By Charlotte Condia
THE GOD OF PEACE
May grace and Peace be yours in ABUNDANCE. God BRINGS the BLESSINGS of Peace to all nations and all people. Do His will, and you will be COMPLETE in everything good.
DEPART in Peace for a harvest of righteousness is sown for those who make Peace. God gives us an EVERLASTING Peace for the EARTH which can be ENJOYED. Peace flows as a river from the Rock and FOUNDATION of Life.
GOD, the HEAVENLY Teacher of Peace, creates us in His IMAGE, and fills us with all JOY. We seek his everlasting KINGDOM which is above all strife.
God, the Father of peace, fills our hearts with LOVE, LIFE and MERCY.
NO Peace is chaos; Peace is ORDER.
God gave us His Son, the King of PEACE, the PRINCE of Life. Such a PEACE the world cannot take away.
Peace is sometimes QUIET, sometimes jubilant. It RESTORES AND RECONCILES all things and is SAFETY and SANCTUARY.
TRUTH is peaceable.
God gives us Peace, love and UNITY. He is not a God of VENGEANCE but One who fills our hearts with WISDOM. The name of the Eternal eXalted God is Peace.
GOD’S PLAN FOR THE WAY TO LIVE A PEACEFUL LIFE.
George Fox believes that God, who loves us with an unlimited love, has a plan for each of us to live peacefully in a violent world.
1. We are created in the image of God so we can be like Him peaceful, loving and good.
2. Christ lives within us as the Light and we are enlightened by Him; Christ the King, the Lamb, is the sovereign ruler of the universe
3. God is our Father. We are created in His image and He lives within us as the Light so we are members of His family. This makes everyone equal. Men and women of every religion, skin color and ethnicity participate in this equality.
4. We can witness too, and “answer the peace and goodness in all persons.”
5. We live in God’s peaceful Kingdom on earth; we will live in God’s heavenly Kingdom for eternity.
CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD
God creates us in His image so we can be like Him peaceful, loving and good; we are in the Image of God in that we can be pure, holy, and righteous. These are moral characteristics. What Fox is telling us is that we can live good moral lives. An image is a copy though for we certainly are not God. However, we are in God’s image in that we know right from wrong, good from evil. We are capable of loving others, of living a peaceful life.
CHRIST LIVES WITHIN US AS THE LIGHT
Christ lives within us as the Light and gives us knowledge and understanding. Fox’s primary belief and the central belief of the Religious Society of Friends is that Christ Jesus said, “I am the way who doth enlighten every man that cometh into the world, and no man cometh to the Father but by me, every man having a light from Christ the way which leads to the Father.” Christ has many names but His true and best name is Christ the Light who has enlightened every man and woman who come into the world.
The true Light comes from God the Father and is glorified with the Father of Light. The Light enlightens every man and woman in the world but the Light is not of the world, being immortal and eternal. The Light gives knowledge of God by whom the world was made. Men and women do wrong things because they do not affirm their faith in the Light.
The Light lives within everyone, helps them, shows them what is right and wrong. Everyone should stand still in Him who discovers all things and makes them readily seen and understood. All sinners must be brought to the Light, for the Light reconciles sinners to God and to one another. The Light destroys the devil, the author of darkness, who is out of the truth.
The Light is the healer. He is concerned for all hurting, weary, sick, sinful humans. He is the binder up of the broken, restorer and seeker of the lost; he brings back those who are driven away. He is the Mediator between God and man, reconciles us to God, justifies us to God, breaks our bonds of iniquity and blots out our sin.
EQUALITY
God is our Father. We are created in His image and He lives within us as the Light so we are members of His family. This makes everyone equal. Men and women of every religion, skin color and ethnicity participate in this equality. In Letter 360 written in 1679 Fox gives a concise, clear statement of his position on genuine equality for men and women. There are no gender barriers to getting to know and love God. “God pours forth his spirit upon all flesh.” We are all sons and daughters of God. There may be great ethnic diversity and religious experience but there are no arbitrary intermediaries to cut women off from God, or men either.
Equality does not mean some sort of unisex to Fox. Men are men; women are women. Women and men, wife and husband, are like Eve and Adam before they fell. Help- meet in righteousness, made in the Image and likeness of God. Help-meets is an expression used in the King James version of the Bible. A modern translation of the Hebrew might be colleague, allies, co worker. This is not a relationship of a superior and an inferior being but help-meets, husband and wife, sharing, helping each other.
In a world in which people behave as if they are created in God’s image, there would be genuine equality for all. Everyone would be free to do God’s will in their lives; they would be creative and live up to the image of God within them.
ANSWER THE GOD WITHIN EACH PERSON.
We can witness too, and “answer the peace and goodness in all persons.” Answering means finding the God or the Good within every person; the truth and goodness within one person speaks to the truth and goodness in the other person. We can understand others, have empathy with them. We can witness too, and answer the peace and goodness in everyone. Friends first job in behaving toward others is to answer that of God in them and to witness to the life of God in themselves. Even captives have the responsibility of answering that of God in others. All persons deserve this respect and courtesy. Using inclusive, universal language Fox tells us to answer that of God, the good in all, in our words and lives in everyone. In other words, we must answer that which is equal, just and true in ourselves and in every other man and woman.
Fox also believes that each of us has authority from God to know His Power which shall never be shaken nor changed. We should answer the witness of God in everyone through this authority. We can also understand the power and authority of darkness through the God of Power. To make this all work God gives us the gift of an endless life, to live with Him forever.
Friends are to spread God’s blessed Truth abroad, and answer it in all people; they are to walk cheerfully over the world, answering that of God in every one. Friends should answer the Light and Truth in every man and woman, especially those who are oppressed.
Fox believes that all the problem in the world can be solved if we answer and witness to the God and the Good within everyone. For healing comes when everyone is brought to the Light who answers the principle of God in all. All sinners must see the good in themselves and in others.
However if people do not believe in Christ the Light; if they are out of the Image of God, out of the life of God, out of the True Covenant, out of the True Church; if they are out of the doctrine of Christ which says love your enemies, there will be violence and war.
THE KINGDOM OF GOD
We are to live in God’s kingdom now and with him for eternity. All Friends everywhere are to keep out of wars. For those who pretend to fight with carnal weapons for Christ are deceived. His warriors only fight with spiritual weapons. Friends are called to Christ’s peace. For his kingdom is not of this world, therefore his servants do not fight.
We are to seek the glorious Kingdom of God, which stands in righteousness and holiness. His kingdom has both “come” and is “coming” to those who give him first place in their lives and loyalties. It is “come;” present within each person who consciously tries to do what God wants them to do with their lives, and who give Christ first place in their lives and loyalties. The Kingdom is also “come” with Christ reigning over the world. The Kingdom “coming.” is the final stage of humanity. The petition: “Thy kingdom come” from the Lord’s prayer indicates that Christ thought of the Kingdom in terms of the future. Fox does too. This Kingdom is never to be destroyed. God’s goodness becomes the everyday standard for the universe. The Kingdom is not a human kingdom but spiritual and eternal. Christ, the conquering King of judgement becomes Christ the conquering Lamb who will conquer all evil whether individual or universal.
We must seek and enjoy the everlasting Kingdom of Peace in which we come to know peace and the end of war. In the Kingdom of Peace all people live in harmony and neighborliness. Friends live in the Peaceable Kingdom of Christ Jesus. (The Peaceable Kingdom is the vision of all people living in harmony and neighborliness, seeking the good and welfare of all.) We are to live in and mind the kingdom of Christ the Prince of Peace and not meddle with the powers of the earth. We are not of this unrighteous world but are heirs of an eternal kingdom where no corruptible thing enters. Our weapons are spiritual yet mighty. Through them the strongholds of the devil, the author of wars, fighting, murder, and plots, will be destroyed.
