The Church of Christ: Yesterday and Today . . .

PEACE OR ENMITY

The point of this essay is that because of Jesus we have a choice that man never had without him. Either we have that peace that only he can give, or we are left with that enmity that goes with any effort to keep law. Peace and enmity are thus opposites, somewhat like grace and law. The law stood as enmity between Jew and Gentile in that the Jews would not accept others except on the basis of law. Jesus removed this enmity (law) as the basis of union, thus making Jew and Gentile one. Whatever we place between ourselves and others as a basis for unity, except Jesus himself (peace), thus becomes enmity (law). Until this is removed by the love of Jesus unity is not possible. This is the theme we propose to develop.

This is Paul’s argument in Eph. 2:14-16: “For he is himself our peace. Gentiles and Jews, he has made the two one, and in his own body of flesh and blood has broken down the enmity which stood like a dividing wall between them; for he annulled the law with its rules and regulations, so as to create out of the two a single new humanity in himself, thereby making peace. This was his purpose, to reconcile the two in a single body to God through the cross, on which he killed the enmity.”

Jesus’ intention is that the enmity that keeps men from being brothers be removed, yea even destroyed. This he did by giving himself on the cross, which no one else could have done. He did not kill the law or even end it, for Paul could still refer to it as holy and good and useful. And Jesus himself said that his mission was to fulfill the law, not destroy it. But he did destroy the enmity that was related to the law. That is, men were looking to the law not only for justification, but as the basis for accepting others as God’s children. So the Gentiles were rejected because they were without law.

The law of course could not be kept, and so it was weak (Ro. 8:2) in that it could not bring one into fellowship with God. It helped to discipline a nation and it served as a tutor to bring men to Christ (Gal. 3:24), but it could never save for the simple reason that man could not fulfill all its demands. This is true of any law that man might look to for either peace or fellowship. Paul’s argument in Ro. 2 is that the Gentiles, who were without the law, did indeed have moral or natural law, to which they were obligated. And so they too were sinners in that they could not keep moral law any better than the Jews could keep revealed law. Man must have help. God does not save man simply by giving him laws, due to man’s sinful nature. God must give Himself. He must give a Helper. This is why He gave the gospel, man’s “way out” thus becoming a Person rather than dogmas.

This is the case with any rule, dogma, doctrine, creed, or opinion that I place between you and me as a basis of acceptance. Whether it be a dietary rule or sabbath regulation, as the Jews liked to do, or whether it be a method of doing missionary work or a particular interpretation of prophecy, it is made a law or condition upon which I base fellowship. God’s people can never keep such laws, for there is no end to them. With every sect demanding that all others yield to its own decrees there can never be peace, for this erects the same kind of wall of partition that Jesus came to remove. Law, whether given by God or whether of our own making (supposing them to be God’s), can never be any thing but enmity, separating men who should be together as brothers.

So Paul contends in Col. 2:14: “He has canceled the bond which pledged us to the decrees of the law. It stood against us, but he has set it aside, nailing it to the cross.” The bond is the handwritten decree of debt. It records our obligation to the law and tells of its demands upon us. It is against us in that there is no way for us to pay it on our own. God sent a Person to cancel the debt for us and to deliver us from it. It is this that he abolished, the death-demanding decrees of the law, and not the law per se. Jesus met the demands of the law, thus fulfilling it, and so abolishing a debt that would have spelled our doom. That was the enmity that he removed, and this he could do because he is God’s peace.

The enmity that Jesus removed was not therefore simply a feeling of malice that existed between Jew and Gentile, though the term sometimes has that force. It is true that the Jews thought of Gentiles as dogs and would have no association with them, and the Gentiles had their prejudices too. But this is not what the apostle has in mind when he says: “He has broken down the enmity which stood as a dividing wall between them.” The enmity, which stood like a fence, was law. This Jesus removed; that is, he removed it as the ground for fellowship or as the basis for unity. His peace, and only that, became the basis of unity and fellowship. Never would the two peoples have become “one new man” on the basis of either Jewish law or natural law.

Enmity remains the problem in our time. Not that we always hate our brothers with whom we differ, but because we allow law to stand as a fence between us, laws of our own creation or laws that we assume to be of God that we erect as conditions for unity and fellowship. A brother may harbor no ill will toward another; he may even love him. But if he does not accept him and become one with him in the Lord until he serves the Supper in a manner that conforms to his own idea, then there is enmity between them. It is likened to a partition or a fence. The enmity will remain so long as some dogma is made a condition of acceptance, for even if one conforms to the other and crosses to his side, the fence remains, separating them from all others who disagree on that point.

Jesus killed that enmity on the cross. Eph. 2:16 says he did. This means that he forever removed the law as the basis either of peace with God or fellowship between men. Even if I should be able to conform to your law, the two of us would not likely be able to conform to the laws of others, or we might have trouble lining up all the others on our side. The scene is familiar enough, with all of our sects demanding conformity to their own unique standards. Thank God that there is a way out! If we so will it, all such enmity ends on the cross for each one of us. When I declare myself free of all debts to the law because of what Jesus did for me, and when I affirm my liberation from all the creeds of men as the basis of fellowship, then I can be “one new man” with all those that lay claim only to that peace that Jesus gives. The choice is ours. We can spend our days in enmity, parroting some party line and talking about “the faithful church,” and die no better off than we began, thus missing the whole point of Jesus’ purpose on the cross. Or we can make Jesus our peace, allowing him to free us of our sectism, and thus make nothing a basis of unity and fellowship that God has not made a condition of sonship.

Peace is so beautiful. The ancient Greeks used the same word that the Spirit later employed, but they never thought of it as a relationship between men or even gods. It was no more than an interlude in the everlasting state of war. Or it was that apathy or state of mind produced by Stoic philosophy. The idea of peace being a person was never dreamed of, and we might wonder if even the modern church is not closer to the Greeks than to Paul in its view of peace. Peace is ours, not by what we do, but what we allow to be done for us. Peace is not ours by keeping laws and ordinances but by yielding to a Person.

With the term shalom the Jews moved much closer to the meaning of peace, though they hardly saw it as personal. It meant well-being, with a strong emphasis on the material side, and so the greeting Shalom! meant something like “to your good health.” But such gifts as health and wealth, which meant peace to them, were from God. And so God not only prospered man but saved him from tragedy. Amidst announced disasters God assures king Josiah: “I will gather you to your forefathers, and you will be gathered to your grave in peace (shalom); you will not live to see all the disaster which I am bringing upon this place” (2 Chron. 34:28).

The Spirit makes much more of peace in the New Covenant scriptures. While it is still a greeting, embracing all the Jews would have meant, it is now a fruit of the indwelling Spirit (Gal. 5:22) and the whole of the Christian mission is described as “the way of peace” (Lk. 1:79). “Peace on earth and goodwill toward men” thus became the intention of the gospel. It is noteworthy that Melchizedek, a priestly type of the Messiah, should be called “the king of peace” (Heb. 7:2). We do well to remember that our Lord is not only the head of the Body, but also the King of Peace, and of course the Prince of Peace. The church should thus be a haven of peace as much or more than anything else. It is unthinkable that God’s children should be oppressed not unlike that of Egyptian bondage while under the domain of the King of Peace.

There is something very special about the peace that Jesus gives: “Peace is my parting gift to you, my own peace, such as the world cannot give. Set your troubled hearts at rest, and banish your fears” (In. 14:27). It was this peace that the risen Christ spoke of in appearing to the apostles: “Late Sunday evening, when the disciples were together behind locked doors, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them. ‘Peace be with you!”he said, and then showed them his hands and his side” (Jn. 20:19). The text says they were filled with joy at seeing the Lord. Again he blessed them with “Peace be with you!”, and then he breathed on them, saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

Joy, peace, and the Holy Spirit are the heart of this great text, and Paul is satisfied to say that these form the substance of what God’s reign in men’s lives is all about: “The kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but justice, peace, and joy, inspired by the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 14:17). It is in this context that he urges us “Let us therefore cease judging one another.”

It is not to overstate the case to say, therefore, that we are given the Holy Spirit that we might have peace. In giving us peace the Spirit is really giving us Jesus, and it is this that shatters the enmity and takes away the fences of separation. He is our peace, and that peace reaches out to those “who are far off and those who are nigh.” Never would Jews and Gentiles become one had they waited for all the theological tangles to be unraveled. Nor did they debate their way to unity. Nor was it a matter of who would “give up” what. It was a matter of Jesus taking away enmity and replacing it with himself.

That word enmity, echthros in the Greek, is one that really stands up and walks. It primarily refers to the disposition of the heart, such as hatred and hostility. In Gal. 5:20 it is listed as a work of the flesh, translated enmity or hatred. Ro. 8:7 says that the carnal mind is enmity against God, and the same word is used in Jas. 4:4 in explaining that friendship with the world is enmity with God.

So the law is enmity in that it lacks the power to unite man to man or to reconcile man to God. It is a fence that must come down. How gracious is that truth that “he has broken down the enmity which stood like a dividing wall,” thus making it possible for us all to be brothers.

Surely Jesus did not take away one fence and then turn right around and authorize the erection of still more fences. He has given us the only ground for oneness: peace, which we have in his own Person through the indwelling Spirit. It is as men accept Jesus as the Lord of their lives that they become brothers and thus constitute the new humanity.

The church today must see that it only creates enmity when it makes any opinion or personal interpretation into a law. What is required for fellowship is clearly and distinctly stated in the scriptures. Paul answers the question of the basis of oneness by listing the seven unities of Eph. 4. In requiring others to conform to our dogmas, nearly always drawn from the silence of scripture, we are no less guilty than were those Jews who rejected the Gentiles over their law. Surely we have the right to our opinions, as does any congregation, but not to the point of making them tests of fellowship.

The choice is ours, peace or enmity. We can go on with our sectarian foolishness of trying to will each other over to our own faction, and thus remain separated on the ground that we only are right. Or we can allow Jesus to remove the enmity by removing the laws that we have made into partitions.

He is our peace, not our dogmas. How tragic that in missing his peace we have gone to pieces. It need not continue so. His peace will teach us that we can accept each other in love with all our hangups, just as he accepted us with all our hangups.—the Editor