Peace on earth and goodwill to all people?

Christmas is traditionally a time where many people around the world celebrate the promise of peace associated with the coming of Messiah, who carries the additional title of Prince of Peace. Even in the midst of the terrible battles of World War 1, somewhere deep in the soldiers’ being was the sense that Christmas Day was a day for peace. On the 25th December 1914, British and German soldiers at the front ended up exchanging gifts and souvenirs, taking photos, singing songs and even playing a game of football together!

We all long for peace. As people of faith, Jesus promised peace many times, from verses such as John 14:27, “My peace I give to you, my peace I leave with you”, or Galatians 5:22, reminding us that peace is a quintessential part of the fruit of the Spirit. However, with all that is going on in the world, many of us struggle to find peace. If Jesus promised it for us, why do we seem to lose it so easily? And how do we have peace in the light of all that is not right?

A few days ago we returned from a quick trip to Uganda. Only short weeks out from Christmas, not to mention on the tail of the global upheaval caused by a tiny microorganism, travelling nearly halfway around the globe we had a plethora of opportunities to experience a lack of peace. From uncertainty about our first time out of the country in more than three years, where so much had changed, to the issue of whether our luggage would arrive with us, to finding ways to rest on a thirty plus hour journey; from food challenges and finding “places of convenience” (not to mention the level of confrontation we might find there, because, lets face it, sometimes PPE, a mask and gumboots are looking like serious options when travelling in developing countries!), to the threat of malaria weighed in with the side effects of antimalarials, not to mention driving in some very adverse conditions - so many cracks and crevices for our peace to leak out through.

Early on in our trip, I became aware of some background anxiety and pre-planning going on in my head about how I would manage such pre-empted issues around each upcoming day. I had a sudden realisation that I was trying to deal with this in my own strength and that I didn’t need to. I remembered that I could leave these things with my Heavenly Father, and that He would sort it all out for me. As I did that, I found that sometimes the situation would be well above my expectations, or that He had gone ahead and would provide the right opportunities or answers where I needed them.

A great example of the way God went ahead of us came very early on with our car hire. Five years ago, we had hired a Rav4 through a small company (there are no large car hire companies in Uganda), which was great, so we contacted them again. The day we arrived, the gentleman meeting us with the car apologised. The Rav4 had had “issues” that morning, so they had upgraded us for no extra cost to a Prado with eight seats, which had also been lifted to have greater clearance. This car proved invaluable so many times on our trip, from driving through boggy goat trails to a village, to being able to take quite a few others with us numerous times, to just our general comfort on some longer trips on often quite bad roads. And of course, functioning air conditioning was an absolute blessing, especially in the notorious Kampala traffic.

The added blessing of this vehicle was such a definite message from God that He was with us, that He knew all our needs (and even cared about our “would likes”). In acknowledging this was from God, it further expanded our faith, and hence, our peace. “Dad’s here, He’s got it all sorted ahead of time, just go for the ride with Him.”

Over the past couple of years, many of us have had ample opportunity to have our cracks and crevices where peace can leak out exposed – those places in our being where we are far more focussed on doing than be-ing, those areas where situations in the past have hurt and disappointed us and we are sure that this will be another, or even where fear still has a stronghold in our lives. In my journey through this season, when I have found myself short on peace God has been reminding me to go back to the place where I lost my peace. It is usually easy to pinpoint the moment. And so, I go back there and maybe forgive the person whose behaviour or words created the crack for my peace to leak out, or break my agreements with the fear that came from some source or other I had interacted with and sent it all back where it came from, in Jesus’ name. And wonderfully, my peace returns to me.

If you are in a place this Christmas where peace seems hard to find, let me encourage you that in Creator God, the source of all peace, there is an endless supply. Meet with Him today. Ask Him where you left your peace and who you need to forgive and/or what agreements you need to break. And may this season be one in which your peace deepens immeasurably and expands out to those around you.

A quiet space to connect with God

This podcast uses and expands on an activity from the book “Experiencing the Depths of Jesus Christ”, by Jeanne Guyon, written around 1685. Perhaps not surprisingly, it is still just as relevant today. As you listen, I pray that your connection with your loving Father will deepen and continue to transform you, for His glory.

Please feel free to share about your encounters in the comments section to encourage others.

(Around 17 minutes)

Backing music by David Lastra, Surrender

The roadmap to freedom in the middle of lockdown.

Getting the news a week or so back that we would continue in intense lockdown for at least another two weeks sent me into something of a tailspin. Perhaps, like many, I’d been holding on to the belief that we would be able to at least lift some of the restrictions. But no. The hopelessness, powerlessness and despair I was feeling about our circumstances was threatening to overwhelm me.

Seeking the Lord for a way out of this emotional space, one that I could engage with, I found Him challenging me anew from an unexpected direction.

The answer was in forgiveness.

Forgiving someone I have no relationship with, no personal ability to impact (at least humanly speaking) but who had a great deal of power over me and my life was a whole new level for me, but I knew it was the answer for my true freedom. And even as I was struggling with this challenge and my lack of desire to forgive, I had a vision.

Jesus, face filled with joy and perhaps some amusement, pointed to something I was clutching in my hand, holding tight to myself. It was like He was giving me a playful poke: “what’s that you’re holding?” Looking at what He was showing me, I saw a black sticky ball of muck. Straight away, I knew what it was. Bitterness. Anger. Resentment. Frustration. The question was obvious. “Do you want to hold on to all that muck?”

No!

I am well aware that forgiveness is often not easy. However,

If we refuse to release our anger, our bitterness, our hatred, our resentment, I would suggest forgiveness is impossible.

In fact, the picture I had would suggest lots of things are pretty difficult to do when we are clutching a bundle of blackness to ourselves, not to mention the way it contaminates everything we touch.

As I observe many interactions on social media filled with vitriol, anger, belittling and other negative output toward people who have different opinions on either side of what has become the “great divide” of beliefs about pretty much everything these days, I see that

forgiveness is vital to the way ahead.

But it is not easy.

In my own involvement in a reasonably low-level disagreement, I realised the exceptional power of the drive to justify and defend ourselves. To step back and not respond, and especially to choose not to escalate, is tough, especially when others respond with emotive and irrational accusations.

In my own reflections about how to forgive someone I believe to be in the wrong, I heard Jesus’ words echo down through the ages:

“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do”.

Jesus underwent arguably the most unjustified conviction, punishment and painful death, and yet, in the midst of it, He could forgive the perpetrators. How?

Lately, I have found myself reflecting on the idea of Creator God being the Righteous Judge. Too often, it seems we use this to claim His favour toward us, that He will back “me”, because I am in the right. We take our own beliefs, (generally well justified, even if only by ourselves and our support crew), about who or what is good or evil, right or wrong, and overlay them on “God the Judge” to prove that “I am right and you are wrong”.

A major problem with this is that I don’t see the line between good and evil are so much of God’s focus. I think the view He takes in His judgement, the main trajectory of His desire, is much more regarding whether our actions and beliefs lead to life, or lead us to death.

It reminds me of the situation of Joshua at Jericho (Joshua 5:13), where Joshua encounters the angel of the Lord and asks whose side the angel is on. The angel’s response: “No”. In other words, he was not on one side or the other. An article I read recently as I was looking deeper into the concept of “Yahweh Sabaoth” as the Lord of Hosts, suggested similarly to this:

God is not about being on my side or your side, but about fulfilling His plans.

Perhaps it is we who are either on His side or not and perhaps it is time we took ourselves off centre stage and put Him back on! (But that is for another discussion…)

Coming back to forgiveness, I am realising our difficulty with forgiving lies in our judgement. “But Lord, they are wrong and I have been wronged! I won’t let them get away with it! Can’t I at least justify myself, prove to them that I am right and they are wrong?” I see Him with His finger on the big red buzzer. BZZZZTT! Wrong answer!

Forgiveness means I have to lay down my right and desire for personal justice, for personal vindication and exoneration. Sometimes God may grant these to us. Often (in my experience), He doesn’t, at least not in the overt way we might like. In the end, we have to lay all this desire down and allow God to be Judge. Only He knows all the details, all the heart motivations, not to mention the future and how it all ties into His plans, so only He can judge perfectly.

While we hold on to our own judgements about situations and people, we effectively “throw a spanner in the works”, at the very least in our personal journey and connection into His plans. If we want to see His perfect judgement at work, we need to lay down our own judgement (remembering that it will be by the same standards we will be judged – see Matt 7:1,2), which means forgiving:

“Not mine to punish, Lord, not mine to convict, not mine to determine the outcome and direction. I TRUST YOU to be the Righteous Judge and bring about Your judgements and outcomes in Your timing to maximise LIFE and because it will bring about Your purposes, just at the right time.”

The real kicker is, though, this is not something we can simply give intellectual assent to and move on. Unless we do the actual work of forgiveness, speaking it out, we will remain stuck. It can be tough, it can take time, and it can be a very real battle with our emotions - often it is an act of our will well before our emotions come along with us. To be the true Body of Christ, to be His pure Bride, though, we must shift out of the mentality of division and breaking unity, of holding on to our need or desire to be right over relationship, or we will not be able to partake in all that He has for us. But more on that soon!

(And if this is something that you struggle with in how to process it all, or just want someone to walk the journey of forgiveness with, please don’t hesitate to contact me. It would be my privilege to walk with you on this.)