ISAIAH 2:4
He shall judge between the nations, and shall rebuke many people; they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.
Peace has always been an elusive prospect. The Columbia Dispatch reported in 1993 that cable TV mogul Ted Turner funded a competition to find a book that gave a workable plan for world peace. Turner said he wanted to see if anybody had a real vision of a future world at peace and harmony.
His quest ended in disappointment. He told an Atlanta gathering of news contributors to his Cable News Network’s “World Report” that, “With 10,000 manuscripts, we did not have one plausible treatise on how we could get to a sustainable, peaceful future.”
Apparently no one thought to check the Book of Isaiah. Here, God reveals that there is a day coming when wars will cease. This will not be the result of any plan proposed by the wisdom of man; it will come, instead, through the direct intervention of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Revelation 20: 1-3 foretells the imprisonment of Satan so that he “should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years were finished” (v. 3). During that time, the world will finally experience the peace it desperately needs. True peace can only come when the Prince of Peace brings it (Isa. 9:6).
We don’t have to wait that long, however, to experience personal peace. That’s available to you right now. When you trust Jesus Christ as Savior, you can have peace with God in your life immediately. The Bible says, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1).
World peace is a wonderful goal and it will be a great day when it happens, but personal peace right now is even greater. Peace among all the nations of the world will last only while Satan is imprisoned (Rev. 20:7-8). Our peace with God, on the other hand, will last forever (Ps. 16: 11; 1 Thess. 4: 17).
THERE HAS TO BE PEACE IN THE HEART BEFORE THERE CAN BE PEACE IN THE WORLD.
WOODROW KROLL
www.backtothebible.in