Peace Has Come

My favorite Christmas song is “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day.” I know, that’s not normal. The meaning behind the song adds to the power of it for me. It wasn’t written during a peaceful time. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote it in the middle of personal tragedy and national turmoil.

Two years earlier, his wife died in a fire in their home. When her dress caught fire, he tried to smother the fire with his own hands and body. He was badly burned on his face. The scars didn’t go away, so he grew a beard to cover them. About the same time, the Civil War was ripping the nation apart, and then he received word that his oldest son had been shot and might be paralyzed.

That Christmas morning, he heard church bells ringing outside. People were singing about peace on earth, but everything in his world was chaos. And he wrote, “There is no peace on earth, I said.” He was saying out loud what many of us have felt. It’s possible to sit through a season filled with talk of peace and still feel a lack of peace in your heart. One phone call can break the peace. One diagnosis. One conflict. One memory.

And yet, in the middle of his grief, he remembered that God hadn’t disappeared. And this is why it’s my favorite Christmas song. As the bells kept ringing, it brought him hope. He wrote, “And pealed the bells more loud and deep; God is not dead nor doth He sleep.” Peace, he realized, doesn’t come from his circumstances improving. It comes from God acting to make things right.

That’s what Advent is announcing. Advent tells us real peace has entered the world because Jesus came. Peace rooted in God’s commitment to restore what sin destroyed. Peace that begins now and will one day be complete. Biblical peace isn’t about being emotionally calm or having your circumstances easy. Biblical peace is the resolution of hostility and the restoration of relationship. It's the kind of peace the Bible describes as shalom, which is real wholeness. It’s when your whole life is rightly aligned with God. Think about it. If peace is nothing more than an emotion, it can go away in an instant. But when it's foundation is in your reconciliation with God, it’s constant even on days that feels chaotic. Peace has come because our greatest conflict has been resolved by Christ.

Peace begins with God’s glory, not human comfort.

When the angels appear in the fields outside Bethlehem, Luke records their message with careful attention. He doesn’t paraphrase it. He quotes it to us exactly as it was spoken. The multitude of angels say, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” (Luke 2:14).

That order matters. God’s glory comes first. Peace follows. Peace doesn’t begin with humanity getting its life together. Peace begins with God acting for His own glory. Shalom flows out of who God is and what God does, not out of what we do.

This should challenge how we instinctively think about peace. We often think peace should start with us. If God would just fix what makes us uncomfortable, if He would remove the stress, the conflict, the uncertainty, then we could finally have peace. But the angels announce peace as something that flows from God being glorified through His saving work. In Scripture, shalom always moves downward from God to humanity, never upward from humanity to God.

The phrase “among those with whom he is pleased” tells us something important. Biblical peace isn’t universal peace. It’s covenant peace. Relational peace. Peace that comes from reconciliation with God. But there’s a problem.

Peace assumes conflict. You wouldn't bother declaring peace if there wasn't some kind of war going on first. The Bible spells it out plainly. We're not naturally on good terms with God. There's real hostility there, and it’s from our side. Romans 5:10 tells us, “we were enemies” before reconciliation. Isaiah 48:22 says, “there is no peace…for the wicked.” Our deepest problem is not anxiety or depression (lack of peace). It is alienation from God (true lack of peace). The absence of shalom always begins with broken fellowship with God.

From the beginning of Scripture, sin creates separation. Adam and Eve hide. Israel goes into exile. Humanity is estranged from God and from one another. The lack of peace we feel in the world is the direct fruit of broken relationship with God. When shalom is fractured vertically, it always collapses horizontally.

Peace only truly comes when God’s glory is upheld and sin is dealt with. That’s why Christmas cannot be separated from the cross. The manger points forward to Calvary. The glory announced by angels is most fully displayed when Christ gives His life to make peace. The restoration of shalom requires sacrifice.

Paul says in Colossians 1:20 that God makes peace “by the blood of his cross.” That’s where glory and peace meet. God is glorified in saving sinners, and sinners are brought into peace with God. Peace is purchased at great cost. Think about the difference between a ceasefire and an actual peace treaty. A ceasefire just hits pause on the shooting. It stops the immediate violence for a while. But a peace treaty ends the war for good by settling the underlying issues. True peace demands that the conditions are fully met, that the demands are satisfied. And that's exactly what Christ does. He meets every single term on our behalf, the ones we could never fulfill ourselves.

You might say, "Wait, I'm no enemy of God. I'm just staying neutral, not really caring one way or the other." But brushing off the One who's giving you every single breath? That's rebellion in disguise. It feels nicer and less confrontational, sure, but it still means the true King isn't ruling your life. Friend, bow your knee to the King of kings and make Him Lord of your life today.

Peace is the announcement that God Himself has acted to end exile and hostility.

Isaiah 52 speaks into the darkness of Israel’s history. The people are led into Babylonian captivity because of their sin. They have been removed from the land God promised them. The covenant relationship appears fractured, if not broken altogether. Exile in Scripture is the loss of shalom, life outside the place of God’s presence and blessing.

Into that lack of peace Isaiah declares, in Isaiah 52:7-10,

7 How beautiful upon the mountains
    are the feet of him who brings good news,
who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness,
    who publishes salvation,
    who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”
8 The voice of your watchmen—they lift up their voice;
    together they sing for joy;
for eye to eye they see
    the return of the Lord to Zion.
9 Break forth together into singing,
    you waste places of Jerusalem,
for the Lord has comforted his people;
    he has redeemed Jerusalem.
10 The Lord has bared his holy arm
    before the eyes of all the nations,
and all the ends of the earth shall see
    the salvation of our God.

The beauty isn’t in the messenger’s appearance. It’s in the message he carries. Peace is news. Peace is announced. The people aren’t told to work themselves into peace. They are told that peace has come because God has acted. Shalom is proclaimed to them before it is fully experienced by them.

At the heart of the passage are the words, “Your God reigns.” Peace flows from God’s kingship. God hasn’t abdicated His throne. He hasn’t forgotten His promises. He hasn’t been defeated by Israel’s sin or their enemy’s power. The God Almighty reigns. And where God reigns, shalom endures.

This passage looks forward to the gospel. Paul later echoes this language when he speaks of preaching good news and peace through Jesus Christ (Rom 10:15). The angels in Luke 2 are continuing Isaiah’s announcement. Peace has arrived because God reigns and salvation is unfolding. The birth of Jesus is the beginning of shalom’s return.

Peace doesn't always show up as a feeling first. It often comes as a promise long before we actually experience it. Think about Israel. They were still going to rebuild everything from scratch. Hardship wasn't going away anytime soon. Jesus wouldn't arrive for another seven hundred years. Yet redemption was already certain. Shalom wasn't gone. It was just not fully here yet.

Peace in Christ is secure even while trouble remains in the world.

Jesus said, in John 16:33, “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace.” He speaks these words on the night before the cross. Judas has already left. Jesus has told the disciples that one of them will betray Him, that Peter will deny Him, and that all of them will scatter. Everything feels unstable. Into that moment Jesus says, “in me you may have peace.”

Notice where peace is located. Not in outcomes. Not in explanations. Not in circumstances. Not in feelings. Peace is found “in me.” in Jesus. It is objective. It is in who Christ is and what He has done. Shalom isn’t found by escaping the trials of life. It’s found by abiding in Christ.

Then Jesus says something sobering. Something we don’t like or want. “In the world you will have tribulation.” Trouble is expected. Following Jesus doesn’t exempt anyone from pain. Shalom doesn’t deny the brokenness that still remains in the world. But then comes the turning point. Jesus says, “But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

Jesus talks about His victory before He ever heads to the cross. And grammatically, He uses the perfect tense, like it's already done, already finished. The win is locked in. From the outside, the cross looks like total defeat, but that's exactly where the real triumph happens. Sin gets crushed. Death loses its sting. And true peace pours out from that victory. It's built entirely on what Christ has already accomplished.

That's why, for Christians, peace can sit right alongside grief. It can coexist with tears streaming down your face or a pile of questions that still have no answers. Peace isn't about pretending everything's fine or ignoring the hard stuff. That’s part of living in the already and the not-yet. We know the not-yet is coming and is certain. And in that, there is peace now for us.

Peace will one day be complete because God finishes what He begins.

Isaiah says, in 52:10, “The Lord has bared his holy arm before the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.” This is a promise about where history is going. This is shalom on a cosmic scale.

The Bible never pretends that believers escape the brokenness of this world. We still experience loss. We still battle sin. We still feel the ache of death and disappointment. The presence of peace with God doesn’t erase the presence of pain in the world. But it does change its meaning. Pain isn’t proof that peace is gone, but evidence that it is still being restored.

Isaiah helps us see that peace isn’t just something we feel. It’s something God is building toward. The salvation that began in Bethlehem will one day be seen by all the ends of the earth. Every rival power will be put down. Every false peace will be exposed. Every enemy of God will be defeated.

Isaiah later calls the Messiah the Prince of Peace, and he says that of the increase of His government and of peace there will be no end (Is. 9:6). That means His peace will be forever advancing. Revelation 21 shows us that end. Peace forever. Resolution of hostility and restoration of relationship forever. Shalom restored forever. The dwelling place of God with man. No more death. No more mourning. No more crying. No more pain. Not because God ignores suffering, but because He removes its cause. Sin is finally dealt with. Death is finally destroyed. The curse is broken and shalom is restored.

That future certainty gives us strength right now no matter what we go through. We can keep going forward, even if all we can do is crawl. It’s because God never quits halfway. The same God who sent His Son the first time in humility will send Him again in glory and power to complete the peace He's already made sure of.

If you are in Christ, rest in that peace. Your greatest conflict has been resolved. God is no longer against you. You are forgiven. You belong to Him.

If you're outside of Christ right now, genuine peace with God—deep and lasting—is being offered to you today. Turn away from running things your own way. Trust the King who died and rose. Let Him bring you to right relationship with God, restoring the peace you can never earn.

Friend, perhaps you came in here today just drained, swearing you'd never step into another church after all that's happened. Please hear me: Jesus sees you. He gets why sleep won't come some nights. His nail scarred hands are open wide. Take the peace He's holding out to you.

This weary world longs for peace. Christmas tells us where it is found: in Jesus Christ, the One who ends the war and restores what was broken. “Then peeled the bells more loud and deep; God is not dead nor does He sleep.”