Now that I have really worked through what exactly the peace of Christ is (“Above and Beyond Peace of Mind – Part 1), I have a far better understanding of where I was originally going with this verse. During my first writing, I casually brushed over that phrase. But once I really started digging into it, it became clear to me that I needed to be able to adequately explain why His peace is so completely peaceful.
And all of the thinking and searching and googling and concordance checking was more than worth it. Now I have something concrete in my mind — reasons why the peace of Christ is so outrageously exceedingly great that it surpasses understanding.
But I must add one more very cool thing I discovered while studying this verse. And that is this… I looked up the Hebrew word for rule and discovered that it means to act as umpire. And so I asked a baseball expert to tell me what exactly an umpire does. This is what he told me. An umpire does all of the following:
rules on fair balls and foul balls
calls balls and strikes
calls players safe or out
controls the flow and tempo of the game
controls player and coach behavior
uses discretion
calls interference
makes “on the fly” decisions
makes judgment on plays
determines strike zone
gives warnings
throws people out if necessary
So, if I let the peace of God do its job, I’d find that it would control my heart by informing me when my thoughts or actions are foul. It would allow me to determine healthy boundaries. It would set the pace in all my circumstances. It would guide my behavior and my reaction to the behavior of others. It would warn me when I was getting into something that would bring me harm. It would keep me steady. It would give me the wisdom in situations that called for an immediate response. It would give me the discretion I need in order to stay peaceful. I would have peace of mind rather than the free-for-all fighting that goes on within me at times.
He sees the whole game. Me and everyone else. He’s fair. He’s completely qualified. He is the final authority. So if I notice a loss of peace in my heart, then the peace of Christ (the umpire) is just doing it’s job.