The Cost of Peace

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” That sounds like something out of the mouth of a warlord or a conqueror. Something to strike fear into the hearts of those faced with the point of that sharp sword. A message of death and destruction. One certainly does not expect to hear such words from the Prince of Peace. Yet that is what our Lord says.

The world likes the baby Jesus. That Jesus is easy to handle. You can picture Him nursing at His mother's breast. You can imagine Him crying in the stable, under the watchful eye of the cattle and sheep. The world loves to sing carols like “Silent Night” and “Away in a Manger”. This Jesus is easy to deal with because He is cute and cuddly and inoffensive.

The world even likes some parts of the man Jesus. Mahatma Gandhi said, “I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians.” The Jesus favored by the world is the one who preached the Beatitudes, as heard through the lens of the human heart. Keep your head down. Work hard. Be nice to everyone. Don't fight back. Be agreeable. This is the Jesus people like, not to mention the Jesus who makes food and drink flow in abundance.

After all, in the eyes of the world, religions and religious people are all about peace. The Bible even says that peace is a fruit of the Spirit. Aren't all religious people supposed to be like Gandhi or Buddha, sitting and waiting for some light bulb to switch on and change everything? Even Islam claims to be the religion of peace. Much breath and print has been expended trying to convince the rest of the world that Islam and Muslims are, at the core, promoters of peace.

Well, the undercurrent of Jesus' message in today's text is this: You can have peace, but it will cost you. Therefore, the question becomes, at what cost does peace come?

Do you love your father and your mother? Hopefully you answer yes, because the Fourth Commandment requires you so to do. However, you may not love your father more than your Lord. You must love Jesus more than all else. He must have first place in your heart, or He has no place. The Lord of Hosts plays second fiddle to no one and nothing.

To love Jesus, you must give up the false gods upon which your heart sets itself. Luther writes in the Large Catechism, “That upon which you set your heart and put your trust is properly your god” (I:3). The human heart is an idol factory, constantly creating gods to suit the particular need or desire of the moment.

However, to love the Lord your God with your whole heart, as the Law demands, requires that you relinquish those false gods and your mislaid trust in them. The devil will come to you and tempt you in many and various ways, but Christ must remain uppermost, and He will. The god of material security calls out to you, but it will fall before Jesus. The god of worldly peace beckons with a siren-song, but it must fall on deaf ears.

For these gods are truly and finally false gods and craven deceptions of the devil. You cannot put your trust in the things of this world if your home is to be above. You may have no other gods before the Lord God. You must fear, love, and trust in Him above all things. Though the devil threaten to take goods, fame, child, or wife, you must not bow down before him. Though he promise you his kingdom for a song, you must not sing one note of his devious tune.

Worldly peace is certainly a worthy goal, but it is not that upon which we stake our existence. Indeed, blessed are the peacemakers, but only those who come in the Name of the Lord. Peace is not worth sacrificing the faith for the sake of quietude. The absence of conflict is not peace. Peace is much deeper and much more abiding than that.

However, sometimes peace requires the sword first. The Old Testament abounds with examples of the Lord's people routing their enemies at the tip of the sword. David did not make friends with Goliath – he slung a rock into his head! Elijah had 450 prophets of Baal slain for leading the people in idol worship. And the list goes on and on. True, deep, lasting peace is the setting right of what has gone awry. Not simply a glossing-over or burying of the problem. No quick fix and simple band-aid will create peace.

Ultimately, the cost of peace is death. Evil must be stopped, and those who do evil must be put to an end. There is no forgiveness of sins without the shedding of blood, and there is no peace without the forgiveness of sins. Therefore, someone had to die. But no mere man would suffice. Each of us could die for our own sins, but that would only lead the dead into condemnation and leave the living still without an entrance into salvation.

However, in the infinite grace and mercy of God, He chose the one solution that would allow for the salvation of all mankind, for those who would believe. Foreknown before the foundation of the world, coming in the fullness of time, Jesus Christ was born a man under the Law, so that He might fulfill the requirements of the Law. Jesus endured the sword so that you might escape it. The scorn of sin, the pain of death, the defeat of the cross – all this He endured willingly for you. This He did, that your sins might be forgiven and your peace with God and man be restored. This was the cost of peace, that the Son of God die in your place.

And yet He rose again, breaking free of the bonds of sin and death, and He appeared in the flesh. He came to His own, that you might know that this peace is enacted, that your forgiveness is secure. His blood has washed away the false gods and all their evil productions. The scorn, the pain, the guilt are all gone. Peace once more with God is made.

Our Lord Jesus Christ endured the violence of the cross to secure your peace. Therefore, it has been won. You have been broken by the Law, but the Law has not crushed you. With His stripes you are healed. The Lord says, “And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26). He has removed the old sinful, hardened heart from you and has given you the heart of flesh that beats with the life of Christ. He has put His Spirit within you, and He gives you peace.

The cost of peace is very high. It requires everything that you are and everything you have. It required the death and life of the Son of God. But that peace is yours in Christ. Forfeit your mother and father. Forget your possessions and reputation. Forsake the false gods of your heart of stone. Take up your cross and follow the One who endured the sword to bring you the peace that endures.

The peace that passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord unto life everlasting. Amen.