Rather than relying on the peace of God, and trusting in His promise to provide for us and save us from sin and death, we neglect His promises and become captivated by this fear. Many times already, I have found myself afraid of what will happen in the summer. How will it work out to move to Campbell River? What's going to happen? This kind of fear will then seep into our relationships, as our mistrust of God and our own sinful natures sow discord in our relationships. There are times when discussing the future will cause me to snap at my wife and drive a wedge between us. Our own fears and our sinful nature lead us to look out for ourselves first and separates us from each other, and, even worse, separating us from the peace that God has given us.
C. But Christ came down to earth to make atonement between us and God, He came to pay the price that our sins demanded. And lets think about that word “atonement” for a second. If you break the word down, what you come out with are the words “at one ment.” Ok, so “ment” isn't really a word, but that still leaves us with “at one.” Through the death of Jesus Christ, in whom both God and man are united, all mankind, you and I, are made one with God. No longer are we separated from God, but through Christ, through the cross, we are reconciled with God and no longer deserve His wrath, but instead are given His peace. The Apostle Paul writes in Romans that, “since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (5:1). And in our baptism, where that faith was given to us, Christ also enters into our hearts and makes His permanent dwelling, His mansion, within us—as He tells us here through John (v. 23). He lives in our hearts and works within us so that we, by the power of His dwelling in us and the gift of forgiveness, we may keep His word, which He spoke earlier in John: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another” (13:34). Not because we have to, but because that is what faith does as Christ works in us, as John records again, “I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do.”
II. Yet this faith, does not come from us. We can't make that choice, like some would have us believe. It is like trying to push two magnets of the same polarity together: even though we're made in His image we repel God, we push Him away, we run away, and we fight against God. But the Holy Spirit turns us and works faith in our hearts so that we might receive the peace that He too gives us.
A. The Holy Spirit is often called the shy guy of the Holy Trinity, never speaking of Himself, but always pointing back to Christ and pushing Him to the foreground, while sneaking back to the background. Christ speaks of the Holy Spirit when He says that, “He will bear witness about me” (John 15:26) and again, “He will guide you into all the truth” (John 16:13). Jesus says in the Gospel reading for today that, “He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you” (v. 26). That is the work of the Holy Spirit, leading us back to Christ, teaching us and reminding of His Word. He is working in us to sanctify us through the peace given to us on the cross. And then, having given that us that peace for ourselves He also keeps working through us to proclaim that Gospel to all the world, so that everyone who's bothered and burdened by conflict can come to know this same “deep peace.”
B. The Holy Spirit has made His permanent home in our hearts with Jesus Christ, and we have the promise in Scripture, that we should “not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say” (Luke 12:11-12). But, we don't trust Him. Nah, y'know what, after all, He is the shy guy of the Trinity, He's probably quiet and doesn't want to speak very much, so I'll just stay here at home. I mean, I've got everything I need right here: good Christian friends, safety, what more could I need? We want to stay in our comfort zones, we like it, because after all, there are other people out there! People who will put us on the spot, ask questions we might not want to answer, maybe make fun of us, or perhaps, just perhaps, get angry. Yet these are the very people that God loves and died on the cross to save. So, we rebel. We ignore God's will. Or, we, in our sinful flesh, try to fight God, or maybe even run away. It happens to all of us, it happens even to the best of us, because we are all sinners.
C. Yet when we fail to trust in the peace the Holy Spirit gives us, and boy do we fail, the Holy Spirit is there then too. He is there to forgive us our sin and to bring us back to the cross where we receive this new peace. In our Epistle reading today, we see the disciples who messed up a lot, who didn't get it a lot and didn't always do what God wanted them to do. Yet the peace the disciples received from the Holy Spirit, who testified of what Christ had done for them, motivated them to reach out of their comfort zones to preach the Gospel to all the nations. Throughout this season of Easter, we have heard how the Holy Spirit worked through the Apostles to share the peace that God had given them to all people. To face suffering, persecution, even death without fear, trusting in the victory earned for them by Christ. In your very own baptism, each of you have experienced your very own Pentecost, as the Holy Spirit comes to dwell in your heart. He dwells in your heart to sanctify you and to aid you in your witness, giving you the peace that Christ gave to His disciples when He said, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you” (John 20:21). Luther describes the work of the Holy Spirit in this way when he says, “He baptized me; He proclaimed the Gospel of Christ to me; and He awakened my heart to believe. Baptism is not of my making; nor is the Gospel; nor is faith. He gave these to me. For the fingers that baptized me are not those of a man; they are the fingers of the Holy Spirit. And the preacher’s mouth and the words that I heard are not his; they are the words and message of the Holy Spirit. By these outward means He works faith within me and thus He makes me holy.”
D. Like the disciples, we too, who have received this gift of peace and have both the Son of God and the Holy Spirit working within us, are motivated to step out of our comfort zones to spread the Gospel, God's peace, to all the world. Not just because we have to, not because we're obligated to, but because that is what faith, created and sustained by the Holy Spirit in us, wants to do. Faith moves us to share that peace to others—it's the best motivator in the world! And so we share it through our love, as the Holy Spirit works in us and brings forth the fruit of love that faith bears. The Holy Spirit works in us and through us as we put others before ourselves, whether we do it by helping our neighbour, helping out with the Sunday School or Out of School Care or helping out with the community. And of course we also share God's peace through our words as the Holy Spirit aids us, and gives us the words to confess our faith boldly and confidently to a world that otherwise only ever seems to hear about conflict, fighting and war.
People often spend years looking for peace, yet never do seem to find it in what the world has to offer. Like sand, the peace of the world seems to fall through our fingers so that we are once again left afraid of what is to come. Yet today, on this Pentecost, we celebrate the day that God sent the Holy Spirit so that His peace might be made known to us. So that through God's Word, the Holy Spirit might proclaim to us the news that Christ died for our sins and reconciled us to God, “making peace by the blood of His cross” (Colossians 1:20). And so that through this church, where we hear the news of that forgiveness proclaimed and where the sacraments are given to us, that we might be enriched by the peace that we now have with God. The peace of God, given for you.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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