or. The sea is not
stagnant, though it be calm. There will be the slow heave of the calm
billow, and the wavelets may sparkle in the sunlight, though they be
still from all the winds that rave. Deep in every human heart, in yours
and mine, brother, is this cry for rest and peace. Let us see to it that
we do not mistranslate the meaning of the longing, or fancy that it can
be found in the ignoble, the selfish, the worldly ways to which I have
referred. We want, most of all, peace in our inmost hearts.

II. Then the second thing to be suggested here is that the Lord of Peace
Himself is the only giver of peace.

I suppose I may take for granted, on the part at least of the members of
my own congregation, some remembrance of a former discourse upon another
of these petitions, in which I pointed out how, in phraseology analogous
to that of my text, there were the distinct reference to the divinity of
Jesus Christ, the distinct presentation of prayer to Him, the
implication of His present activity upon Christian hearts.

And here again we have the august and majestic 'Himself.' Here again we
have the distinct reference of the title 'Lord' to Jesus. And here again
we have plainly prayer to Him.

But the title by which He is addressed is profoundly significant, 'The
Lord of Peace.' Now we find, in another of Paul's letters, in immediate
conjunction with His teaching, that casting all our care upon God is
the sure way to bring the peace of God into our hearts, the title 'the
God of Peace'; and he employs the same phraseology in another of his
letters, when he prays that the 'God of Peace' would fill the Roman
Christians 'with all joy and peace in believing.'

So, then, here is a title which is all but distinctively divine. 'The
_Lord_ of Peace' is brought into parallelism and equality with 'the God
of Peace'; which were blasphemy unless the underlying implication was
that Jesus Christ Himself was divine.

He is the 'Lord of Peace' because that tranquillity of heart and spirit,
that unruffled calm which we all see from afar, and long to possess, was
verily His, in His manhood, during all the calamities and changes and
activities of His earthly life. I have said that 'peace' is not apathy,
that it is not indifference, that it is not self-absorption. Look at the
life of the 'Lord of Peace.' In Him there were wholesome human emotions.
He sorrowed, He wept, He wondered, He was angry, He pitied, He loved.
And yet all these were