Friday, December 19, 2014

We Can Have Peace in Our Relationships


Jesus Christ can us move us from division to community.

People find it hard to live in harmony & peace with one another. We fight and we bicker. We criticize and tear each other down. Our courts are filled with people who can't get along. We encounter strife at work, at home and, even, at church. We compete for position, for attention, and for material gain. It was not long before Adam and Eve turned on each other. Jealousy drove Cain to kill his brother and drove Joseph's brothers to sell him into slavery. Lust drove David to take the wife of one of his mighty men. And so it goes.

In the New Testament we read repeatedly of enmity between the Jews and non-Jews. Ethnic and racial strife is as old as the Tower of Babel and is as fresh as the morning news.

There is good news. God has sent us the Prince of Peace. “Jesus himself is our peace, who has made the two one [Jews and non-Jews] and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility” (Ephesians 2:14).

The Bible teaches, “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28).

In a world filled with strife the church must be an oasis of peace. We should both examples and agents of reconciliation. After all, we are carrying out His ministry of reconciliation as His ambassadors.


Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts,
since as members of one body you were called to peace.
Colossians 3:15




 


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