Blessed are...

Prince of Peace

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.” Matthew 5:9

“How beautiful on the mountains,” sang the prophet Isaiah, “are the feet of those who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say to Zion, ‘Your God reigns!’”[1] Whether or not he knew it, Isaiah sang of Christ, the long-awaited Messiah, the Prince of Peace. Later, Isaiah wrote of the suffering and glory of the Lord’s Servant. He foresaw the One who was “despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.”[2] “He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed.”[3]

The punishment that brought us peace was borne upon Golgotha. This makes the peace of Christ, His gift to us, both immensely costly and incredibly valuable. There was nothing cheap about His peacemaking. Paul reminds us that, through Christ, God reconciled all things to Himself, “making peace through His blood, shed on the Cross.”[4] So, since peace and suffering were so intertwined in the life of our Savior, why do we think that we can have one without the other today? Until He comes again, the business of peacemaking will be costly for those who bear the name of Christ. After all, we must share in His sufferings now if we are to share in His glory hereafter.[5] But whatever our circumstances, no matter how difficult it becomes for us to be peacemakers in a violent, cynical world, we should never lose heart. We are secure in Christ. He has won us at a great price. From now on, He is our peace.[6]


Beautiful Savior,
Beyond the battlefields of a godless world You have brought me,
to the broad, fair, beautiful uplands of grace.
You have captured my heart through the incomparable riches of Your grace.
Now send me as an ambassador of Your peaceable Kingdom,
so that others may know the joy that is mine.
For Your love’s sake.
Amen.



[1] Isaiah 52:7
[2] Isaiah 53:3
[3] Isaiah 53:5
[4] Colossians 1:20
[5] Romans 8:17
[6] Ephesians 2:14