PEACE

18  And Melchizedek king of Salem (Peace) brought out bread and wine. (He was priest of God Most High.) And he blessed him and

said, “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your. hand!” And Abram gave him a tenth of everything.

• Peace and the tithe are mentioned together for the first time in Scripture.Following his victory over a coalition of kings, Abraham gives a tenth of the spoils to Melchizedek.
• This is described as an act of thanks and a custom of the time, yielding in a return of peace to Abram and his family.

The angel says to Gideon, "Peace be to you. Do not fear; you shall not die." Gideon then builds an altar and calls it "Jehovah-Shalom" ("The Lord is Peace").

• Gideon was hiding from the Midianites, threshing wheat in a winepress, when the Angel of the Lord appeared to him.
• After a divine meal was consumed by fire, Gideon realized he had seen the Angel of the Lord face-to-face and exclaimed, "O Lord God! For I have seen the Angel of the Lord face to face"
• In response to Gideon's fear, the Lord says, "Peace be with you; do not fear, you shall not die".  Gideon then builds an altar to the Lord and calls it "Yahweh Shalom" ("The Lord is Peace")

You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts you.

• The peace described here is the first corporate peace of the city and the nation that comes from the "hand of the Lord" 
• Also the individual peace of the person whose mind is stayed on God. The source of such peace is the righteous, sovereign, saving God who "will swallow up death forever" and "will wipe away" every tear and who alone is worthy of trust. 

Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

• In the Beatitudes, Jesus makes pronouncements to the crowds and religious leaders and gives instructions to his disciples concerning the nature of life in the kingdom.
• Those who promote God's messianic peace (shalom, total well-being both personally and communally) will receive the ultimate reward of being called sons of God as they reflect the character of their heavenly father.

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.

• The expression peace in Hebrew, "shalom" is a much richer word than the English word for peace. Since it conveyed not merely the absence of conflict and turmoil but also the notion of positive blessing, especially the terms of a right relationship with God. As a result, the idea that "all is well" in one's life.

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

• Paul echoes Jesus' teaching in the Sermon on the Mount that believers are not to be anxious but are to entrust themselves into the hands of their loving heavenly Father, whose peace will guard them in Christ Jesus.
• Paul's use of "guard" may reflect his own imprisonment or the status of Phillippi as a Roman colony wiht a military garrison.