All hell was about to break loose in coming hours for Jesus and His disciples. Jesus, knowing what lay before Him, spoke words of life and hope that would be desperately needed in the coming hours. He sat among these men who loved Him and had promised to follow Him, even into death, and gave them this promise and command: “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27).
Peace versus trouble are the juxtaposing realities that Jesus sets before us. He said, “In this world we will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” Tribulation lay just hours ahead of Jesus, yet He turned His eyes, as well as the eyes of His disciples to the Father, focusing on that which is eternally good and away from that which is but a momentary affliction.
The word peace in this passage is eirḗnē (from eirō, “to join, tie together into a whole”) – properly, wholeness, i.e. when all essential parts are joined together; peace (God’s gift of wholeness).
Whereas, the opposing word, troubled is tarássō – properly, put in motion (to agitate back-and-forth, shake to-and-fro); (figuratively) to set in motion what needs to remain still (at ease); to “trouble” (“agitate”), causing inner perplexity (emotional agitation) from getting too stirred up inside (“upset”).
Satan will literally shake us, agitating our lives, creating turmoil and unrest through circumstance, leaving our minds disturbed. One can imagine taking a completed puzzle and shaking it so that the image is no longer cohesive.
Jesus’ words brings us back to a place of equilibrium, where He takes the broken, scattered pieces and restores them to wholeness, to peace. No one and nothing else can bring such serenity into a horrifying life situation but Jesus Christ.
“How does the world give peace? If you were troubled and you went to a doctor who was not a Christian and asked him, What can I do to gain peace? What would he tell you?
Take a trip. Go to Hawaii. Get away from it all. In other words, Change your circumstances. Go to a place where nothing bothers you, where everything is peaceful around you. Then you can be at peace.
But Jesus says, I give peace right in the midst of trouble, right in the midst of distress and turmoil and heartache and pressure. I can impart peace to your heart right there, and not as the world gives. Why? Because we can return to that basic relationship we have–You in Me, and I in you. Out of that comes the guarantee that He is working out His purposes. He will bring us to the end of the trouble. He will still the storm and quiet the waves. We rest in the boat, content, knowing, no water can swallow the ship, where lies the Master of ocean and earth and sky. That is peace. (Ray Steadman).
Christ spoke these words before He endured the worst beating and death a human being could ever suffer. These were not platitudes that sounded sweet at the end of their Passover meal, but rather a bolstering of truth and faith that would help His disciples and us today walk through our own valleys of the shadow of death. We can choose to put our eyes on Jesus when life’s storms run their course, or we can let our minds and hearts be the devil’s playground stealing our peace and hope.
Jesus gives us His promise of peace, but we must make the choice to seize it. He commands us to not have a troubled heart and that is an action we must take, through the power of the Holy Spirit. Peace is ours in all circumstances, but we must claim it as ours, knowing Christ’s promises are sure and true.