April 21: Peace to You
♫ Music:
Day 48 - Monday, April 21
Title: Peace to You
Scripture: John 20:19–23 (NKJV)
Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be with you.” When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”
Poetry & Poet:
“Making Peace”
by Denise Levertov
A voice from the dark called out,
‘The poets must give us
imagination of peace, to oust the intense, familiar
imagination of disaster. Peace, not only
the absence of war.’
But peace, like a poem,
is not there ahead of itself,
can’t be imagined before it is made,
can’t be known except
in the words of its making,
grammar of justice,
syntax of mutual aid.
A feeling towards it,
dimly sensing a rhythm, is all we have
until we begin to utter its metaphors,
learning them as we speak.
A line of peace might appear
if we restructured the sentence our lives are making,
revoked its reaffirmation of profit and power,
questioned our needs, allowed
long pauses . . .
A cadence of peace might balance its weight
on that different fulcrum; peace, a presence,
an energy field more intense than war,
might pulse then,
stanza by stanza into the world,
each act of living
one of its words, each word
a vibration of light—facets
of the forming crystal.
PEACE TO YOU
Today’s passage is Jesus’ post-resurrection appearance to his disciples, in which he issues a greeting of peace (twice) and bestows the Holy Spirit. These words are gifts to the disciples present in the room, and they are gifts to us over 2000 years later. This passage does not exist on its own but exists within the context of John’s Gospel. The words of Jesus highlighted here––the greeting of peace and the bestowing of the Holy Spirit - have been consistently present in Jesus’ teaching prior to his post-resurrection arrival in the locked room.
Jesus tells his disciples in John 14:27, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you” and goes on to note that his peace is different than the world’s peace. His peace, Jesus instructs, is so that our hearts aren’t troubled or afraid. Several chapters later, Jesus tells his disciples “When the Spirit of truth comes; he will guide you into all the truth. For he will not speak on his own, but he will speak whatever he hears...he will glorify me because he will take from what is mine & declare it to you.” (16: 13,14)
Jesus’ post-resurrection proclamations of peace and of the arrival of the Holy Spirit are consistent with his teaching and with his nature. Prior to his death, Jesus prayed to the Lord that current and future believers would be unified in each other and in the Trinity so that the world would know the truth. (John 17:20) When Jesus appears to the disciples in the locked room with a greeting of peace and an issuing of the Spirit, these words are also meant for our edification as believers today. (Romans 15:4) There is much more in this passage beyond what has been highlighted in this devotion. You are encouraged to contemplate and pray over the work of the Spirit in our lives and meditate on the nature of Jesus’ peace.
The creative arts are often prisms by which we can see different reflections of the truth, and there are wonderful expressions of truth in today’s selections. The author of the book of Hebrews writes that “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature...” (1:3). Radiance brings to mind light and wonder, and Rembrandt’s Christ Appearing to His Disciples provides a physical depiction of Jesus’ radiance. “Peace Over You” by Here be Lions contextualizes Jesus’ promises of peace into our daily lives, reminding us that “You don't have to fear the future, this is our confidence / that the God who holds forever is not finished with you yet.” Denise Levertov’s “Making Peace” forces us to consider the “cadence of peace,” and as Christians, we must conclude that Jesus’ peace supersedes all.
Prayer:
Father God, we thank you for Jesus’ consistency in word, thought, and action. We rejoice because you sent Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. We praise you for the peace that surpasses understanding and pray that the Holy Spirit would work in us for your glory.
Amen.
Stacie Schmidt
Law Librarian
For more information about the artwork, music, and poetry selected for this day, we have provided resources under the “About” tab located next to the “Devotional” tab.
About the Art:
Christ Appearing to His Disciples
Rembrandt
1656
Etching and drypoint
16.4 x 20.8 cm
Metropolitan Museum of Art
New York, New York
Public Domain
This etching is by Rembrandt and depicts Christ, surrounded by a ring of bright light, amid kneeling and standing followers after His crucifixion and resurrection. According to the Bible, Jesus appeared to His disciples and others eleven times after His resurrection. These appearances took place over a forty-day period and helped strengthen the disciples’ faith and substantiate the claim of Jesus’ resurrection.
About the Artist:
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606–1669) was a Dutch draftsman, painter, and printmaker. He is generally considered one of the greatest visual artists in the history of art and the most important in Dutch art history. Unlike the art of most Dutch masters of the seventeenth century, Rembrandt’s works depict a wide range of style and subject matter, from portraits and self-portraits to landscapes, genre scenes, allegorical and historical scenes, and biblical and mythological themes. His contributions to art came in a period of great wealth and cultural achievement that historians call the “Dutch Golden Age.” Having achieved youthful success as a portrait painter, Rembrandt’s later years were marked by personal tragedy and financial hardships. Rembrandt’s portraits of his contemporaries, self-portraits, and illustrations of scenes from the Bible are regarded as his greatest creative triumphs. His self-portraits form a unique and intimate autobiography, in which the artist surveyed himself without vanity and with the utmost sincerity. Rembrandt’s foremost contribution in the history of printmaking was his transformation of the etching process from a relatively new reproductive technique into a true art form. Because of his empathy for the human condition, he has been called one of the greatest storytellers in the history of art, possessing an exceptional ability to render people in their various moods and dramatic guises. Rembrandt is also known as a painter of light and as an artist who favored an uncompromising realism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rembrandt
https://www.biography.com/artist/rembrandt
About the Music: “Peace Over You” from the album Still God, Still Good
Lyrics:
I know the battles raging
I know your body’s weak.
But I also know that heaven
Is much closer than you think.
He’s in the air you’re breathing.
He’s there in the unknown.
So, you don’t have to worry.
Just grab His hand and don’t let go.
And I speak peace, peace
To come into the room.
I speak peace, peace over you.
I speak life, life to come into the room.
I speak life, life over you.
And I know it’s suffocating,
When sickness weighs you down.
But it’s not yours to carry
So, let it go right now.
You don’t have to fear the future
This is our confidence.
That the God who holds forever
Is not finished with you yet.
So, I speak hope, hope,
To come into the room.
I speak hope, hope over you.
And I speak joy, joy,
To come into the room
I speak joy, joy over you.
Cause I’ve known His freedom.
And I’ve felt His power.
And I know that time and time again
He has come through
And I’ve known His healing
And I’ve seen His fire.
So, I’m asking Him to come and flood the room.
And I speak peace, peace,
To come into the room.
I speak peace, peace over you.
And I speak life, life
To come into the room.
I speak life, life over you.
I speak peace, peace
To come into the room
I speak peace, peace over you.
And I speak life, so much life,
To come into the room.
I speak life, life over you.
You don’t have to fear the future.
In this I’m confident.
Cause death is just a shadow,
And You will rise again.
You will rise again.
About the Composers: Dustin Smith and James Galbraith
Dustin Ray Smith (b. 1975) is an American Christian musician. His first release with Integrity Music was in 2012: You Are the Fire. This album was his breakthrough release upon the Billboard magazine Heatseekers Albums chart. The subsequent release, Rushing Waters, was just a re-release of You Are the Fire with a bonus DVD disc, but minus the three studio tracks. It failed to chart. In 2014, he released a fresh album, called Coming Alive, and this charted on the aforementioned chart alongside a charting on the Christian Albums chart. Dustin formed the music group Here Be Lions with his wife and others. He and his wife, Jeanna, are now the Pastors at Hope UC Nashville.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dustin_Smith
https://herebelions.org/
James Galbraith is a dynamic and creative pastor whose passion for inspiring and empowering individuals to become the best versions of themselves has made him a leader in his community. With a unique sense of humor and a gift for storytelling, James has a way of making complex theological concepts accessible and relatable to people of all ages and backgrounds. After traveling and helping build churches around the world, James landed in Nashville as a guitarist/songwriter for the band Here Be Lions, where he quickly became known for his innovative approach to ministry. Today, James serves as the creative/worship pastor of Hope UC Nashville. His vision for building a vibrant, connected community continues to inspire and transform lives, and he remains committed to empowering others to be the best they can be, both in their spiritual and personal lives.
https://worshipleader.com/author/james-galbraith/
About the Performers:
Here Be Lions is a ministry collective focused on discipleship, music, and community. The collective takes its name from the old mapping tradition in which explorers marked unknown, dangerous territory with a symbol and the phrase “Here Be Lions.” Originally meant as a warning, the phrase has become a call for the group to advance God’s kingdom, authority, and order. They do so through three ministry outreaches: Be Fierce, a discipleship resource for families; All About Worship, a resource for churches; and Healing Is Right, a resource for the sick and hurting. The Here Be Lions worship team, led by pastor and worship leader Dustin Smith, aims to create music that welcomes the power and presence of God in expectation of a supernatural move of the Father to bring salvation, healing, and restoration. Here Be Lions’ debut live album, Only A Holy God (Integrity Music), including worship favorite "Power When We Worship," released in 2018. Their sophomore project and EP, I Speak Jesus was released in 2019.
https://www.herebelions.org/
About the Poetry and Poet:
Denise Levertov (1923–1997) was educated entirely at home and claimed to have decided to become a writer at the age of five. When she was twelve, she sent some of her poetry to T. S. Eliot, who responded by encouraging her to continue writing. At age seventeen, she had her first poem published in Poetry Quarterly. Her poems of the 1950s won her widespread recognition and her book With Eyes at the Back of Our Heads (1959) established her as one of the great American poets. Levertov went on to publish more than twenty volumes of poetry, and was also the author of four books of prose. Levertov’s conversion to Christianity in 1984 was the impetus for her religious poetry. In 1997, she brought together thirty-eight poems from seven of her earlier volumes in The Stream & the Sapphire, a collection intended, as Levertov explains in the foreword to the collection, to "trace my slow movement from agnosticism to Christian faith, a movement incorporating much doubt and questioning as well as affirmation."
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/denise-levertov
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denise_Levertov
About the Devotion Writer:
Stacie Schmidt
Law Librarian
Stacie Schmidt is a law librarian. She loves solving difficult research questions, finding the best hole-in-the-wall restaurants, and dialoguing about film. Her favorite book of the Bible is Hebrews.