A cliché beauty contestant response to questioning about personal goals is the assertion of “world peace.” This unrealistic ambition inspired a bumper sticker, “Imagine Swirled Peas.” Are these the only options for peace-seeking, the impossible global objective or the ridiculous vegetable one?
Note: This image was created using Microsoft Copilot.
We have just started a new year, and with it, our hearts and minds are filled with new hope. For me, I want the fresh year to be one of greater peace. The outgoing year was full of many challenges that all too often pushed peace out of my inner being. Much of the year I felt like I was fighting – to get urgent matters finished, to resolve unsettled issues in relationships, or to find the energy to fulfill responsibilities. With all this fighting, a sense of peace has been elusive. What do I want for the new year? I want more peace.
But what is peace? If Tolstoy in his famous treatise is correct, peace is the opposite of war. Wars cease when peace treaties are signed. Peace is an absence of conflict, a condition of tranquility. A nation at peace is not engaging actively in war-making efforts. Peace of mind exists when the battleground of the mind is in a ceasefire. Calm is pervasive and tensions are absent.
Defining peace as the absence of war or conflict is unsatisfying. Isn’t peace something more, the presence of a condition that is better than just a lack of tension? The announcement from the angels to the shepherds in Bethlehem at the birth of Jesus began with “Peace on earth.” Was this just a proclamation for battles to cease?
A song has been playing in my mind the past week, “Let there be peace on earth.” I linked a lovely YouTube version sung partly by Vince Gill and the second time through by a young girl. The call for peace in these lyrics involve a pledge for peace to “begin with me.” Yes, I would like that, for peace to begin with me, but how?
James wrote about conflict between people and attributed it to the battle within people. In the Berean Standard Bible translation, chapter 4 verse 1, James said, “What causes conflicts and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from the passions at war within you?” To James, the battles between us emerge from the battles inside us. Logically, peace within people would be the remedy for a lack of peace in the world.
And there we are again, peace begins with me, peace begins with you. I can’t fix the passions at war within you; can I fix the battles in me?
How do wars end?
Someone surrenders. Hopefully it’s the “good guys” who get the “bad guys” to agree to stop fighting.
For the passions at war inside of me, where does surrender lead to peace?
The Bethlehem angels announced “peace on earth” because the Prince of Peace had arrived (see Isaiah 9:6). After His resurrection from the dead, Jesus visited the disciples and declared “Peace be with you!” (see John chapter 20, verses 21 and 26). This “shalom” peace was a blessing of restored relationship between God and people. It is a gift; we only need to stop rejecting it.
To have this type of peace, a peace that surpasses our ability to understand it, requires surrender (see Philippians 4:7). Our surrendered, rebellious will needs to be submitted to God’s perfect, loving will. In what is known as The Lord’s Prayer, Jesus included this phrase “Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (see Matthew 6:10). Here, Jesus, the Prince of Peace, provided a prayer of surrender for people struggling with wars within them. People like me. And you.
In the new year let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me. Wars and conflicts will continue around us, in the swirled peas of the mess people make. But I can surrender to the Prince of Peace, accepting His will in place of mine. May peace begin with me. May peace also be with you.
Dear Lord, thank You for being the Prince of Peace. I surrender my rebellious, selfish will to Your perfect, loving will. May your kingdom of love come to us on earth; may Your superior will be done among and through us here on earth. Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with a more surrendered me. Amen.
