Let the peace of God rule

https://odb.org/2025/02/28/common-ground-2

Colossians 3:12–17 (NIV):
12 Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. 13 Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 14 And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. 15 Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body, you were called to peace. And be thankful. 16 Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. 17 And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

I just saw a short dashcam video of a Honda CRV trying to get ahead of a Perodua Myvi in busy crawling traffic because the Myvi had earlier overtaken it. At one point, the CRV driver even got down from the car. Fortunately, nothing untoward happened as he had to get back into his car when the traffic moved on. I’m sure we have seen before such theatrics being played out, or perhaps we ourselves could have been the perpetrators. Not so much of the faster time but more of the ego of sometimes not accepting that someone else has overtaken us and took a place ahead of us. Actually, so what if we are one car behind? The time difference to arrival at our destination is probably just 10 seconds! But still, we sometimes find it difficult to let it go. We want to get ahead nevertheless. We want to win.

But as believers, we are supposed to be peacemakers and not become an instigator of trouble or conflict or turmoil. Don’t become the troublemaker or the trouble itself! Instead, we are to be peaceful in any situation. Like Paul taught in Colossians 3:15, let the peace of God rule in our hearts since, as members of one body, we are called to peace. We are not to create discord, strife, or unrest. We are not to get into fights. Let the peace of God rule and take control. Because one thing may lead to another, and we may end up in a bad situation. There could be consequences which we could have avoided. I still remember a traffic skirmish led to a driver wielding a machete on an accountant who had a severed carotid artery and bled to death. As it turned out, the culprit was likely an underworld figure as he was using false plates and was never found.

Let the peace of God rule. We don’t need to win that argument. We don’t need to be ahead. Make our point and let it go. Not everyone will agree with us.

Have a good weekend, everyone! May we experience the peace of God that surpasses all understanding as we worship Him this Sunday, and may we be an instrument of the peace of God in all situations! Amen!