outWORD by Matte Downey

What is peace? We talk about Jesus being the Prince of Peace, a peaceable ruler of a peaceable kingdom, but what exactly does that mean? What does it look like? And how do we participate in it? We may associate peace with a lack of conflict, or being free from burdens and constraints, or stillness, or wholeness, or agreement. I will not try to define peace here, but simply offer 14 snapshots (scripture, story, litany, reading, song) to consider. I invite you to engage with each section by taking a moment to meditate on it, paying attention to the words and ideas and images which stand out to you. In the scripture verses, I have highlighted the words that relate to peace, just to give a focal point. I invite you to enter into peace. 1. "For a child is born to us, a son is given to us. The government will rest on his shoulders. And he will be called: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. His government and its peace will never end . He wil...

We find many names for Jesus in the witness of Scripture. There are names which Jesus gave himself (Son of Man, bread of life, good shepherd, the way, the truth, the life, etc.) and there are names which others bestowed on Jesus. I want to look a little closer at the latter. We find three of them in the account of his birth in Matthew 1:18-23. Here Jesus is identified as the Messiah (v. 18), Jesus (v. 20), and Immanuel (v. 23). In the Hebrew culture, names did not simply identify or distinguish a person; they expressed something about their character and nature. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Hebrew Bible contains more than sixty names for the God of Israel ( Names of God ). Names also reflected the time or context into which a child was born. Though Jesus was given a rather unremarkable first-century Hebrew name, it reflected the prophetic cry of the people at the time. The Jews were longing for God to intervene, to rescue them from Roman occupation and oppressive circum...

I sometimes think: if I had been living in the first century, I would have been an eager follower of Jesus of Nazareth. But I am not so sure. The gospel accounts reveal how hard it was for people to reconcile what they imagined the Messiah would be like with the rather unremarkable son of Joseph. Even the disciples were often unsure about the identity of their teacher, especially when things went horribly wrong during the Passover celebration. Before they could really grasp the severity of the situation, Jesus was arrested and executed. Not surprisingly, most of them scattered. Jesus was gone. His death - a public, ignoble affair - dealt the final blow. Their loyalty was now a cause for mockery. Their constant companion for the past three years was no longer with them. Or so they thought. In the thick of all their disappointment and grief, they failed to see what Jesus had been trying to show them all along: that the Messiah came to serve and to love, even when it cost him his life...