SPEAKER_00: This sermon was recorded at Faith Evangelical Free Church in Grand Forks, North Dakota.
SPEAKER_01: Do any of you have that uh that one family member, or maybe it's it's two family members that comes at Thanksgiving or Christmas and you just can't wait until they leave?
SPEAKER_01: That one family member that is always the person that stirs the pot, that causes problems, that makes a peaceful gathering unpeaceful.
SPEAKER_01: Why is that?
SPEAKER_01: Why does that happen?
SPEAKER_01: Why is it that we want a Christmas, excuse me, that is full of peace?
SPEAKER_01: Why is it that we do not sometimes get that Christmas that is full of peace?
SPEAKER_01: I invite you to take your Bible with me to the book of Isaiah in chapter 9.
SPEAKER_01: So this morning we begin considering three passages of Scripture that speak about the peace of Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: This morning we're going to consider for a few moments the Prince of Peace and that passage that you are likely familiar with.
SPEAKER_01: We'll look at another familiar passage next Sunday about the Shepherd of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: And then Christmas Eve, we'll consider the coming of peace.
SPEAKER_01: That moment where you have a Christmas where it is disturbed, the peacefulness is disturbed by an argument, by a frustration, by a family member that just is out of sorts.
SPEAKER_01: It's pretty normal.
SPEAKER_01: It's pretty common.
SPEAKER_01: What is uncommon is what happened on Christmas in 1914.
SPEAKER_01: Anyone around, been around in 191, was around in 1914?
SPEAKER_01: I figured there might be one.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe two.
SPEAKER_01: No, I don't see any hands.
SPEAKER_01: 1914.
SPEAKER_01: Christmas in 1914 was unlike any other Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: It was so unusual that today it's difficult to tell which stories recount accurately what happened and which stories were attention-seeking, maybe not quite telling things as they were.
SPEAKER_01: Some details, though, are a matter of historical fact.
SPEAKER_01: Christmas in 1914, battle lines were drawn across much of Europe as the world was five months into World War I.
SPEAKER_01: Many thought that the war would be short-lived.
SPEAKER_01: Perhaps that was a small foundation for the strangeness of that Christmas season.
SPEAKER_01: A British machine gunner named Bruce Bern's father recorded his memories of that Christmas in 1914 in his published memoirs.
SPEAKER_01: As was the case with most of the infantrymen fighting in Belgium, Bairne's father spent a good deal of the Christmas season crouched in a trench three feet deep by three feet wide, mostly sleepless and fearful.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he wrote.
SPEAKER_01: Here I was in this horrible clay cavity, miles and miles from home, cold, wet through, and covered with mud.
SPEAKER_01: There didn't seem the slightest chance of leaving except in an ambulance.
SPEAKER_01: Then on Christmas Eve, on Christmas Eve in 1914, something unusual happened.
SPEAKER_01: Barron's father records that a strange sound came across the ground of no man's land between the English and German armies.
SPEAKER_01: And the English soldiers realized that the sound coming from the German front lines was the singing of Christmas carols.
SPEAKER_01: That was followed by a shout to meet in the middle of no man's land.
SPEAKER_01: And suddenly a spontaneous truce occurred in the middle of No Man's Land in Belgium on Christmas Eve of 1914.
SPEAKER_01: Opposing soldiers shared what little they had with one another.
SPEAKER_01: They helped one another.
SPEAKER_01: They partied through the night.
SPEAKER_01: There are even stories of soldiers from opposing sides working together to gather the slain and the wounded from the battlefield.
SPEAKER_01: One story even recounts a soccer game taking place in the middle of no man's land.
SPEAKER_01: Even though the truces angered commanding officers on all sides, several of these Christmas truces are said to have occurred in 1914.
SPEAKER_01: World War I would drag on for four more long years.
SPEAKER_01: And that Christmas truce never happened again.
SPEAKER_01: For a little while, for a little while there was peace on Christmas in 1914.
SPEAKER_01: But not everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: Some parts of the battle line still saw fighting.
SPEAKER_01: But there were areas of the world war where there was hope that someday there would be peace for the world.
SPEAKER_01: And as strange as this might sound to our ears, Bruce Bern's father looks back on that Christmas and he wrote, I wouldn't have missed that unique and weird Christmas for anything.
SPEAKER_01: And it lacks a key component that is integral to Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: You see, the events leading up to Christmas in 1914 in Belgium occurred because of the killing of a ruler.
SPEAKER_01: The real Christmas began with the birth of a ruler.
SPEAKER_01: Christmas in 1914 displayed an underlying international lack of peace.
SPEAKER_01: The real Christmas came about because of the reality of a universal lack of peace.
SPEAKER_01: And Christmas in 1914 contained moments of peace that quickly returned to war.
SPEAKER_01: But the real Christmas brought eternal peace.
SPEAKER_01: And to simplify those parallels, we might say that the peace of Christmas in 1914 was an illusion.
SPEAKER_01: It was an interruption in the reality of war on earth.
SPEAKER_01: But the true Christmas is not an illusion.
SPEAKER_01: You see, in the midst of their rebellion against God, God's gift to mankind provided true peace offered to all who believe in God's gift of a perfect Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: Now, as we look for a few moments at God's promise of a Prince of Peace in Isaiah 9, I want to shatter any human-shaped perceptions that we have about peace in our world, about peace in our families, even peace in ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: And I hope to shatter those human-shaped perceptions with a single reality.
SPEAKER_01: What is that reality?
SPEAKER_01: That reality is that Christmas peace is only an illusion if you don't have the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter what the context is that we're speaking of.
SPEAKER_01: If it's an individual, if it's a family, if it's a state, if it's a country, if it's a world.
SPEAKER_01: If you lack the Prince of Peace, any kind of peace that exists is only an illusion.
SPEAKER_01: The hope of Christmas can only be grasped by seeing the hopelessness without the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: We're going to see this truth first by noting the biblical anticipation of a perfect ruler, then by acknowledging the universal lack of peace to lead us to the promise of a Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: So the portion of Isaiah 9 that I want us to consider is a familiar one, beginning in verse 6.
SPEAKER_01: If you have your Bible, it'll be on the screen as well.
SPEAKER_01: Isaiah chapter 9, verse 6.
SPEAKER_01: Isaiah writes, For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't end there though, he goes on.
SPEAKER_01: On the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore.
SPEAKER_01: The zeal of Yahweh of hosts will do this.
SPEAKER_01: A prince is coming.
SPEAKER_01: And he will be a wonder of a counselor, guiding the government and the military.
SPEAKER_01: He will be all-powerful.
SPEAKER_01: He will be the mighty God who is the eternal, loving, caring Father.
SPEAKER_01: He will be a prince who will bring peace.
SPEAKER_01: And that is precisely where Israel got sidetracked.
SPEAKER_01: In this verse, they saw someone who would bring peace to Israel's borders through military might and Solomonic wisdom.
SPEAKER_01: See, they failed to grasp what we too need to understand.
SPEAKER_01: Terminating war by military victory does not bring about everlasting peace.
SPEAKER_01: A pause in the fighting, even on Christmas Eve, does not imply peace.
SPEAKER_01: Removing the invader, removing the suppressor, removing the homebreaker, removing the abuser does not usher in love and peace.
SPEAKER_01: It merely subdues the conflict for a while.
SPEAKER_01: The Jewish people have a long, have long had a well-rounded way of speaking of peace.
SPEAKER_01: In Hebrew, it's it's called shalom.
SPEAKER_01: Shalom could be used like a greeting, like saying hello to one another.
SPEAKER_01: Or shalom could be used to designate the result of a treaty that ends a years-long war, a treaty that results in peace, or in that case, the lack of fighting.
SPEAKER_01: That ought to tell us that shalom is a very broad term.
SPEAKER_01: It can be a noun that refers to a state of peacefulness, like a coexistence between two countries.
SPEAKER_01: It can be an adjective that describes the condition of peacefulness.
SPEAKER_01: If you have a restful and relaxing Christmas season with no interruptions, that's shalom.
SPEAKER_01: It can be a prayer that expresses a desire for peace.
SPEAKER_01: So you get the idea.
SPEAKER_01: It can refer to many different kinds of peace or peacefulness.
SPEAKER_01: And when we bring all of those concepts together, we get a little closer to what shalom means in the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: When this word appears in Scripture, it has the sense of wholeness or of well-being, of completeness, satisfaction, contentedness.
SPEAKER_01: Everything's okay.
SPEAKER_01: It's the opposite of being divided.
SPEAKER_01: It's the opposite of division.
SPEAKER_01: It's the opposite of covetousness.
SPEAKER_01: And when Isaiah recorded these words about a child to be born, he described this child with the name.
SPEAKER_01: Notice he will be named, he will be called Prince of Shalom.
SPEAKER_01: It might even be translated without the of, as in Prince Shalom.
SPEAKER_01: Now, for the ancient Israelite, that might have conjured up national memories of Israel's history under the rule of King David.
SPEAKER_01: You remember God promised King David that his kingdom would be established forever and ever, and he would always have a son sitting on the throne of Israel forever.
SPEAKER_01: So near the end of David's life, the people celebrated the announcement of which one of David's many sons would rule in his place.
SPEAKER_01: And it was announced that it would be Prince Sholomon, Prince Solomon, the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: That memory was appropriate.
SPEAKER_01: You remember of David's desire to build the temple.
SPEAKER_01: And God said, No, you can't build the temple because you are a man of blood.
SPEAKER_01: You've shed too much blood, you've warred too much.
SPEAKER_01: Your son, the son of peace, will build the temple.
SPEAKER_01: This was a national memory.
SPEAKER_01: It might be like going to the through the Lincoln Memorial for Americans, remembering a national time of the end of war.
SPEAKER_01: And the ushering in of a time of peace.
SPEAKER_01: So that memory is likely coming into play here.
SPEAKER_01: But this is not Solomon.
SPEAKER_01: Solomon is already dead and buried.
SPEAKER_01: This is another, a greater Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: So it describes for us the anticipation of a perfect ruler who will establish the boundaries of true peace.
SPEAKER_01: As World War I began with the death of a ruler, true peace was initiated with the birth of the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: Boundaries were important in ancient Israel.
SPEAKER_01: David expanded Israel's territorial boundaries.
SPEAKER_01: And Solomon grew them even more.
SPEAKER_01: And the more expansive the borders, the larger the area that experienced the peace brought by Solomon, that Prince of Peace who was the son of David.
SPEAKER_01: But by the time of Isaiah, those boundaries had significantly shrunk.
SPEAKER_01: And the peace of Solomon's reign was long gone.
SPEAKER_01: Now dominating war machines were far larger, and more powerful nations were constantly banging on the doors of Judah's kings.
SPEAKER_01: Israel to the north is already gone.
SPEAKER_01: Taken away by the Assyrian kings.
SPEAKER_01: So you can feel the hope within these words in verse 7 of the increase of his government and of peace.
SPEAKER_01: But the anticipation here is not only Solomonic.
SPEAKER_01: It not only brings the hope of a return of the peace that existed in Solomon's time, it says it's going to even go beyond that.
SPEAKER_01: There will be no end to his government and no end to his peace.
SPEAKER_01: So all at once, the boundaries are established in governmental terms, on one hand, this will be a prince of peace who will rule.
SPEAKER_01: He will lead a government that will last forever, and it will not be bounded by the boundaries of Palestine, for this Prince of Peace is the mighty God who has no limits.
SPEAKER_01: He's not even limited by time, for he is everlasting.
SPEAKER_01: You may be longing this Christmas for a peaceful home.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe a peaceful workplace.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you're hoping for another Christmas truce of some kind.
SPEAKER_01: Well, those things are good to hope for and to pray for.
SPEAKER_01: Do you see that you have set your sights too low if that is where you stop?
SPEAKER_01: For God has said that there is a perfect ruler who will usher in a peaceful universe.
SPEAKER_01: Not limited to Israel's borders, not limited to Israel's people, but to all creation.
SPEAKER_01: The boundaries of peace established by this child to be born are unlimited.
SPEAKER_01: And there's a part of all of us, I think, that longs for something like that.
SPEAKER_01: But there is this problem of a universal lack of peace.
SPEAKER_01: It's everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: And it's only when we grasp the reality of this universal lack of peace that we can begin to see the nature of what true peace really is.
SPEAKER_01: And we know that peace is an illusion without the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: Because everywhere we go, there's a lack of peace.
SPEAKER_01: Shalom occurs 29 times in Isaiah.
SPEAKER_01: It's quite a bit.
SPEAKER_01: Quite a bit for a book filled with war.
SPEAKER_01: Shalom occurs 29 times in Isaiah.
SPEAKER_01: The first two instances are here in chapter 9, verse 6, and chapter 9, verse 7.
SPEAKER_01: The third time we see it is in Isaiah 26, verse 3, where Isaiah says, Of God, you keep him in perfect shalom, whose mind is stayed on you.
SPEAKER_01: Because he trusts in you.
SPEAKER_01: In Isaiah 32, verse 17, we read, the effect of righteousness will be shalom.
SPEAKER_01: And the result of righteousness, quietness and trust forever.
SPEAKER_01: You see, God established this idea of shalom, of wholeness, of well-being, of peace within the act of trust in a sovereign God.
SPEAKER_01: The object of our faith is Him.
SPEAKER_01: It is the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: It is Prince Shalom.
SPEAKER_01: And peace exists within the heart of the one who trusts when we let exercise our faith in him.
SPEAKER_01: And it's not merely shalom, it's perfect shalom.
SPEAKER_01: But if we keep going in Isaiah, when we get to Isaiah 48, we realize that not everything is shalom in God's creation.
SPEAKER_01: For God said to his people in Isaiah 48, 18, Oh, that you had paid attention to my commandments.
SPEAKER_01: Did you hear that echoing in your mind from telling your children?
SPEAKER_01: Just listened.
SPEAKER_01: Then your shalom would have been like a river.
SPEAKER_01: And your righteousness like the waves of the sea.
SPEAKER_01: They had not paid attention.
SPEAKER_01: So there was no shalom.
SPEAKER_01: Just a few verses later, Isaiah would write, There is no shalom, says Yahweh, for the wicked.
SPEAKER_01: And in the context of Isaiah 48, that wickedness is not listening to God.
SPEAKER_01: It's not paying attention.
SPEAKER_01: Again in Isaiah 57, verses 20 through 21, but the wicked.
SPEAKER_01: Are like the tossing of the sea, for it cannot be quiet.
SPEAKER_01: Its waters toss up mire and dirt.
SPEAKER_01: There is no peace, Isaiah says of his God, for the wicked.
SPEAKER_01: Now that may feel, that may feel far away and long ago to our modern ears.
SPEAKER_01: So lest we misunderstand, perhaps it would be good to hear what the Apostle Paul said in the book of Romans, beginning in chapter 3, verse 9, he asks the question, what then?
SPEAKER_01: Are we Jews any better off?
SPEAKER_01: He asks of himself and his people?
SPEAKER_01: No, not at all, for we've already charged that everybody, all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin.
SPEAKER_01: For as it is written, quoting multiple passages in the Old Testament, none is righteous.
SPEAKER_01: And what did we just read?
SPEAKER_01: We just read that shalom is the result of righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: So if none is righteous, how many have that shalom?
SPEAKER_01: None.
SPEAKER_01: No, not one.
SPEAKER_01: No one understands.
SPEAKER_01: No one seeks God.
SPEAKER_01: All have turned aside.
SPEAKER_01: They've together become worthless.
SPEAKER_01: No one does good, not even one.
SPEAKER_01: Their throat is an open grave.
SPEAKER_01: They use their tongues to deceive, the venom of asps is under their lips.
SPEAKER_01: Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.
SPEAKER_01: Their feet are swift to shed blood, and their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known.
SPEAKER_01: There is no fear of God before their eyes.
SPEAKER_01: My friends, we see that the true nature of peace is not about one generation of people over another.
SPEAKER_01: It's not between nations or groups of countries, or even about the ceasing of hostilities on Christmas Eve.
SPEAKER_01: To have true peace, we first have to contend with the cause of hostility.
SPEAKER_01: That's my own heart.
SPEAKER_01: Only, only when sin is removed can there be true lasting peace.
SPEAKER_01: Because everywhere we go, there's no one who has not sinned.
SPEAKER_01: For man's sin to be removed, there must be peace between God and man.
SPEAKER_01: Man must be at peace with God, and God must be at peace with man.
SPEAKER_01: The enmity that exists between God and man, constantly butting heads must be removed.
SPEAKER_01: That is the nature of true peace.
SPEAKER_01: True peace is spiritual.
SPEAKER_01: It is the abolishing of the enmity between God and sinners, and that is precisely what Isaiah 9:6 intends to address.
SPEAKER_01: When we were dead and our trespasses and sins, having no experience of the righteousness that comes from peace, God sent a prince of peace.
SPEAKER_01: That prince of peace was promised not merely to bring national peace for Israel, but that promise of a prince to come would establish the hope of true peace.
SPEAKER_01: It's not just the ceasing of hostilities, not just a pause and the bullets flying across no man's land.
SPEAKER_01: It's not just everybody getting along for 24 hours so we can open presents and have food together.
SPEAKER_01: This is taking away the cause of hostilities so that our hearts are first right with God, so that our hearts can then be right with one another.
SPEAKER_01: It's an ultimate, a complete, and eternal peace that only the mighty God and the everlasting Father can provide.
SPEAKER_01: God Himself would be this prince, the one greater than Solomon, who would bring peace with God by paying the ultimate price to remove the cause of war.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we read in the New Testament in Romans chapter 5, therefore, being justified by faith, we have shalom with God.
SPEAKER_01: How?
SPEAKER_01: Through the Prince of Peace, the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Ephesians church in Ephesus would hear it as He Himself is our peace.
SPEAKER_01: Are you looking for some peace in your life?
SPEAKER_01: Are you seeking genuine, authentic peace?
SPEAKER_01: It's already come.
SPEAKER_01: Just receive him.
SPEAKER_01: Eternal peace is offered as a gift from the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: Place your trust in him alone.
SPEAKER_01: For when you have this child, you have true peace, no matter what your circumstances are.
SPEAKER_01: You see, it was the assassination and the death of Archduke Ferdinand that led to the First World War.
SPEAKER_01: Christmas of 1914 provided a very brief respite from the hostilities.
SPEAKER_01: But when fighting resumed, it showed the nature of mankind.
SPEAKER_01: We are ruled by sin.
SPEAKER_01: And as long as we are ruled by sin, there can be no lasting peace.
SPEAKER_01: But while the death of the heir to the Austro-Hungary Empire led to war, the death of the heir of the universe, that prince of peace, paved the way for eternal peace.
SPEAKER_01: I think Clement of Alexandria was right when he wrote around 200 AD.
SPEAKER_01: Most people have a disposition that is unstable and heedless, like the nature of storms.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we so often lack peace.
SPEAKER_01: And we have no shalom.
SPEAKER_01: But God's promise of a prince of peace is no illusion like the Christmas of 1914.
SPEAKER_01: And Gene Viet was right.
SPEAKER_01: He wrote, It should not be possible for Christians to be disillusioned.
SPEAKER_01: It should not be possible for Christians to be disillusioned, for we should have no illusions in the first place, because our faith is in Jesus Christ alone.
SPEAKER_01: For it's Jesus, the one greater than the Prince Solomon, the true Prince of Peace, who brings eternal peace through reconciliation of sinners with God.
SPEAKER_01: In a few moments we're going to celebrate together as we introduce some new members to our fellowship who have chosen to identify with us by their faith in this Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: A few moments we're going to celebrate together.
SPEAKER_01: Some individuals declare publicly to you that they have received the Prince of Peace and are now ruled by that Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: What a wonderful day to put all of this together.
SPEAKER_01: Would you pray?
SPEAKER_01: Lord Jesus, we commit ourselves to you.
SPEAKER_01: That you would rule in us, that your peace would rule, that we would be led by the Spirit who leads us to be like Christ, that we might live lives of peacefulness.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, thank you that you came, the true Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: May we be peacemakers.
SPEAKER_01: For you said, Blessed are the peacemakers.
SPEAKER_01: That means we are like you, the Prince of Peace.
SPEAKER_01: Work through us and in us this Christmas time we pray.
SPEAKER_01: In Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: That concludes this sermon from Faith Evangelical Free Church.
SPEAKER_00: Our mission is to declare the Word of God and disciple believers into mature, devoted followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: You can learn more by visiting our website at faithfree.com.