God blesses those who work for peace, for they will be called the children of God.
Matthew 5:9
Blessed: makários (mak-ar’-ee-os) (mac ar e os) describes a believer in enviable(“fortunate”) position from receiving God’s provisions (favor) – which (literally) extend(“make long, large”) His grace (benefits). This happens with receiving (obeying) the Lord’s inbirthings of faith
Peace: eirēnopoiós(i-ray-nop-oy-os’) (ey ray nay poy yos): bravely declares God’s terms which makes someone whole
Peacemakers:
- stand on the truth of God’s Word, rather than bending to society’s ever-changing ideologies.
“The grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of our God shall stand forever.”
Isaiah 40:8 (TLB)
- reflect the image of their heavenly Father, rather than blending into the culture around them.
So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.
Romans 12:1-2 (MSG)
- spend their lives about their Father’s business, rather than the pursuing the business of this world.
Now all glory to God, who is able to make you strong, just as my Good News says. This message about Jesus Christ has revealed his plan for you Gentiles, a plan kept secret from the beginning of time. But now as the prophets foretold and as the eternal God has commanded, this message is made known to all Gentiles everywhere, so that they too might believe and obey him.
Romans 16:25-26
This kind of peacemaking:
- is not in-step with culture.
- is not go along to get along mentality.
- is not simply ending a fight in a business meeting, agreeing to disagree on social media, or marching in protests lines… this is about salvation… sharing with the lost, the empty, and the broken how that they can be found, full, and whole.
And whenever those possessed by evil spirits caught sight of him, the spirits would throw them to the ground in front of him shrieking, “You are the Son of God!” But Jesus sternly commanded the spirits not to reveal who he was.
Mark 3:11-12
Jesus told the evil spirits not to reveal who he was. Even the spirits know Jesus and His power.
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