President Bush is gradually discovering that it costs more to preserve peace than to wage war. The rest of the world seems to have woken up to this fact earlier. Thousands of extra US troops have been committed to Iraq [bbc]. And the British troops already there will not be withdrawn any time soon.
It seems wrong that lives must be lost to keep peace. Surely peacekeepers should beat swords into ploughshares, as the UN motto (and the Bible before it) says so eloquently?
Peace on earth is so elusive to win, so delicate to maintain. If this is true on an international scale, then how much more so on an individual scale? Personal peace is what we desperately crave, yet find so hard to attain.
God promises us the peace we want and need so much. We can know "peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Christ is God's peace broker. He obtained that peace "through the blood of His cross." The recurring theme - peace comes at the highest cost - rings true for God's peace as for man's. But there the similarity ends. Unlike our fragility, God's peace is unbreakable and eternal.
How can we find this peace? At the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ ... like the woman in Mark 5, come to him with all your problems, reach out for his help, trust in him and hear his voice "Go in peace, your faith has made you better."
