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HG Wells was a visionary author born in 1866 a Victorian through and through, and yet in his writing he foresaw many things about the 20th century. He’s known as the father of science fiction, and yet actually what he predicted much of it became fact. And so he predicted space travel and nuclear weapons and satellites, and even something approaching the internet.

He was right about many things. However, it was him who described the Great War of 1914 to 1918 as the war to end All Wars, and he couldn’t have been more wrong. You may know that the 20th century was the bloodiest in the whole of human history. More people died as a result of conflict in that century than in all the centuries that went before.

And for all of our technological miracles, it seems that we are no closer to peace. Jesus said Blessed are the peacemakers. And our world needs peacemakers more than ever. So we are doing this lovely autumn series on the fruits of the spirit, and it seems very fitting for this season of mist and mellow fruitfulness.

But don’t make the mistake of thinking that these things are sentimental. The subjects of love and joy and peace are actually very serious indeed. Not least when you consider what their absence looks like, and there is none more so than our subject this evening, which is peace. Our reading was from the wonderful epistle to the Ephesians, but notice this.

When the Bible talks about peace, it is not simply talking about a sort of subjective feeling of peace, but actual peace. Actual reconciliation between alienated parties. Verse 14 says, for Christ is our peace. Who has made us one and who has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility. The foundation of peace needs to be real peace, and the early church was an amazing force for peace in the world.

Age old conflicts between people and tribes were being overcome. It was the Ecclesia, the Gathering. It was a new people of God where people were citizens of God’s kingdom. And it broke down old divisions of race. It broke down divisions between rich and poor, slave and free male and female, Jew and Gentile.

The old enmities between people were being broken down, and it did so through the gospel of Jesus Christ. Verse 17, Jesus came and preached peace to us who were far away and peace to those who were near. Through him we both have access to the Father by one spirit. Do you see that the diagnosis of scripture is that the conflict and division that we experience, not just in ourselves but between us as people, is rooted in actual fact in our alienation from God.

Verse 18. Through him, we both have access to the father by one spirit. Our tendency is always to point the finger to blame others for the problems that we see. But Jesus says there is no them and us. The world is not made up of good and bad, but it is all of us, we all like sheep have gone astray. Each of us has turned to our own way.

There’s a wonderful story you might know about a time when the newspaper, the Times of London sent out an inquiry to leading intellectuals of the day and asked the question, what’s wrong with the world? And you might ask the same question in this day and age.

And the brilliant author, GK Chesterton, wrote back and simply responded, dear Sirs, I am. Yours sincerely, GK Chesterton.

The heart of the human problem is the problem of the human heart. Our tendency is to blame. This is where the problem lies. If we want peace in our world, in our communities, in our relationships, in ourselves, we need to start not with the problem out there, but with the problem in here. People sometimes say, well, I’m only human, and when you make mistakes, say, well, you know what’s to be expected, but according to Jesus, that is exactly the problem.

Our natural human condition is one of alienation from God of rebellion against him. We want our own way. We reject God’s just and gentle rule, and we elevate ourselves above everyone else, even above God. And the conflict in our world is an outworking of that, the clash of human pride, our greed and our envy, and our anger.

These things that the Bible calls the works of our fallen nature. But it’s also universal that we think that it’s normal. But the good news is that God has not left us to our own devices. It’s a little early in the season for this, but do you remember the angels? Who arrived to visit the shepherds at Christmas time.

And they say to them, they say these words. Peace on earth and goodwill towards all people. Because that’s the beginning. That is the olive branch. That is God’s plan for bringing peace to human beings beginning. It’s God’s astonishing intervention in the world to be born as a child in occupied territory, to live a life of grace and truth and peace, and open up a way of reconciliation with God through his own body, through his death on a cross. Verse 16. And in one body to reconcile us to God through the cross by which he put to death our hostility.

This is the gospel. This is the good news. You want peace? Start here. Repent and believe. The reason why the early church was able to overcome the clashes of difference amongst them was because they recognised that they were all responsible. Don’t point the finger. Take responsibility for yourself. Repent and believe the good news.

So what Jesus teaches us is that peace comes first and foremost through reconciliation with God, and then with others. But the consequence of that is wonderful. Very often when people become Christians, particularly after quite a long time. Their first experience is a profound experience of peace, as if years of conflict and alienation sort of ebb away and are replaced by a sense of joy and peace, and that’s a precious thing.

We find a new identity, a new belonging, a new citizenship in Christ, and through his spirit, we are being remade in God’s image. Verse 15, his purpose was to create in himself one new humanity. It’s not that I’m only human, it’s that I’m being remade through the spirit of God into his new humanity.

And it’s a wonderful thing to know that as you discover that experience of God’s peace, it can be found in even the hardest times and the darkest circumstances. You can learn to treasure it, to seek it above all things, to know when you’ve lost it and to return to God in order to find it once more. But of course, the truth is, in a world like this, we need to practise peace. Never take it for granted. Some woman said, peace isn’t the absence of conflict. It’s the ability to handle conflict by peaceful means. There will never be a situation where there aren’t difficulties, where people don’t trouble us, but the ability to handle that with grace and truth means that we can live together in peace.

We said last week that if you wanna get warm, you need to stand by the fire. If you want joy and peace, you need to stay close to the source of them. Day by day we practise peace by being close to the source, to God himself. I’m also struck that peace comes through letting God be God. So all too often our difficulty is that we want to be in control.

And I think there is a real peace that comes through simply allowing ourselves to say to God, thy will be done not mine. Thy kingdom come, not mine. Let God be God. He’s far better at it than you or I are. Allow his word to speak to you and to guide you and to console and to shape you. And trust him that his purposes for your life are for your good and your happiness and your peace.

One final thing. Peace comes through forgiveness. It comes through finding forgiveness in Christ and recognising our own need for forgiveness. But then it also comes through taking seriously Jesus’ demand that we forgive as we have been forgiven. There is nothing more likely to rob us of our peace than unforgiveness.

Have you been wronged? Have you been hurt? And it felt like the person who did that just got away with it? I understand. I really do. And more importantly, Jesus understands. But what Jesus would say is that justice is God’s job, not yours. And that if you can trust him to worry about that for you, and you can learn to forgive, there is peace to be found.

Unforgiveness hurts nobody except you. Peace is one of the fruits of the spirit. It comes from being reconciled to God through Christ. It can be experienced day by day through the practice of the presence of God, and it’s from that experience of peace that we can offer it to others. We can build communities of peace, and this church is a community just like that.

And in the way that we love one another, in our patience and our welcome in our generosity to one another, in the grace with which we treat one another, and especially that we treat those who are different from us. So we are practising that peace of Christ because in him, the whole building is joined together, says verse 21, and it rises to become a holy temple in the Lord.

And that is what you are. You are being built together to become a dwelling place in which God lives, by his spirit and where the spirit is, there is peace. And so may the peace of God, which transcends understanding, keep your hearts and your minds in the knowledge and love of Christ. Amen.