Advent is a time of living on tip-toes! We eagerly anticipate a new world coming, a world of peace.
The message of the angels at the birth of Jesus was for peace on earth (Luke 2:14), a vision that can be fulfilled only by the action of God. No political or personal efforts of our own can bring the peace which comes to the world and to us from God, in Jesus Christ. Today, let us receive the peace of God in Jesus Christ! We need forgiveness for our sin; and in Jesus Christ, we receive peace and reconciliation by his death on the cross (Col. 1:20). As John Calvin said, “We cannot be joined to God otherwise than through Him.” Only through Christ can there be peace in the human heart—and among all human hearts with each other: nation to nation, people to people. Advent Peace is the message our world needs beyond all else!
The Advent message of personal peace that comes through Christ is what we need as well. When his disciples were afraid of sinking in their boat, Jesus calmed the turbulent waves by saying, “Peace! Be still!” (Mark 4:39). No matter what our situation or our heartache, “God pours the Golden Oil of Peace into Broken Hearts,” said the Puritan Thomas Watson. The “oil of peace” comes to us in Jesus Christ, God’s Son. Christ is our peace (Eph. 2:14). He is the “peace which passes all understanding” (Phil. 4:7). For Jesus Christ is “God with us” (Matt. 1:23)!
Let Advent be a time of peace for you. Confess your sins and receive forgiveness in God’s promised Savior, Jesus Christ. Let the peace of Christ dwell in you (Col. 3:15) so you find in all the tough and troubling and sad times of life—that God’s peace in Jesus Christ is with you! Rejoice with the angels: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace” (Luke 2:14).
Calvin, Commentary on Colossians 1:20. (Calvin’s New Testament Commentaries, p. 311).
Thomas Watson, A Body of Practical Divinity (London, 1692), 209.