Chapter 2
Peace
Our Need – Genesis 25:21–23, 27–28, 34–38, 41
“Two nations are in your womb,
and two peoples from within you will be separated;
one people will be stronger than the other,
and the older will serve the younger.”
The boys grew up, and Esau became a skillful hunter, a man of the open country, while Jacob was content to stay at home among the tents. Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob.
“Your brother came deceitfully and took your blessing.”
Esau held a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing his father had given him. He said to himself, “The days of mourning for my father are near; then I will kill my brother Jacob.”
Sibling rivalry is nothing new. All the way back to the first brothers (Cain and Abel), sibling relationships have been tense, competitive, and resentful. It’s difficult to think of any sibling relationship mentioned in Scripture that isn’t characterized by strife at some point—right down to Jesus and his half–siblings. Cain and Abel, Isaac and Ishmael, Rachel and Leah, Joseph and his brothers, David and his brothers, David’s children, Solomon’s children.
Out of them all, Jacob and Esau are arguably the poster children for sibling rivalry. Theirs started in the womb and extended through their descendants (Esau’s descendants were the Edomites; see Obadiah for their relationship to Israel). So difficult was the relationship that Rebekah was forced to inquire of the Lord what was happening in her womb.
Pregnancy, so I’m told, is a harrowing experience on a woman’s body. Kicking, moving, illness, bladder pressure. But so great was the turmoil in Rebekah’s womb that she sought the Lord about it. And while many followers of Jesus carry their pregnancies to God in prayer, this is not what Rebekah was doing when she “inquired of the Lord” (Genesis 25:22).
God told her that in her womb a conflict warred that would last generations and between people groups. The babies in her belly were already jostling for position and primacy. This was only the beginning.
Isaac’s family lived by strife, lack of compassion, and selfish maneuvering, all aided by the parents (who played with the fraternal twins). Imagine what it would have been like to have your children constantly in conflict with each other while you and your spouse were each helping one of the children. A house in conflict is an understatement. Anything but peaceful.
Swindled birthrights, stolen blessings, threats of violence fill out the story of the brothers. The family needed peace. A peace they never received—although the story of Jacob and Esau had a (semi) happy ending, with the brothers living at peace with one another. Their legacy left two nations—relatives—in conflict with each other for generations. Inherited tension and strife passed through the generations leading to entire peoples not living at peace with their relatives.
There may have been a “ceasefire” between Jacob and Esau, but it was no true peace. The past swept under the rug does not make the house clean. Livable, perhaps, but eventually the debris of tension and strife cannot be ignored or concealed by the rug.
We all experience that same strife. We long for peace in our personal relationships. We want to see peace in our world. Mothers and fathers with their children, siblings to each other, coworkers, employees, teammates, customers—so many relationships that need peace. Nations need peace in themselves and between each other. We are torn apart by selfish desires and ideologies that cling to.
We all need peace.
God’s Provision – Mark 5:1–8, 11–20
They went across the lake to the region of the Gerasenes. When Jesus got out of the boat, a man with an impure spirit came from the tombs to meet him. This man lived in the tombs, and no one could bind him anymore, not even with a chain. For he had often been chained hand and foot, but he tore the chains apart and broke the irons on his feet. No one was strong enough to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and in the hills he would cry out and cut himself with stones.
When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell on his knees in front of him. He shouted at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? In God’s name don’t torture me!” For Jesus had said to him, “Come out of this man, you impure spirit!”
Those tending the pigs ran off and reported this in the town and countryside, and the people went out to see what had happened. When they came to Jesus, they saw the man who had been possessed by the legion of demons, sitting there, dressed and in his right mind.
Prophesied as the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6), it shouldn’t surprise us that Jesus brought peace to so many he connected with. Whether it was the physical peace of healing, social peace of restoring relationships, spiritual peace with God, or emotional peace of personal acceptance and value, Jesus was truly the Prince of Peace who invited others to live under his rule.
Usually the joke is that people leave chaos in their wake. But one day, when Jesus climbed into a boat and went across the lake, he left peace in his wake.
Jesus met a man in desperate need of the peace that only Jesus could give. Internally and externally, the man was tormented. Sometimes personal demons are exactly that. Demons.
Possessed by a legion of demons that plagued him day and night, he would scream his torment and cut himself with stones as he lived among the tombs because he could not stay in society. Peace was the last word that could be associated with this pitiful man. At war with himself, at war with his own people, his was an existence of tension and strain. He would not know peace until—unless—someone else brought it to him.
Enter Jesus.
Straight into that naked, screaming demoniac’s world Jesus walked. He saw and spoke to the conflict within the man. He learned its name and ordered it to leave.
As the scene flashes away to the fleeing porcine destruction, the next time we see the man, he is “dressed and in his right mind” (Mark 5:15). So stark was the difference that the Prince of Peace had brought to this man that the fear the people had felt toward the man was transferred to Jesus. What kind of power must this man possess if with simple words he could restore the man whom chains could not bind?
Jesus had brought peace to what had seemed a hopeless situation. The man’s troubled mind was restored and ordered. His naked and distressed body was now clothed and beginning to heal—the wounds and scars a physical reminder of the peace Jesus had brought to his life.
And when this man, understandably, wants to give his life to Jesus and follow him, one last act of restoration takes place. He is sent back to his own people. Those who had tried to bind and retrain him, who feared the strength and violence his possession had allowed, would now see the great healing that had taken place in his life. Reunited with family, friends, and society. The former demoniac now embraced peace on all sides.
The peace of healing. The peace of restoration. That is the peace that Jesus brings.
You Might Also Like