The Missing Piece of Peace

What is the one thing we are all actually after? Peace. We work hard to earn enough money so we don’t have to worry about life, which is just a negative way of saying that we would like peace. Why do we go to war as nations? Because someone either has upset or threatens to upset peace. Imagine that! War to get peace. Killing each other to get peace. It is the most sought after gift in the world, yet here it is, sitting right in the fruit of the Spirit. It’s not even the first one listed! 

 

Now, what is peace? I imagine that many of you have different answers to what that would mean for you. Some in here, I would imagine, would feel peace if this physical problem would just go away. If only you could hear like you used to, see like you used to, move like you used to, then there would be peace. Peace is found in a return to the past. For others in here, particularly the youth, peace is found in finally reaching the future! If only you could look ahead to see if life is going to be ok for you, you would find peace. For those of us in the middle of those two sections of life, we don’t want the past or the future; we don’t want time to move at all! In fact, if life could just be still for a minute, THEN there would be peace. 

 

All of that is a lie, and it isn’t even the first thing about what real peace is. Those may be pieces of peace, but they are not peace itself or even the things that lead to peace. Peace is a person, the one Who’s arrival caused the angels to sing that verse we’ve just read, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” What impresses angels so much that they would say that? Well, let’s take a look at what peace means. I’ll give it to you up front, and over the course of the next few minutes together, you’ll see it come from the Scriptures. Peace is the feeling of wholeness solely founded on the fact of Christ's work for you.