As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace to you!”

 The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Lk 24:36.

There are barriers to enter into the Peace that Jesus Himself wants us to come into. This peace we are going to discover is a demarcation line between one world view and another. It is not just the feel good factor, or the absence of trouble.

It is interesting that as they had arrived with new hope in their new “We have seen the Lord” an experience reserved for us on this journey, the purpose of this journey is not to see our ministry, our Church, but to see the Lord! Right there as they related to the other disciples Jesus comes into their midst. A promise to us now, speaking of our discoveries in the Word, in prayer, that Jesus Himself comes into our midst! As we are living in a time of political change, the social ills spoken about, setting the record straight, debates, the journey sets us up to a new reality.

As Jesus appears, His words are curious: Peace be unto you.

What I desire to convey with the help of the Holy Spirit that Peace that Jesus is declaring is not an end in itself. It is a doorway to a different reality, distinct to the world, distinct to the political, national movements, religions, faiths, churches.

Jesus is declared the Prince of Peace, which means His Father is the King of Peace! This means that as Jesus conveys in John 16 all things have been conferred to the Son, so His greeting is bringing them from beholding to being. This journey has been with one objective, beholding. Now we are transitioning from beholding to being. The first manifestation is coming into the realm of peace. Not by chance that Jerusalem, or Jeru-shalom, the city of peace. Yet with Jesus in its centre, peace has a different setting and its connection with eternity. Just as Jerusalem is replaced with a heavenly counterpart after Jesus descends again to promote a millenial Kingdom, in preparation for an eternal city, so we are in a place of transitioning into the realm of Kingdom in the same way and preparing for our eternal state in the same way.

The doorway is bestowed to us by Jesus. He is preparing us to live not just in peace, but in faith and hope, as we shall see in the final instalment in this series, and this publication, Kingdom is the final preparation in this journey that connects us to Pentecost. The spiritual life says the Apostle Paul, is from faith to faith and glory to glory. This means we are ever in a transition, in contrast to the idea of evolving, we are not evolving into anything different but we are transitioning and transformation into the image of Jesus Himself. Peace is the doorway to this.

This means our ministry, vocation is not taken up with the ethics and politics of local Church, only, but it is driven by a passion to communicate Jesus. Not communicate just by words, but the glory comes through the Word. As we see for the disciples here in Luke 24 it is a turning point in their journey.

Our true peace only comes by beholding Him. The whole journey from brokeness in which we left Jerusalem, put our foot forward toward our Emmaus, in which the Word has been opened to us in our grief, in which we came to the Table, to covenant, then to the Bread which we partook of Him, interacting intimately with Him.

In this moment we beheld Him in all His Glory and said “You are the Lord!”

Peace positions us to take on a new worldview, that contrasts to the contractions of the fallen world in waiting for redemption. We are the first fruits of that redemption. We are being transitioned from beholding to being, so the programme of world redemption can go forward. The new worldview as Jesus sees it, does not trust in untrustworthy people, does not promise what cannot be fulfilled. It resides upon the full complete work of Calvary, which culminates in the Glorification of Jesus Himself.

This peace comes from this work and comes from the authority and person of the Son of God, son of man, Son of David. It positions us as ambassadors of a Kingdom to come where inequality is replaced by equity, injustice is replaced with Righteousness and Justice, two pillars of that Throne in the picture above.

May we come into this understanding of His Peace this day, as He proclaims this over us, He is proclaiming a great transitioning from our Beholding Him to Being in Him.

Maranatha!