Am I a Person After God's Own Heart? Part 2

Peace on Earth. Goodwill towards men. This sentiment is a desired state of humanity who is busy in materialism and self-promotion, and creates the opposite of peace on Earth and goodwill towards men. We, as humans, send peace troops into battle zones. We create armies, as humans, to preserve the peace and then turn them into agents of warfare. In the end time, the Bible speaks of a red horse that will ride, and that red horse speaks of a global surge of warfare that will start at that time, which will be worse than any warfare on Earth up until that time, and would certainly annihilate all life if Jesus Christ did not return and stop it. And as we also read in the parallel account that Jesus gave in Matthew 25, as that red horse rides and the white horse rides, division separates members of the Church. So this notion of peace on Earth, goodwill towards men, is a false ideal. It is some type of a sentiment. It's an expectation. It's a hope that people believe in. But even within Christ's own body, he said, there will be deep division. Now, what does that say about the Church of God, about you and me? You know, there's a classic example in the Bible about cause and effect, and it was about God's people.

We go back to Esau and Jacob. You know, he had Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. Well, Isaac had a couple of sons, Esau and Jacob. And how did this family get along? Well, we find that Jacob lied. He cheated. He tricked. He deceived. Even his father, he stole his brother's birthright. He was about himself, what he could get. And what was the effect of that? He had to hop on a camel and ride out of town.

He had to go a long way away and run. It separated family. Division divided that family. There was alienation. It's interesting that later on in life, Jacob, now a little older, a little wiser, having family of his own, a couple of wives, a lot of kids, began to say, I want peace on earth and goodwill towards my family. It was interesting that God gave him a vision. It was a very powerful vision. He wanted restoration, and God spoke to him about restoration.

If we go back to Genesis 28, verse 16, we see that Jacob made a cautious vow to God. It's kind of probably like most humans who aren't trusting. He's just hearing about God, just had a vision, just being told a few things. It might be like you or me when we're first called. We don't really have full trust, full faith yet. But here he likes what he hears. In Genesis 28, verse 16, it says, Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it. So he's come into a very powerful association with God.

And this dream that he dreamed, this vision he saw, was really moving him. He was afraid at that point. But notice, he wants to accomplish something. In verse 18, he says, he rose early in the morning, got up real early, and he took the stone that he had put his head on, and he set it up as a pillar. He poured oil on top of it, and he called the name of that place Bethel. And dropping down to verse 20 through 22, Jacob then made a vow, saying, Here's the state of mind he was in. The vow begins with if, and it has five conditions.

Any one of the five conditions aren't met, the vow is no good. If. So here's what he says. I like this concept of God. I like what I hear about him. If. If God will be with me and support me in this way that I am going, He's heading back to family.

And give me bread to eat and clothing to put on. Does this sound a little bit like Matthew 6, where people are very concerned and worried about what they're going to eat, what they're going to wear, what their lives are going to be like, what they might drink? And Jesus says, no, you pursue godliness. You pursue righteousness in the kingdom of God. These other things, I'll worry about this. But here's what's on the mind of Jacob. God supports me in the way I'm going, gives me bread to eat, clothing to put on, so that I come back to my Father's house in peace.

Then the Lord shall be my God. He identified this God as a God of peace. There's no other God with a small g at the time on earth that was associated with peace. Gods tended to be angry things, and gods you had to appease, regional gods and great gods, and you're always sacrificing and killing children and trying to appease them so that you could get food to eat.

This is a unique God. This is a God of peace. It's a process to obtain a relationship with God, the God who is associated with peace. It's even a larger process to become like God as far as being an agent of peace. That's what we want to talk about today. Paul was an apostle who saw so much division, so much warfare.

He saw so much persecution and fracturing of relationships on all scales, on all levels. Paul had a favorite name for God. You know what his favorite name for God was? I say a favorite name. He used it. He used this name in his letters to Rome, to Philippi, to Galatia, to Thessalonica. He called him the God of peace. There's something unique about the family of God, the mindset of God, the character of God, that is different from the mindset of this world, from the agent of war, from the agent of division and lying and murder, which comes from Satan the Devil, as Jesus Christ said.

This God is unique, and he's uniquely different than me. He's really uniquely different than you, if we look at that. Jesus Christ is coming as the Prince of Peace. The firstfruits that are going to reign with him are led by the Holy Spirit, and that Spirit develops in them a primary agent of agape, love, joy, and peace.

Not just the state, but that's the fruit, that they also become agents of peace, like the family of God does. In this series, of which we're in Part 2 here of 3, as far as I know, entitled, Am I a Person of God's Own Heart? Today I want to look at Part 2, a promoter of peace, oneness, and unity. Peace, oneness, and unity. These are important aspects, crucial aspects, of the heart of God, the mind of God, the character of God, the mindset of God.

Last time we looked at obedient and lawful. And the Bible tells us that a good understanding have those who keep and do God's commandments. You don't get that understanding until you actually do God's commandments. Then we begin to understand why. And one of the things that comes out is the relationships that God's commandments stitch together. That agape love of loving God with your heart, soul, and might, loving your neighbor as yourself just binds and stitches, it breaks down walls, it puts self second, it puts others equal or above yourself, and starts binding relationships in peace.

So let's examine this next level in Part 2, a promoter of peace, oneness, and unity. God's goal of his children, who he's calling now, and all people who eventually will be called in his timing, is to have them develop his mindset.

And that mindset is established on agape love. John tells us in the book of 1 John two or three times that God is agape love. That is really what the core of the God family is. And to come in to understand what that is, is to understand the whole word of God. Because Jesus Christ said that agape sort of divided into love for God, and God for man, and love for man, and man for man, is what the whole law, what the whole law and the prophets, what the whole writings of the Bible were at that time.

That's the objective here from the God family. And if God doesn't get individuals who are of his mindset, then they're not his children. You can also see that in the book of 1 John. The children of God and the children of the devil are manifest, and it just shows. And those who are lawbreakers, as we saw last time, will have their part in the lake of fire, which is the second death.

It's very clear in Revelation 21, verse 8. The previous verse is, those who become godly, those who overcome this selfish nature and take on God's nature, will be called sons of God and will live and reign with him forever. So that's what's before us, and we each have to choose those things. Jesus Christ, in John 17, verses 21-23, passionately said how much he wants us to be one with God, with each other, as he and the Father are one, that we are to be stitched to that family in peace, unity, oneness, whatever term you want to make.

That was what he came for. That's what he lives for. That's what you were created for. That's what he died for. And if you cannot appreciate the fact that he wants peace and oneness and unity so strongly that he would come here and live and die for that, and then come back and work in us through the Holy Spirit to develop that peace, then we don't understand.

We're playing some game about, if I do this, then I'll get paid off by eternal life, and if I do that, I won't. It's just nonsense what humans come up with. Ephesians 4, 16, of course, talks about the body stitching itself together by the agape love which every joint supplies through God, through his Holy Spirit. That is the body of Christ. So, peace on earth, goodwill toward men, may be a sentiment for some. It's not a sentiment for us.

It's not a sentiment for God. It's not a sentiment for the people of God or the family of God. That is what we're about. Jesus Christ is coming to be the Prince of Peace on earth. And he only has good will toward men. So, that is a reality.

That is something that you and I are not to be going after lawless selfishness and throwing out these little tidbits, maybe even based on Bible. Peace on earth, goodwill to men. As we go out and carve up what remains of the earth's resources and try to grab what we can of the happiness and the materialism that's available. That's where mankind is going. Let's go back to Romans 3 and read verses 13 through 17. Romans 3 will begin here in verse 13. He's quoting here from Psalm 14 and Isaiah 59.

Romans 3, verse 13. Talking about humans, let's not point the finger here and say, Well, this is the world. No, let's talk about me. And you can look at me, or you can look at yourself if you have the guts to do so. But we humans, this is what we are like. Our throat is an open tomb. And you just go to James 3 and you can read about the mouth and the tongue and how hard it is for us.

With their tongues, they have practiced deceit. We like to make ourselves look better and make little opportunities for us to obtain things and get further. The poison of asps is under their lips. We tend to critique and criticize others and put them down. Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood. It's not real blood, but as Jesus said, if you even say something or think something bad about another individual, you can be guilty of murder. Destruction and misery are in their ways. The end result of that tears apart relationship. It destroys things that took a lifetime to build. For instance, you think about how long it takes to build a family.

You have a young man and young lady, kids growing up. They work hard to develop into adolescence and finally into adulthood. They get education. They look and pray for a maid. And finally, they hopefully are brought together by somebody that God links them to. In this precious relationship, they step off into life, into unknown territory. There are challenges being a man with a woman and a woman with a man because there are so many uniqueness. There are challenges to finances. There are challenges to all kinds of things. But somehow, they put it together and they have children, if God blesses them that way, and they move a little forward. Now, with all this work and all this effort and all this time as they're rearing their children, you can come in and BAM!

Blow that marriage apart, just like you drop a bomb out of an airplane and blow a building apart. A building took just as much energy in somebody's mind to orchestrate, to create all the wiring and all the foundation and all the superstructure and all the permits and all the work went into it. But some guy somewhere is watching a little screen with a drone and he zeros in with the crosshairs and pushes a button. And next thing you know, BOOM! Families can be ripped apart and torn apart.

And all that work is gone. Buildings and everything can just be torn apart. This is the destruction and misery that comes from being self-centered. It happens all the time.

It happens in corporations, it happens between societies, it happens in cultures, it happens in families, it happens in business, it happens in friendships, it happens in between countries, it happens between men and God. And this is humanity. Verse 17, And the way of peace, well, that's something else. They have not known. The way of peace isn't sort of a tranquil absence of war. It's a way that is opposite to what I just described and what Paul is saying here to the church at Rome. The way of peace is just as much work, if not more so.

It's a lot harder to actually create something peaceful and unified than it is to push a button and blow something up. But you know, the way of humanity, you can see in almost all entertainment, any good entertainment is going to have destruction, crashes, explosions, relationships ripped up, people shot and killed. That's good entertainment. But the way of peace they've not known. There is no fear or deep respect of God before their eyes.

That's why the first part of this series, obedient and lawful, is necessary before we can ever get to the second part, which is to be a promoter of peace and oneness and unity. As I said, Satan is the current God of this world, a father of humanity, Jesus calls him. He's a fake father. He's a murderer. He's a promoter of warmongering or destruction. And people think it's cool to go in and break up and destroy that which was put together.

God said, let no man separate what I have joined together. Yet that's exactly what Satan is doing, and he's being very effective. It's very easy to engage people with human nature in warfare. I don't meet with guns and bombs, necessarily. I mean, in any kind of warfare, it comes natural to us. It's part of our nature from childhood. Two kids, one toy. I mean, here we go. One job, you know, 100 candidates.

Whatever it is, getting the girl, getting the guy, getting some sort of respect. Careers, marriage, religion, to armies. You know, when James 4.1 says, where do wars and fightings come from among you and the church? It kind of personalizes it, doesn't it? It comes down to the fact that we as human beings and our selfish nature, it's easy for us to engage in things that separate in our little battles. Peace is elusive, then, to humans. The way of peace, we don't know. It's repugnant to us, as we'll see in a minute, because it's not fair.

It's elusive in marriage, in families, in business, in politics, in towns, in church, in religion, global affairs, everywhere. But Jesus said in Matthew 5, verse 9, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God. A totally unique group. It's so dramatic and so unique that he said, Blessed are the peacemakers, as opposed to the warmongers.

You could call these the peacemongers. You know, they're waging, they're taking the hammers and pounding out peace. It's hard to do. It's laborious to construct peace. Blessed are the peacemakers. Guess why? They're like us, he's saying. They'll be called the sons of God. They fit with the family.

Why? Because they're unique? Well, they're unique because God's Spirit has made them like God, in the sense of how they think and how they act. None of us were created that way. We're all just a bunch of selfish kids. And we've got a change into kids after our spiritual parents. Every member of the God family will be a peacemaker, or they won't be in the God family. Everybody in the Bible that is called holy or is spoken of as being in the first resurrection, including those who will be the bride of Christ at his return, all of those are peacemakers.

From our Father Abram, as we'll see in a minute, all the way to the very end of the bride of Christ. They're all peacemakers. That's what the kingdom will be composed of. Again, Jesus said, blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the sons of God. Nobody else. This is not a qualification. You can say, well, it'd be kind of nice to do that.

We ought to have one or two of those. No, this is it. Being a person after God's own heart requires lawfulness. It requires us to be obedient. It also requires us then to take on the nature of God. And that nature of God promotes peace and unity and oneness. And without that, we cannot be part of the family of God. I would say this. If you will become a spiritual son of God, you will have been a peacemaker.

Think of the consequences of Jesus's statement there. If you will become a son or a daughter in the family of the divine family of God, you will have been a peacemaker. Because that's what he said in Matthew 5, verse 9. The kingdom of God is composed of righteousness and peacemaking. Let's go over to Romans chapter 14 and verse 17. Sometimes we think from the human perspective of what the kingdom is like. Oh, the kingdom? Well, that's eternal life. Wonderful. The kingdom? Well, that's joy. Well, the kingdom? That's no worries, man. Live forever. But what is the kingdom of God from God's perspective? What is it really composed of and who will comprise it? Romans chapter 14, verse 17 gives us a glimpse.

Paul says, for the kingdom of God...it's not about physical things, not about eating and drinking. The kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. That's what the kingdom of God is. Righteousness. What is righteousness? Obedience, lawfulness, peace, joy. All these things come from the Holy Spirit, from the God of agape love. And that's what the kingdom of God is about. And that's who will inherit the kingdom of God. So you and I have this opportunity, don't we, to be growing into children of God? Be the bride that Jesus Christ is washing and scrubbing in Ephesians chapter 5, verse 21. The bride who, in Revelation 19, verse 7 through 9, has made herself ready, or has been made ready, by that washing of Christ, and her garments are righteousness, and they are white and clean. The righteous acts of the saints.

We have work to do. Always will have work to do. One of the things that we need to be growing in is this mind and attitude that will fully fill the kingdom of God and the inhabitants of it.

Ephesians chapter 4 is a chapter about the body of Christ, about the church. Let's go over there real quick and just take a little look at this particular chapter.

Ephesians chapter 4, Paul's going to talk to the church of Ephesus, talk about the body of Christ, talk about how it's composed by Christ, what's in it, what it does.

You see, in chapter 4 here, it's going to analyze the church, the body of Christ. It's going to show the peace, the oneness, and the growth.

Verse 1 through 3, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called.

God has called you. He said, Hey you, come, follow me. What do we say in return? Do we say, Yes, I will sacrifice everything, I'll drop it all and come follow you.

Or do we say, Well, hold on. I have a father to bury, I have a career to pursue, I have some other things I've got to do to get in the way.

But I'll get back to you. Is that kind of where we are? Sometimes we come to church. Yeah, I'm going to be doing that soon.

I'll start studying and praying regularly, daily, and I'll start changing here. Real soon. I've just got a few other projects here. I've got to nail first.

Walk worthy of the call. You've got to walk. That's motion. Motion.

With all lowliness and gentleness, with long suffering, bearing with one another in agape love.

This now starts to talk about some of the mechanics of peacemaking.

Humility is not about me. Gentleness, long suffering with others who make mistakes and make me feel bad. Bearing with one another as they are imperfect and unfair.

Using the love of God that comes through the Holy Spirit. Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

If you look at verse 3 right there, the bond of peace from the Moffat translation is translated, Making every effort.

So it might say, Endeavoring. Well, I endeavored.

But making every effort, that's something totally different.

Making every effort possible to keep the unity of the Spirit.

This bond of peace from the Moffat, by binding peace upon yourselves.

This bond of peace, again, the word, but binding peace upon yourself.

Binding peace means there is no way peace will not be part of me.

So it's going to happen because I'm going to make every possible effort, and I'm going to bind peace to me, so that is what I will do.

And there's no separation, there's no possibility that it's not going to happen.

So this is really something here.

He's talking about really being zealous and not taking no for an answer.

In verse 4 it says, There is one body.

It's not fractured, it's not broken, it's not split, it's not splendered.

In God's eyes there's one body.

And we can come up with all the reasons why there's fractures and more fractures.

But with God, remember, He's a God of peace, of oneness, and of unity.

Anything that does something different is not of Him.

There is one body, one spirit, just as you are called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who is above all, through all, and in you all.

What just happened was everything just got, boom, brought together in oneness.

That's how God is. That's how He works.

So if you and I are agents of that family, we are also going to see relationships around us with our God, with each other, with other people in the workplace and in the world be going this direction. And we will not take any exceptions. It's not good, not good enough, because we are binding ourselves to this.

We are making every effort to do this. This is part of what we do. This is part of what the children of God do. We can skim on down here. We have a very gracious God in verse 11 who has given people in the church.

And what are they there for? Verse 12, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of service, for the building up of the body of Christ. This is what the body does. It builds itself. It's not smashing. It's not destroying. It's building.

Till we all come in the unity of the faith, to the measure in the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about, divided, but speaking the truth, an agape may grow up in all things into him who is the head Christ. There's no exception for not doing that.

And anybody of us, me included, that chooses not to do that, well, we're going to be growing somewhere else doing something else because, verse 16, from whom the whole body, the body of Christ, is joint and knit. It's not just attached.

It's not sort of nice to be close to you. When you knit something together, you stitch something together, you can't tear it apart.

It's all knit, according to the effective working by which every part does its share causes growth of the body for the building, the edifying of itself in love.

So this is what the body is doing. This is what Jesus Christ and God the Father are doing.

They're reaching out and stitching more people into this body. They're going to have a family at the first resurrection, at the seventh trump.

They will rise with Christ, and they will be first fruits with the first fruit, lamb.

And they will be inseparable. Revelation 20, verses 4 and 6, talks about that transformation that takes place.

And they will always be together. They will be like the family of God, with the same elements of the family of God.

And we're told in Scripture that we don't know what we'll be like, but we know we will be like Him.

We will be given the glory that He has given.

Various small things, glimpses of the future are there, because children, co-inheritors with Christ of all things, and children of God and the God family, are like the parents.

They are subject to them and authority, but just like our children, or like us, we will be like God in a very large way.

It will be wonderful to see how that works.

Now, you compare this with what we see in James with human nature.

Where does wars and fighting come from among you? Wherever there's self-promotion, wherever a person is envious or jealous, this is evil. It's divisive. It's fracturing. It says, this does not descend from above, but it comes from below. It's demonic. It's earthy.

God is coming to scrape that away and get rid of that, burn up that type of character, and it will not exist in His kingdom.

Let's go to Acts 9, verse 31. Let's compare this description of the church, a simple one-verse description of the church in Acts here, near the beginning.

In Acts 9, verse 32, just compare it with society today.

Notice what we just read there in Ephesians, how this actually works.

There's one thing to talk about in Ephesians 4. This is how the body is, and it stitches itself together.

Let's see the reality. Does it really work?

Acts 9, verse 31 says, Then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had peace and were edified.

Exactly what Christ came to do took place in all the churches in the whole region.

They had peace, and they were being built up, stitched together.

Walking in the fear, the deep respect of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, they were multiplied.

So there's the reality. Yes, if we do walk and are led by the Holy Spirit, in other words, God prompting us to say no to self, and yes to serving others, and yes to the various components of peace and unity, this is the result.

David was a warrior, David was a hunter, and David said, seek peace and pursue it. If you think about that for a minute, if you have bound yourself with peace and you are not going to accept anything else in any relationship with anyone except peace, no matter what it takes, then it's like going hunting. You're going to seek peace and pursue it.

It's kind of like warfare, where you're going to seek an enemy and you're going to pursue it.

But in this case, you're going to seek an enemy, pursue it, and turn it into a friend.

That's hard to do. It's easier just to shoot the animal.

Shoot the enemy. See? But no, we're going to seek, we're going to track it down, we're going to use all of this energy, and then we're going to get to the hard work of changing it into a friend. That might sound odd to you, but that's exactly what Jesus Christ and God the Father did to you and to me.

We were enemies. We were enmity.

Cardinal human nature is against God.

And He tracked us down and went through the difficulty of converting us into friends and family, eventually.

And look at the effort and the work and the sacrifice and the humility that that took.

That's a whole lot more work than just saying, all right, you messed up, you're dead. Throw us in the lake of fire.

This is quite an opportunity. Seek peace and pursue it.

You might ask the question, how do I wage peace with my spouse, with my employer, with my neighbors, with the government, with my friends, with my enemies, with those who are just out to get me, with those in the church, out of the church?

How do I wage peace with everybody?

We could look to Jesus Christ's example. We could follow that example.

It's a hard example. It's not an easy path.

He said, you know, take up your stake, your tree, your cross, follow me.

It's not that it's the easy way. No, it's the difficult path.

The wide easy path is the way to destruction.

You know, warfare, destroyed relationships, destroyed lives, destroyed everything.

Easy path's a little harder. A lot harder. It's going to be hard for you to do and hard for me to do.

But Jesus did it, and those who are His disciples will do it, and those who join His family will do it.

Are you ready to know how to do it? Let's go to Isaiah 53.

Begin to look. Isaiah 53, two verses we'll look at here, verses 4 and 5.

Isaiah 53, beginning in verse 4.

Isaiah 53, verse 6.

Surely He has borne our griefs. He carried, He carried, not just carried them around in a bag.

No, He carried them through stripes. He carried them through loss of blood, a spear in His side.

He bore them, in other words. He carried them sort of your list and my list of sins, as it were, attached to Him. Maybe He nailed or stapled on to Him. Yeah, that's what He's carrying here, you see.

Our griefs, our sorrows, the penalties for our sin.

And we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.

But what were these things? He was wounded for our transgressions.

This is how He waged peace with you and me. He took the blame.

He willingly took a loss. The one who created and designed you and me, actually took the blame for our carnal actions that were really prompted by Satan the Devil.

And He said, guilty, I'll take the guilt right here, put it on me, kill me. Death is required for sin.

The soul that sins will die, therefore I'll die. I'll take it. I'll go down. I'll be the one to take the fall.

That's what He did.

The chastisement for our peace was upon Him.

And by His stripes we are healed. Healed, restored. Look at the Hebrew word, stitched together, sewn up.

He sewed these relationships together by taking the fall, taking the guilt.

Now, that's repugnant to human nature. It's repugnant to my human nature.

We're all about fairness. We're all about equality. We're all about, hey, justice!

Is Jesus about fairness? Is it fair that your Creator goes through that? Is He about equality?

Do we treat Him like we treat ourselves? No, we esteemed Him as stricken, smitten by God.

We didn't get to play ball with us humans. We beat Him up. We spit on Him.

We said He was no good as He walked around for three and a half years doing His ministry.

You want justice? I don't want justice. You really don't want justice.

You know the penalty for sin? Is eternal death? You want justice? Not me.

No, I want unfairness. I'm thankful that God is unfair. I don't want justice. I want to be just. I want to become just. I'm not.

Every day when I get on my knees and say, Father, forgive us as we forgive one another for our sins, I don't want justice. I don't want fairness. Not at all.

But when I walk out the door, I do. You know? I don't want to be taken advantage of.

I don't want anybody to say something that's not quite accurate about me.

I don't want to lose any opportunities. Buddy, you better not take my garden hose over there.

You better not take my jeans off the line.

Oh, you think they're your jeans? Well, come over here and we'll decide whose jeans those are.

We're all about fairness and keeping my stuff and packing a few little heat just to protect what I've got.

That's not what God's like. That's not the attitude of God.

His next job will be the Prince of Peace. You know, it says there in Isaiah chapter 9 verses 6 through 7, Unto us a child is given. Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace.

It's different. Different than you and me. We're trying to grow up into Him like it says there in Ephesians 4. We need to grow up in Him. We've got to change. It's a unique individual.

If He's coming to do that, He needs helpers. I don't know why He needs helpers, but He needs helpers. He needs a bride.

He's called those to assist Him and be priests of Him for a thousand years and reign with Him, as it says there in Revelation chapter 20 verses 4 and 6.

He came, took our sins, sacrificed, suffering, and He waged peace with us. And it worked. It was very effective, wasn't it?

Very, very effective. From our standpoint, it's very... it was great. It was working great.

But look at it from His standpoint. Look what He had to go through. He and you are at one. Just like you prayed there in John 17. I will that they will be one as we are one. He did it! He succeeded! He waged peace.

He went to it the hard way and He accomplished it. And you're living proof of that. It worked. It's fabulous. Now you're one with Him. You're at peace with Him. You're united with His body.

Blessed are the peacemakers is the next step then. He's looking for helpers. He's looking for people like Him. He's ready to wage peace through a thousand year reign after humanity has just torn it all apart and all relationships are ripped apart.

Are you, am I, prepared to pay the price for peace? Jesus Christ was prepared to pay the price for peace. What is the price for peace? Well, basically the bottom line is your willingness to take an undeserved loss. That's the price for peace.

Again, that's repugnant to us. To bless your enemies. That's repugnant to us. But that's what it takes. He was willing. He won peace. He was successful. Am I ready to do the same? Well, I don't know. Think about that one.

We can also say, oh yeah, yeah. But wait a minute. Am I really? Am I really? How would you do that? How would I do that? Well, in Luke 6, verses 27-31, He gives us a little glimpse of a daily routine you would walk through. This is not some once in a lifetime. This is everyday stuff. Here's what it looks like during the day.

Luke 6, verse 27. And here's where it kind of gets a little hard. We have to ask ourselves, is this what I'm going to do? Is this what I'm going to be about? Am I going to really join the family here and be this kind of person on a daily basis? Luke 6, we'll begin in verse 27.

Now, if you can get through that, here's some more. Verse 28.

Do not withhold your tunic either. He says over in Matthew, if somebody sues you for your cloak, we might say, as you go through life, you know, genes look a lot alike. I can just see the genes there.

Hey, what are you doing with my genes? Give me my genes. Oh, those are my genes. If he takes your genes, you know they're your genes. You've got your name inside them, okay?

Don't just give him the genes. Give him the matching gene jacket that goes with it. You know, the $50 gene jacket.

And guess what? Make friends with the guy. Have a good relationship.

It's about forging unity, oneness, and peace with everybody. It's not about quibbling over whether you got smacked upside the head, or somebody stole your genes or your outfit, etc., etc.

Give to everyone who asks of you. Someone comes up and says, hey, I need help. Yeah, be a helper, in other words.

In another place, it's not talking about money, because in another place he says, of your possessions, share and give of your possessions, your blessings, as God has given you.

So this isn't about some grand thing. It's just about being a giver to those who ask. You're going to develop relationships, aren't you? Somebody says, hey, I need help. Change an attire.

Hey, I need some help. Or I need this or that. We're not talking about, you know, helping drug addicts on the street corner with a sign that says, you know, they need help.

We're talking about people with real needs. Be a helping, giving person. And from him who takes away your goods, somebody comes and steals from you. Don't ask for them back. Don't say, hey, you took that thing, and that's mine.

What do you end up with? You end up with hostile relationships. I saw you take that. Just don't just let him go either. If you want peace and oneness, go develop a relationship with that. Hey, you want another one?

You know, can you use the hose for that hydraulic tool you're running off with? Can you use some help with the project you're trying to accomplish? You know, it's that kind of thing. This is not fair, is it? The whole thing just sort of smacks as weird and we tend to walk away. Because justice and fairness and inequality are reasons for war. That's what wars are based on.

Justice and fairness and equality. You go back through the wars in history and look for justice and fairness and equality. You'll find war after war after war kicks off. If we look over in 1 Corinthians 6 and verse 6, we kind of see where the human mind can go, even within the church. You know, our carnal mind is focused on the self, on my needs, on my wants, on my aspirations. You get in the way of that, we're going to have a little problem, you see.

I justify the situation. I defend the situation. I say, well, this action of mind, this whatever it is, this is defensible. And I'm sure it is. It's probably a law in the books that even defends you. You could hire a battery of attorneys to defend your position if you want. Is that going to build peace with the other individual? Am I talking about being taken to the cleaners on things? No, this is Jesus talking about the daily walk through life, just the events and the affairs of life, not somebody taking your home and your property and your business and your wife or something. It's just about relationships.

Less, for me, is repugnant. Loss, for me, I can't accept. My human nature doesn't like it. And so in 1 Corinthians 6, verse 6, it says, But brother goes to law against brother in that before unbelievers. I mean, it's right, it's fair, it's the thing to do, it's justice. Right? I'm going to uphold and defend my position because it's the right one. Well, what if Jesus did that? None of us would be here. You know, we all be dead. There wouldn't be a single human ever to inherit the family of God.

It's easy to read this statement in Psalm 133, verse 1. I think it at times can become sort of a, well, I don't know, a goal, a desire. Maybe it's just sort of a platitude sometimes in our minds.

But in Psalm 133, verse 1, it says, Isn't it sweet? How do you get there? It's one thing to read it, isn't it? It's one thing to say it.

But how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity comes from a different father, a different spirit, a whole lot of work, humility, personal loss of brethren of like mind dwelling together in a unity that eludes humans.

We skip over to verse 3. It's like the dew of Herman descending on the mountains of Zion. Evidently, there's a lot of dew up in that area. I think Jerusalem's about 4,000 feet, and I've read something that there's a lot of dew there.

Notice, This is where we're headed if we're developing peace. Peace and unity among brethren and family. The goal is life forevermore.

That's the goal for the church. That's the goal for us to enter the kingdom of God by doing it. It's difficult, it's hard, but that's what we do. We have to develop this heart like that of God. It's doing the difficult things.

Let's see an example of the Father of the Faithful now. In the New Testament, Abraham is referred to as the Father of the Faithful.

Let's go back to an example of this in Genesis 13, verse 7. He didn't get some pass because he was one of the first patriarchs.

He gets the pass, the blessing or the praise here, the title of being a Father, a pater, the Greek word, an influencer of the faithful, an example, in other words.

A leader by example, by doing, that we can then look to and be influenced by.

In Genesis 13, verse 7, there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram's livestock and the herdsmen of Lot's livestock.

Uh-oh. We've got family here. Abram and Lot were family, but they weren't equal family.

If you go back and look, Abram was a very wealthy man. He was an individual that God had brought out of the land of Ur as a child up to Haran, and then his father died, and God brought him down to Egypt and then back to Canaan.

I mean, this is the man. God is working with Abram. We don't know about Lot. Lot's kind of a tag-along. Lot's kind of an also-ran.

Abraham should say, it's my calling. This is my land that God's bringing into.

What's fair is for me to get everything I want. You could easily develop that mindset. And now there's strife here.

So Abram said to Lot, please let there be no strife, let there be peace, in other words, between you and me, and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen, for we are brethren.

What does that take? Fairness? Equality? Justice? He says, it's not the whole land before you. Now just imagine here, something like this.

You're up on a high area to the west of the Jordan Valley, and you can look down over that Jordan River that comes down from the Sea of Galilee down to the Dead Sea. And that whole plain is lower and it's watered, and the Jordan River flows in there, and the fertile valley that's overflowed through the ages, and it's rich.

Now you can also look up the higher country. It's scruffy, it's scrubby, it's dry, there's no river, there's not much to it.

So he's saying here, you look down there at the whole land. If you take the left, I will go to the right. If you go to the right, then I will go to the left.

Now Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere, like the Garden of Eden of God, like the land of Egypt as you go towards Zor, that fertile land of Goshen with the Nile Delta as it just soaks up all that country there.

And Lot chose for himself all the plain of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east, and they separated from each other.

Now, that was hard, I'm sure, for Abram to do. Very hard. It would be hard for you to do. Did he take a loss? Oh, yes. Was he humble? Yes, he was. Was he giving? Was he waging peace? Yes. Was he bound to it? Yes. He said, look, you and I are going to remain family. We're going to be unified here. But what did he take? He took a loss.

Now, you might think that's the end of the story, unless you read just a little bit further. Because, remember, God supports godly people. God blesses. He supports. You know, when we give, like Paul was saying, if you give of your resources to help others, the Lord will fill the seed bag of the sower. He'll refill it so that you will have more in order to give.

God is a giver. That's what that passage says. You know, God loves a cheerful giver. He'll refill the giving bag. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but he will.

And so, when he, Abram, did this peace initiative and one peace with Lot, what does God think about that? What does God do for that? Let's go down to verse 14.

Who is calling you and me to become like him? Yes, there may be a loss, and Jesus Christ certainly took a loss, but then he was elevated to the right hand of God and inherited everything. He said, all things are put under his feet.

And for you and me who are going to give up, and we're going to be treated wrongfully and spitefully, and we're going to have to take losses in order to wage peace, we're going to inherit everything with him.

So, in the end, there is no loss.

God wants people to be like him, and he will support that.

In Colossians 3, verses 12-13, we find out the people that God wants us to be. This is what we're intended to be. This is what we've been called to.

Not some sideline issue, not some little thing that would be nice if you had this as well. Here's our calling.

Colossians 3, verses 12-13, Therefore, as the elect of God, you've been called now to become one of these children of God in the firstfruits' resurrection.

Holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, long-suffering, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another.

If anyone has a complaint against another, even as Christ forgave you, so also you must do.

That's what we're about. No fairness there, is there? No real equal equality between men and women.

Equal equality between whatever stature, how we see ourselves, young and old, no racial, anything else.

It's not about us, somehow, finding an equal footing as humans, but finding an equal footing with God.

Because with God, there is no race, there is no sex, there is no age. We are all equal children in the eyes of God.

On that plane, we don't fight for my personal rights, my personal, you know, justice or whatever. No, we are agents of that family, all equal with Him, but down here, we are all unequal with humans, because we are the ones taking undeserved loss.

Undeserved loss. Got to get used to undeserved loss. Strikes on cheeks. Slander, being called every imaginable name.

Jesus said, if they've done this to me, they'll do it to you. If you deny me, then you can't be my disciple.

In for a penny, in for a pound. We're either children of the family of God or not.

Among ourselves, we are all the same. Among the world, we will not be treated fairly.

But as agents of peace, we will win our battles, as it were, of peace and unity and oneness with God's help.

We will reach out and connect in relationships within our families, in our congregations, in workplaces everywhere.

We will be at peace as much as it depends on us.

You can't make a person or force another person to be at peace with you, can you?

You cannot do that. But if it's bound to us, we're committed to it. We will not let it go, just as Jesus Christ didn't. We're going to be agents of it.

In verse 15, And let the peace of God rule in your hearts. That comes first. That rules.

And when somebody says this or that or does this or that, peace rules.

We take the loss. What will it take for me to engage you? What will it take for me to make you a friend?

Oh, my enemy, my slander. What will it take for me to change that in you?

You know, it's very possible. It's amazing how humans will warm up to God's spirit, to godly people, to people who really honestly care.

Not the ones who are trying to work a deal and, you know, Hello, Mr. Eliot. How are you today? Are you having a nice day? I want to sell you something.

You don't care about me. You don't care about my day. You're reading a script.

People are used to that hollow stuff all the time.

When somebody genuinely comes up and wants to embellish their life, all kinds of walls begin to drop. All kinds of issues begin to fade.

Absolute enemies can become very, very close and dear friends.

That's what God does. That's what the family of God does.

Somebody has to pay the price for peace. Will it be you?

Again, Jesus said, if someone wants to take away your tunic, give him your coat to go with it.

But I don't think he means, just, oh well, we got out of that one.

Lost some jeans and a jean jacket. Lost a nice dress and some high heels.

And, eenie, eenie, eenie, you know.

No, I think it's the relationship of peacemaker because that's the whole concept that he's talking about.

It's what he stands for.

It's human nature, you see, to repay evil for someone who takes from me, makes me suffer a loss.

That's why they're called enemies, you know.

If you look at the term enemy, your enemies are causing you to suffer loss.

Ask yourself a question. Do you have enemies?

I don't, if I'm thinking correctly. People who make me suffer loss are my brothers. They're my fellow human beings. They're people I want to see in the family of God. They're not my enemies. I may be their enemy.

All I have to do to keep them from being an enemy is to suffer the loss, and we're not enemies.

See? So if you have enemies, or if I have enemies, or I should say, when we have enemies, we need to stop and ask ourselves, why did I allow myself to have an enemy?

He says, Bless and pray for your enemies, that you may be sons of your Father. They're in Matthew 5, verse 45.

If you want to be a son of God, bless and pray for enemies.

You know? They're not your enemies if you're blessing and praying for them, are they? If you're blessing them and praying for them. They're not your enemies. They're your friends.

They're people you love. They're people that you hope the best for, you want the best for.

And if we do that, then we start becoming family. Then we start having the mind of God. We start having a heart after God's own heart, and being people after God's own heart.

It's kind of exciting, really. We're to be ambassadors of this type of peace. You can read in 2 Corinthians, chapter 5, verses 19 and 20.

We are actually called to be ambassadors of peace. Let's go read that. 1 Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 19. Because this is really profound if you see it within this context. We're not some sort of, yeah, ambassadors for Christ. No.

Let's read very carefully what Paul says here.

2 Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 19. And I don't mean to make light of when I said that, but we're just not sort of a little label and a little sign. We run around and say, we're ambassadors for Christ. No, we are. We're ambassadors for the family of God by being like the family of God. In other words, when you see an ambassador in a foreign country, you're actually seeing the foreign country.

That's what the whole point of an embassy is. If you say, go down in Washington, D.C. to the Romanian embassy, maybe you've never been to Romania. You'll never get to go there. You go into the Romanian embassy and guess what? You're in Romania. Literally. That's the country of Romania inside that building. And hopefully a bunch of Romanians will say, hello. How are you?

And you say, look at these. These are Romanians. This is what Romania is like. When God calls you as a child and you begin to take on his nature, and somebody else then comes to you and me as an ambassador, it's not like we have some sort of a badge or label.

They should see the light of Jesus Christ. They should see God, in a sense, in your character. They should see that agent of peace, hope, agape, love, etc. That's why we're called the sons of God. So we look here at ambassadors for peace in 2 Corinthians 5, verse 19. In a real sense, the will... I'm sorry... That God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. Notice this carefully. Reconciling the world to himself. We've talked about how he waged peace with the world, taking a loss, suffering, being treated horribly, reconciling the world to himself.

That's how he did it. Not imputing their trespasses, not getting into fights, not getting into accusing anybody, right? And has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Aha! You and I now are to be agents of reconciling relationships. That ministry has been committed to us. Now, then, you can see what we're ambassadors of. We are ambassadors for Christ of reconciliation. Examples. As though God were pleading through us, we implore you on Christ's behalf to be reconciled to God. This is peacemaking. This is unity.

This is oneness. He did it with you. Now, you are expected to go out and do it for the family. Brethren, this is important. Peace is an attribute of God's heart. You know it's a major component of the Holy Spirit in Galatians 5, verse 21. It's an important attribute of the Church.

In 1 Corinthians 14, just go back a few pages here. 1 Corinthians 14, verse 33. For God is not the author of confusion. If you look in verse 33, the margin of confusion is also translated as disorder, chaos, breaking, destroying. You see, God is not the author of things going that way. But rather, God is the author of peace, as in all the churches of the saints. Not some of the churches of the saints, all of the churches of the true saints. God is the author of peace. It's part of the mind, the heart of God. It's an attribute of His Church that you and I must also be part of.

So as we conclude this, we've looked at some pretty tough stuff, big stuff. But it's really what God is made of, in a sense, part of what is character. It's a slice of His character that if you want to be in that family, in that kingdom, if you want to be an ambassador, if you want to be an agent, we've got to step up and really grow up into Christ. Let's see a summary as we conclude of what we've been examining here today. This summary is over in 1 Peter 3, verses 8-12. I think it's fitting conclusion to the message.

1 Peter 3, beginning in verse 8. Finally, kind of makes a good conclusion, doesn't it? It's interesting he used that word, but finally, all of you be of one mind. That's what Christ wants us to have. That's the goal of the family. Having compassion for one another. Love as brothers. Be tender-hearted. Be courteous. Not returning evil for evil, or reviling, or for reviling, which comes from this concept or notion of fairness and justice. But rather, on the contrary, blessing, blessing for what? Blessing for evil.

Blessing for reviling. There it is. Knowing that you were called to this, that you may inherit a blessing. That's our calling. Our calling is to inherit the blessing that Abraham did for taking a loss, that Jesus Christ did for taking a loss, in a very real sense. To take that loss, to stitch that together, blessings and good things for things that are horrible, that we may inherit that blessing.

For he who would love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, his lips from speaking deceit. Let him turn away from evil and do good. Let him seek peace and pursue it, for the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous.

I hope, brethren, this will be an inspiration to you to dig a little deeper, maybe fast and pray and see how in your own life you can grow into a deeper mindset, a heart more like God's as we move closer and closer to the return of his Son Jesus Christ. So that that bride may be prepared and ready, that she can be continually being washed more and more and able to assist the Prince of Peace as he brings peace to this earth. Next time, in the final installment in Part 3, we'll see that God's heart also is humble. It is also sacrificing, and it is also serving. Have a really good Sabbath.