God is a peace-loving God, and a peace-making God. The whole history of redemption, that climaxed in the death and resurrection of Jesus, is God’s strategy to bring about a just and lasting peace between rebellious man and himself. As Romans 5:1 says, “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,”

When the angelic choir proclaimed peace to the shepherds, they were not declaring a cease fire between truth and error. There was no summit where God and rebellious man ironed out their differences and agreed to disagree. No, the peace that the angels proclaimed was born out of the total victory of truth over error on the cross.

And so we need to see, as a foundational starting point, that peace with God comes first through surrender not a cease fire. The only way to be at peace with God is to surrender to Him. Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 2:14, But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, In the first century Roman world a triumphal procession was a Roman military parade in which the defeated, one-time enemies of Rome were paraded through the streets in chains as a trophy of the conquering power of Rome. So, when Paul says that Christ always lead us in triumphal procession, he is saying that he regarded himself as a trophy of God’s victorious, conquering power in Christ. He is celebrating the fact that he had been conquered and made to surrender. Paul was, amazingly, celebrating his defeat!!!

Paul understood himself as few men do. C. S. Lewis once said, “Fallen man is not simply an imperfect creature who needs improvement: He is a rebel who must lay down his arms.” Paul had been a rebel, and the gracious, merciful thing that God did for Him was to defeat Him in his rebellion. He was conquered and captured by the love of Jesus.