Grace → Peace

No, not me, and not my photo. One day I might start doing some of these types of shots for my blog, but until then, you'll have to suffice with stock photos.

I recently had a helpful conversation with a friend of mine about Paul's use of "grace and peace" in his letters . They were explaining a little about something they had come across in a study they facilitate and I found it somewhat enlightening.

Many of us have heard Paul's introductions to his letters, that he typically begins them with some kind of comment about his desire that certain favor would be upon them from God.

"Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ." - 1 Corinthians 1:3

If you scan the introductions to Paul's letters, you'll soon find that they all have this statement, almost word for word written the same way, with the exception of, unless I am mistaken, his letters to Timothy. Even those merely add the word 'mercy' into the midst.

It's been said that the reason for the word order is that Paul is saying before you can have peace with God, you must have experienced the grace of God. And so it follows that it should say 'grace and peace'.

I've always agreed with that, but I'm not sure I could give an exegetical reason as to why. I'm not familiar with the Greek grammar per say. I guess deep down I figured, "yeah that makes sense, but maybe it's not the case at all. Maybe Paul just liked saying it in that way."

I mean, it's meat and potatoes, apples and oranges, fruit and vegetables. How often do you hear those phrases reversed?

Don't misunderstand me, you must experience the grace of God before you can experience the peace of God, I'm just not sure there was much point in putting too much stress on Paul's word order. And you Bible scholars out there don't fuss at me, I'm getting to a point here.

My friend elaborated on some of what they had studied and pointed to what Jesus said in John 14:27:

"Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful."

That kind of helped flesh out the idea more for me. The reality is, the peace of Christ is not a peace this world can give. He gives it to His disciples. Extending that, when Paul mentions for example the 'peace of God' in Philippians 4, it's to believers.

More so, in Romans 5:1 we read: "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,"

In other words, true peace is for believers, and it begins with salvation. When we are saved we are made right with God, against whom we have sinned.

Paul states it like this in 2 Corinthians 5:21: "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

Outside of Christ we are enemies of God (Romans 5:10 and 8:7). In Christ however, we are friends of God, brought into relationship with Him through Jesus. The grace of God leads to the peace of God.

So, did Paul just happen to like saying grace before peace? Again, you never hear someone say they like potatoes and meat, do you? No, it's meat and potatoes.

But maybe he really was helping his audience understand that not only all of who he was - his salvation, his apostleship, etc. - was of grace, but that it's the same for us. That reality of grace leads to the reality of peace with God, one that cannot be undone. And the understanding of that grace leads to a peace in our hearts.

Perhaps, especially given that he had to defend the very gospel itself to the Galatians, but perhaps that is why he expanded on the phrase, "grace and peace", in Galatians.

"Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins so that He might rescue us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forevermore. Amen." - Galatians 1:3-5