One of the often-misinterpreted dualities is when something is an action or state. For example, emotions are actions that are taken, but prolonged persistence of those actions yields a state. That protracted amount of action is what causes someone to be known as a happy, sad, or angry person. However, there are some things that cannot be anything than what they are. When Solomon wrote about the times and seasons in Ecclesiastes 3, he talked about times to do certain things. Sometimes it was a time to laugh, sometime to weep, rend, sow, etc. In all of these actions, he said there is a time “to” do these things. However, when he got to war and peace in the list, they are prefaced differently than anything else. It is either a time “of” war, or it is a time “of” peace. War and peace are inherently not actions but states of being. One cannot truly be somewhere in between. For example, if the time is looking at laughing or weeping, it could be neither one. Same with sowing and rending, gathering stones, casting them away, etc. We can live in between these actions and often do. However, the states of war and peace are perpetual for as long as life here exists.
Warfare: To God’s family here on earth, there are many adversaries. They don’t rest, take vacations, etc. The devil is doing just as he did in Job’s day. He walks up and down this earth, going to and fro, seeking whom he may devour. We don’t shed the depravity of our Adamic nature until the day it is laid down in death or the Lord’s return. As such, every day is a fight with the enemies both without and within. On the other hand, to live in peace with these enemies is to be at enmity with God. Before regeneration, our every fiber of being was at odds with God and therefore, at war with Him. To those who know Him not and are not His, they remain at enmity with Him all their days. (Romans 8:6) Therefore, whether someone is a child of God or not, there is a warfare though the enemies are different.
Peace: This is perhaps harder to scope than warfare. Some describe peace as the “absence of conflict.” That is a dim and limited view of what peace is really about. After all, if decades of “cold” war between the US and USSR displayed, war was ongoing even when the conflict wasn’t openly brimming or festering. True peace is not the same thing as a ceasefire or armistice. Real peace can only come from the Prince of Peace, and that is why it is listed part of the nine-fold fruit of the Spirit. (Galatians 5:22-23) While real warfare is something common to all men of every stripe, real peace can only found by those in God’s family. A natural man may not have open hostility towards another, but that “peace” is only as good as the last moment, most recent favor, etc. Such is the state with nations. The US and USSR were allies together against the Axis forces in WWII, but quickly after that war was done, they were at odds for the next 40+ years. Abiding peace is only found when our minds are stayed on Him. (Isaiah 26:3)
Duality of Both: If the above sections are true, then it is quite clear that a regenerated child of God will live with the duality of war and peace at the same time. What pleases the flesh will trouble the spirit and vice versa. Even when in seeming peace with the people of Sodom, Lot was inwardly tormented in his righteous soul. (II Peter 2:8) When a child of God is walking in Zion in accordance with God’s laws and commands, he will find trouble and persecution without. (II Timothy 3:12) If our goal is a state of peace as defined by an absence of conflict, then we will never get there from here. However, walking in meekness and lowliness like our Prince did, we can have peace even when there are conflicts all around. I have no doubt as Scripture declares that Jesus got troubled in His Spirit, He groaned, became angry (even to the point of whipping people), sighed, etc., but in all of these things, He never shed His glorious title as the abiding peace of doing always those things which please His Father was a constant in His life. We can never find true absence of all conflict in this world, but we can find real peace and the comforts from home even in the midst of our warfare against this old world, spiritual wickedness, principalities, and powers.
Friends, our perspective and expectation will shape a lot of what we find. If our goal is just to avoid conflict, we will end up crying “peace, peace” even if there is no peace. But, if we meet the troubles of this life, our enemies, and the vain corruptions of our old flesh head-on, we can realize peace in a chaotic world. As soldiers of the cross, we will find quiet peace and fortitude walking with our God. Some of the most peaceful and contented people I’ve ever known in my life were the ones that lived through some of the hardest situations in life. People who had lost loved ones in the brutal and cold ways this world brings at us, were actual veterans of real wars, or saw some of the vilest examples of depravity before their very eyes. By the same token, some of the most restless and fitful people I’ve ever known saw and lived through the same things. Therefore, real peace in the midst of war is not about what you face but how you face it. Whatever circumstance we have to walk through and endure, may we constantly look to Him for the real and lasting peace we can have until that day we go to the land that knows only peace as the sound of war will be heard no more in that great city called heaven.