Sermon for 4 Advent 2023
Peace Sunday
St Peter’s Lutheran Church, Port Macquarie
John 16:25-33
Peace is the traditional theme of the final Sunday in Advent. It is also a major theme of the Christmas season. I looked back over sermons from previous years for this Sunday and found that I often started by noting that there seemed to be a short supply of peace in the world. Last year in was the war in the Ukraine, the year before that Myanmar was the focus of attention. And before that in the war with ISIS in Syria and Iraq, and before that it was the war in Afghanistan. This year, the focus of the world’s attention is on the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. In fact, for the past one hundred years there has been a significant and horrendous conflict going on somewhere in the world. And of course, prior to that one hundred year period was the small matter of the first world war, billed at the time as the ‘war to end all wars.’ I think you see the pattern.
Yet every Christmas we wish one another peace. We sing about peace on earth, just like the angels did to the shepherds. And we pray for peace. It seems that one of the few things that has changed over the past 100 Christmases is that we now hear a lot more detail about the human suffering brought about by war and we hear about it much more quickly and in much more graphic detail. So how on earth do we sing about peace on earth and goodwill to all people when there is always at least one major, tragic war going on in the world? And why do we even bother? Perhaps the angels were simply naïve when they sang their song. Perhaps Jesus was simply being overly optimistic when he spoke of peace. Or perhaps, we are missing something.
Today’s gospel text is a good place to start. It finishes with Jesus telling his disciples that they will have peace. In the ancient Near East the wish for peace was a common greeting and farewell. In Hebrew and Aramaic, spoken by Jesus and his disciples, ‘Shalom’ was ‘hello’ and also ‘goodbye’. Only the intonation was different. And sometimes goodbye was the double ‘Shalom, Shalom!’ The Arabic greeting ‘salaam’ also means peace and comes from the same original core word as Shalom. So perhaps Jesus was simply wishing his disciples ‘goodbye’ in the familiar language of the day and not actually promising them an elusive peace.
To put Jesus’ wish for peace for his disciples into context, we need to look at the conversation he was having with them when he said these words.
In today’s text Jesus is coming to the end of his long Last Supper discourse to his disciples. He has just a few more words to say to his closest companions, then he will pray for them (John 17). And then he will be arrested. Much of what he has been saying to this point perplexed his disciples. At the end of chapter 13 Peter interrupts him to ask why he cannot follow where Jesus is going (13:37). This in chapter 14 both Thomas and Philip interrupt him. Thomas asks how they can know the way to where Jesus is going when they do not even know where he is going (14:5), and then Philip asks Jesus to simply show them the Father (14:8). And then Judas (not Iscariot) interrupts to ask how it is that Jesus will reveal himself to those who follow him, but not to the world (14:22). And then earlier in chapter 16 Jesus gave them the riddle, ‘A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me’ (v. 16) which left them all puzzling over what he meant.
But now Jesus says to them that he will no longer speak to them in figures of speech, but will now speak plainly.
Then he tells his disciples: ‘On that day you will ask in my name. I do not say that I will ask the Father on your behalf; for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father and have come into the world. Again, I am leaving the world and am going to the Father’
And to this his disciples respond: ‘Now at last you are speaking plainly and not in figures of speech!’ (v. 29).
Now I do not know about you, but these last words of Jesus seem no less perplexing than the things he has been telling them which they found so difficult to understand. And yet their response is one of clear relief. ‘Thank goodness you are now speaking to us plainly!’ And not only that, but these words prompt them to confess that they now believe Jesus knows all things, does not need to have anyone question him, and has truly come from God (v. 30). And this is perhaps a reference to the fact that they have been peppering Jesus with questions the entire evening as he sought to explain to them what was about to occur.
Now it is the readers’ turn to scratch our heads, wondering just what is was that Jesus said in these few short sentences that is not only now so clear to the disciples, but which provokes such a response of faith.
What we are missing is the first century Jewish context. Jesus has been talking much about the Father and his relationship to the Father in John’s gospel. Some of his words have been such explicit claims to be God that the Jewish authorities took up stones and tried to kill Jesus. But now, after twice in this extended Last Supper discourse telling his disciples to ask anything of the Father in his name and they will receive it (14:13f; 16:24), Jesus comes back to them saying that when they ask in his name he will not ask the Father on their behalf. This is because there is no need for him to do so.
What Jesus has been saying to his disciples from the beginning of his time with them now suddenly becomes clear to the disciples. Jesus does not need to ask the Father on their behalf because he and the Father are in fact one. When they have loved Jesus, they have loved the Father. When Jesus goes on to say, once again, that he came into the world from the Father and is now leaving the world to return to the Father, echoing the language that John began his gospel with, the penny finally drops for the disciples. Jesus is from Father. He is one with Father. And is now leaving the world to be fully one with the Father again. Jesus is not just a great prophet. He is not simply the Messiah. He is God himself. Suddenly the eyes of the disciples are opened and what Jesus says is plain to them. This is what prompts their confession of faith in Jesus.
And Jesus responds to them not with great praise for finally getting it, but with these sardonic words: ‘Do you now believe?’ In other words, at this very last hour, at the end of my final words of teaching for you, you at last get it!
Well, and good. Better late than never. But now that the disciples finally clearly understand who Jesus is, he has some hard news for them.
‘The hour is coming,’ he says, ‘and is indeed now upon us when you will be scattered, each to his own home, and you will all abandon me, leaving me alone. But as you have now understood, I will not be alone because the Father is with me’ (v. 32).
The disciples now understand, but there is no time to explore what this means. There is no time to rejoice in their now firmly cemented faith. Jesus needs to tell them that very difficult times are coming and coming very soon. The disciples are about to flee into hiding.
Just when they finally fully understand just who Jesus is, their time with him is at an end. And things are going to become very difficult for them. And it is precisely here that Jesus promises them peace. In fact, he tells them that he has told them these things, about he and Father being one. About him leaving the world to return to the Father, about the difficult times about to come – in order that they might have peace.
It does strike us at first as a strange kind of peace. To be told your friend, your teacher, your Lord, is going to leave you. To be told that persecution is coming and you will all go into hiding – these are not the kind of words we would normally associate with bringing peace. But that is exactly what Jesus says. He doesn’t sugar-coat anything, he doesn’t beat around the bush. He tells them bluntly that things are going to change, and that trials are coming. But he tells them this to give them peace. And this peace is possible because of who Jesus is. The peace Jesus promises is possible because Jesus is returning to the Father where he himself will hear their prayers. This peace is possible because, despite the persecution they are about to face, Jesus assures them: ‘I have conquered the world.’ (v. 35).
Notice the past tense. Jesus is not about to conquer the world. He is not hoping to conquer the world. He is not in the process of developing a plan to conquer the world. Jesus has already conquered the world. By taking on human flesh and living among us. Jesus has already redeemed and ‘conquered’ the world. His death and resurrection are yet to play out, but the victory has already been won.
Here Jesus uses military imagery here. A great peace comes after a great victory. Jesus has won a great peace through a great victory. But it is a victory that no one saw coming, and a peace like no one had envisaged.
And this is not the first time Jesus promised his disciples peace during his last evening with them. In chapter 14:27 we read that Jesus told his disciples ‘Peace I lave with you; my peace I give to you.’ This was his promise to the disciples as he explained he was going to be with the Father. And notice it is not just any kind of peace he promised by ‘my peace’, the peace of Jesus. That is the peace Jesus is now reminding his disciples of at the end of his talk with them at the last supper. This is the final thought that he wants them to take with them into the difficult times to come.
We continue to pray and work for peace on earth, and not only at Christmas. We do this because Jesus has made peace with all people through the cross. We do this because through his resurrection Jesus has defeated death and so offers us a peace that goes far beyond a simple earthly cessation of hostilities. Even when physical peace between nations and peoples seems in short supply, we know that have a peace with God through Christ that shines brightly in our lives and in our world regardless of the troubles that rage around us.
At Christmas time, regardless of what turmoil we might be experiencing in our lives, or whatever troubles are unfolding in the world around us, we have real peace, the peace of Christ that rises above all else, a peace that transforms us and fills us with joy and hope.
And now in the words of the Apostle Paul which we heard in our epistle reading this morning, ‘May the peace of God was transcends all human understanding guard you in heart and mind, now and always.’ Amen.
Pastor Mark Worthing
St Peters Lutheran Church Port Macquarie 