Tag Archives: John 14:27

Peace of Mind and Heart

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“Peace of Mind and Heart”

John 14:23-27 (14:27) – May 22, 2022

            The world is in powerful need of peace right now! Isn’t it? Just think of the many places in the world today, right now, where there is strife, conflict, fighting, and even outright warfare. The gift of Jesus that He speaks of here in today’s reading, peace of mind and heart, is something truly to wish for! Even, to clasp tightly to our minds and hearts!

            Here in John, chapters 14 through 17, is His Farewell Discourse. These are the last words that Jesus gave to His friends before His arrest and crucifixion. Important words, indeed!

            Even at this point, on the night before Jesus was betrayed, His disciples needed some further explanation of what Jesus was saying to them. First Peter (John 13:36), then Thomas (14:5), then Phillip (14:8), and then Judas (not Iscariot) (14:22) ask for clarification about exactly what Jesus is telling them. Jesus packs a whole lot into just a few short verses.

            I would like to highlight one particular verse: John 14:27. Jesus said, 27 “I am leaving you with a gift—peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don’t be troubled or afraid.” There is so much conflict, fighting, mass shootings, and attacks of one kind or another happening in this world right now. We need peace badly!

            David Lose, one of my favorite commentators, wants us to think more deeply about this word “peace.” I hear Jesus say this word. But why? How do we understand peace? What do we imagine Jesus means? “Too often, I think, we think of peace as simply the cessation of conflict. And clearly an end to violence is a good thing. Many of us have prayed for peace in the Middle East, [peace in the Ukraine,] peace in our community, perhaps even peace in our homes. But I think the peace Jesus offers is more than the absence of something negative.” [1]

            But, wait a minute, some people say! I know the world needs peace in the Middle East, and peace in Ukraine, and peace in lots of other places worldwide. But, what about me? What about my house, my neighborhood? I am not experiencing much peace in my personal life!

            Rev. Janet Hunt agrees just this past week that peace is regularly shattered in her neighborhood in the town of Dekalb, in the community where she lives and serves. She mourns the fact that “peace of mind, heart and body are too hard to find; so many needs, physical and otherwise, go unmet. And even if all else seems to be going well, still we struggle through our personal, sometimes private heartaches which threaten our peace, our sense of wellbeing.” [2]

            Looking at Chicago, I was just on the spot of a mass shooting on Friday, just a few blocks west of the Water Tower, off of Michigan Avenue. The police activity was still very present as they investigated that evening shooting and the aftermath. I needed to be in the area for my job, to visit a patient for the hospice I work for. Yet, I saw firsthand the very real conflict and disruption in the city center, in one of the most affluent parts of the city.

When someone reports feeling calm and “at peace,” so often people scoff, or are jealous, or disbelieve. That is, at first. Why is this? Is peace so rare or so unusual?

            I want us to go back to the Upper Room, back to the Farewell Discourse. “Think, again, of the timing of Jesus’ promise: it is the night of his betrayal, the evening when he will be handed over to those who hate him and who will take him away to be executed. And yet in that moment, he not only senses peace but gives it to others.” [3]

            Yes, Jesus knows He doesn’t live in a peaceful world, and Jesus knows very well that His personal life is going to be rocked to the core in just a few hours. Yet, Jesus tells His disciples that He gives them His peace. And, guess what? We can access that same peace! That peace which the world does not understand, that the world cannot give.

              When someone reports feeling “at peace,” that person “instead testifies to a sense of wholeness, even rightness, of and in one’s very being It’s a sense of harmony with those persons and things around us. Peace connotes a sense of contentment, but even more fulfillment, a sense that in this moment one is basking in God’s pleasure.” [4]

            Even when you and I are in the midst of hardship, struggle, even conflict or disruption, we can access Jesus and His peace! Countless believers have clung to this blessed promise, even through great difficulty, horrific tragedy, and deadly conflict. Through personal tragedies or nationwide devastation, it does not matter. Jesus still offers His peace, freely! That peace is not only to be embraced in some far distant future, but it is already ours!

            God’s promise of peace is not maybe, or perhaps, or just in case. God loves us with an everlasting love! God has already gifted us with that peace that passes all understanding. God has already laid claim to us! With that claim comes peace that is truly beyond our understanding, peace that is always ours for the receiving.

            With Rev. Janet, I can affirm that in the hardest of times, in the hugest of challenges, when my heart is most tender, God’s peace is right there for me, and for you, too. Both when faith runs deep, and when it’s hard to believe, too. And when it’s a challenge for you to have faith alone, that is what the church is for – to believe together, in community.

            Jesus said, “the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don’t be troubled or afraid.” This gift of peace is truly for us all.  Alleluia, amen!

@chaplaineliza

(Suggestion: visit me at my other blogs: matterofprayer: A Year of Everyday Prayers. #PursuePEACE – and  A Year of Being Kind . Thanks!

(Thanks to Rev. Janet Hunt and her excellent commentary on this Gospel reading for the 6th week of Easter, https://dancingwiththeword.com/when-peace-like-a-river/. I have used several ideas and quotes from this post in this sermon. And, thanks to Rev. David Lose as well. I owe much to him, from http://www.davidlose.net/2016/04/easter-6-c-peace-the-world-cannot-give/)   

[1] http://www.davidlose.net/2016/04/easter-6-c-peace-the-world-cannot-give/

[2] https://dancingwiththeword.com/when-peace-like-a-river/

[3] http://www.davidlose.net/2016/04/easter-6-c-peace-the-world-cannot-give/

[4] http://www.davidlose.net/2016/04/easter-6-c-peace-the-world-cannot-give/

An Instrument of Peace

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“An Instrument of Peace”

instrument of Your peace, round

John 14:27 – February 17, 2016

This evening, we are going to consider pursuing peace within ourselves. Tonight we consider two things: a verse and a prayer. Both have a great deal to say about peace. And both are examples for us and our daily lives.

First, the verse. Giving you some context, this verse comes from the final night our Lord Jesus spent on earth. Jesus was at a Passover dinner, or seder, with His friends. The Gospel of John gives us an extended look at this evening, and devotes several chapters to this time. Jesus discusses some things and gives His disciples some last instructions.

Now, the verse, John 14:27. “27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”

These familiar words of Jesus we’ve just read can sound far away and distant. Perhaps we remember this verse from a funeral, or quoted by a chaplain at a hospital or care center. It seems that almost every week we are surrounded by evidence of upset, catastrophe, and trauma. Many people today are searching for peace in an anxious, unpeaceful world.

Remember the political situation Jesus was operating under! Israel was an occupied country. Politically, the situation was not good. Personally, in the life of Jesus, this was not a peaceful time, either. Remember where Jesus was, here in John 14. This was the Passion Week of our Lord, hours before His arrest. Imagine what Jesus was preparing Himself to go through, in the next hours. Yet, we hear Jesus talk about peace. His peace. He wants to share His peace with all those who are listening. Amazing. Astounding. Almost inconceivable.

Suppose we catch on, and suppose a light bulb goes off in our heads, and we say to ourselves, “Maybe what I’ve been hearing in church on Sundays and in services on Wednesdays is worthwhile, after all! Maybe God really does want to give me peace. Maybe God wants me to focus on peace on the inside. Internally.”

So, some people turn around and concentrate on the inside! To be more specific, on their insides. The internal person. But there’s a danger here, too. If we’re not careful, worry and anxiety can sneak into the picture. Worry and anxiety can push away peace. Worry and anxiety can gnaw away on the insides, as well as our relationships with God and with others around us.

Has anyone here had any experience with termites? I never have, thank God, but I understand that termites can go through large amounts wood over an extended period of time. If we allow worry and anxiety to eat away at our peace with God and with others, it’s like termites eating away at a wooden front porch. After a period of time, even though the porch looks stable, and seems like it can hold weight, it collapses.

It’s the same way with us, when we lose peace. When we allow worry and anxiety to get the better of us and take control of our insides. This refers to the second part of verse 14:27, “Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.” This is Jesus giving advice to us! He is helping us hang onto the peace He’s just given us, just as He told the disciples so long ago. This is an exhortation, not a suggestion.

The second half of this meditation tonight lifts up a prayer. It is a really good prayer: arguably the most famous prayer attributed to St. Francis of Assisi. There is no direct link to St. Francis, but one of his companions, the Blessed Giles of Assisi, wrote a short synopsis of this prayer. The prayer could very well have been enlarged and written from those words.

The first line of this prayer runs as follows: “Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace.” I am assuming we all want the peace that Jesus so freely gives away. Jesus gives it away to anyone. I mean, anyone. Step right up, and Jesus will lovingly give you peace. His peace.

This wonderful prayer lets us know some of the outgrowths of the peace of Christ. For example, using God’s peace, we can sow love, pardon, faith, hope, light, and joy.

St. Francis and St. Giles knew very well that they were both imperfect people. Yet, this meaningful prayer was an expression of everything they strove to do and everything they tried to live by. We, too, are imperfect people. Anxious, fearful, sometimes even angry and sinful people. Yet, we can be instruments of God’s peace, too.

This night was the most event-filled night of our Lord Jesus’ life. He knew what was coming. Yet—He makes the statement, “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you.” He gave His disciples the gift of His peace.

Jesus gives us the same gift, today, too. His peace. It isn’t peace like the world would expect. It isn’t always external peace (although it can very well be that, too!), but it is peace on the inside. Peace where it counts, as far as Jesus is concerned. We have His word on it. He promises to give us peace in our interior selves. So that, imperfect as we all are, we can be instruments of God’s peace to our brothers and sisters, and to the world.

Amen.