What is Biblical peace? It is that state wherein man is reconciled to God via the gospel message of the Lord Jesus Christ; it is the agent of peace.
Please consider the following scriptures about this: 2Co 5:17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! 2Co 5:18 And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to Himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to Him. 2Co 5:19 For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And He gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. 2Co 5:20 So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making His appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” 2Co 5:21 For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ. Eph 2:14 For Christ Himself has brought peace to us. He united Jews and Gentiles into one people when, in His own body on the cross, He broke down the wall of hostility that separated us. Col 1:20 and through Him God reconciled everything to Himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ’s blood on the cross.
In other words, after God gave us the gift of new life through His Son, we being then converted, having received a new heart, afterwards, we became capable of peacemaking, reconciling people to God via the gospel message of Christ crucified.
Those who have not received a new heart, those who have not been born again, cannot make peace of any kind. A man certainly cannot initiate and establish peace between himself and God; nor can he with man.
Regarding all of men’s failed efforts to establish peace in the earth, their errors become obvious by using the metaphor from the Beatitude 5 post wherein the topic of changing behavior was discussed in terms of roots and fruit. In the above scriptural examples, via conversion God changed the root–man’s wicked heart; afterwards, good fruit could be borne by him. But natural man always focuses on changing fruit (only God can change hearts); therefore, the hearts of those natural men involved in attempting to make peace are left unchanged: good fruit is not possible from a bad root; hence, peace is never achieved. If you look at any attempt by natural men (those not born again) to establish peace, you will see that they are focused on fruit (behavior) alone.
Consider: Mat 12:35 A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. Jer 17:9 “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is? (Using the TSK dictionary from e-sword, the following scriptures state what Jer: 17:9 does: Jer_16:12; Gen_6:5, Gen_8:21; Job_15:14-16; Psa_51:5, Psa_53:1-3; Pro_28:26; Ecc_9:3; Mat_15:19; Mar_7:21-22; Heb_3:12; Jam_1:14-15.)
What is required in peacemaking? Dr. MacArthur noted that two kinds of error must be confronted: personal sin and doctrinal error. In doing that, one must not compromise Biblical truth, and issues must be dealt with directly and honestly. Peace can occur when all involved accept the pure (unmixed, as in pure gold not mixed with alloy) truth of scripture. That never occurs without a conflict of some kind.
Biblical peacemakers are always seen by the world as agitators, troublers, because they do not compromise Biblical truth. Furthermore, they must be direct in their interactions regarding confronting error/sin. That is, they cannot avoid dealing with known sin: turn their head and pretend not to see sin; let it resolve itself…. Those kinds of behaviors are the same as compromising. (See post 1D on self-examination, defense mechanisms.) But, it seemed that Dr. MacArthur was saying that peacemakers should not go around provoking situations everywhere they see problems, but that they live in peace until that is not possible. Praying to God for wisdom and discernment regarding which problems to address and for courage to act are indicated.
In our times, for example, the Pope and Rick Warren (and many others) have been attempting to achieve peace via ecumenism–throwing out all that divides people of different religions in an effort to unify them. The Baha’i Faith seemingly is aiming at peace and oneness via incorporating all religions; and the postmoderns, seemingly achieve peace in their relationships by saying that all is relative, that we can each have our own version of truth. And I am sure there are many others attempting to arrive at peace by focusing on similarities rather than differences; or by throwing out those things that cause division…. But God will have none of that. His Spirit is the author of the truth of scripture and that is all that is acceptable to God the Father. And His Spirit illuminates scripture and has given teachers and preachers…to Christ’s church so that the truth of scripture can be taught and believed….
Furthermore, the Bible states that we must dig for God’s truth, His Spirit gives illumination to those that do as in Proverbs 2: 1-5. (Note: as is indicated in the “mission statement” post — see categories, which states the purpose of this blog, there are many preachers in the church that were not called by God, that is clear because they are not teaching the truth of scripture. You have to abide in scripture to understand this problem. Jesus spoke of it in John 10; the same is spoken of by Ezekiel in ch. 34 –concerning the Good Shepherd who cared for His sheep.)
One last point: in my own life, since having read through the Bible, I have participated in many conversations wherein I was clarifying false ways of worship based on Biblical truth. I have been very moved to do that. Early on, I was a bit too enthusiastic and made unnecessary mistakes and closed doors by my thoughtlessness; not to mention the enemies I made. So, it seems best that we abide in God’s appointed means of grace and learn to patiently endure in our Christian walks, and trust that God will make it clear to us when we should act on those two points noted above.
Recommended studies:
Dr. John MacArthur’s series on the Beatitudes (it is free with the iphone app for “Grace To You”, under teaching series; free also for pc users at gty.org). His sermon on peacemaking is an hour long and covers all necessary related topics.
The Truth Wars, by Dr. John MacArthur.
A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23 by Phillip Keller. This is a wonderful little book that explains all the care involved in being a shepherd. By reading it, one can get an idea of all Christ does for His sheep.