SHALOM.

What is peace? As I have gotten older, this has been a question the Lord has invited me to wrestle with.

Growing up, avoiding conflict seemed to be all that peace meant to me, or, maybe better put, peace was the absence of conflict, of fighting, and of violence. Peace was when it looked like everyone was getting along. Peace was when everyone was calm or had a smile on their face, whether that be genuine or not. As I have gotten older though, I have grown to understand through prayer that peace is so much more than this superficial idea. 

Peace is not merely pacifying.

Peace is not pretending like everything is okay when it is not. 

Peace is not sweeping things under the rug in order for the exterior to appear conflict free. 

If these things are not peace, then what is it? 

From my experiences, peace is both a gift and something that is worked towards. God can certainly give us His peace in the midst of life’s various trials, but he also calls us to make peace. For in the Sermon on the Mount He says, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God” (Matthew 5:9).

Peacemaking is not peace keeping. If we look at the Hebrew word for peace, we can learn that peace is so much more than just the absence of conflict, fighting, and of violence. 

Shalom - Peace - a Hebrew word used commonly in greetings within the Jewish community. Shalom is described as “completeness, soundness, and welfare” (etymonline)

Completeness, soundness, and welfare are absent in just keeping the peace. Peacemaking, on the other hand, includes putting in the work, by having the hard conversations, fearlessly entering into the brokenness and knowing that is exactly where God can be found, too. Wholeness and welfare are found in healing. They are found in letting God put the pieces back together, not in purposelessly allowing them to be broken and abused over and over again.

Where is the Lord calling you to make peace, to find shalom?

WRITTEN BY:

Alexis Graf