Centuries before the birth of Christ Jesus, Isaiah called the Messiah, who he said would be born of a virgin, ^{See Isa. 7:14 .} "The Prince of Peace." ^{Isa. 9:6.} Micah prophesied that this Messiah would come out of Bethlehem, and said, "This man shall be the peace." ^{Mic. 5:5.} The angels who announced to the shepherds that Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem, sang, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." ^{Luke 2:14.}

Because Jesus' advent fulfilled prophecy in every other way, one might suppose his ministry would have inaugurated worldwide peace. But such has not been the case.

Jesus' ministry did bring peace on earth, but the peace it brought was not quite like the global serenity some may have envisioned. The Messiah's peace was, and still is, a peace of the heart, a peace that endures regardless of outward circumstances. Christian peace is the invulnerable calm that marks those who pray and practice the Christian precepts Jesus taught. The Christian discipleship of Christian Science practice teaches us that all is well because God, good, is All-in-all.

Jesus couldn't be separated from Christ, God's message to men, and so he knew peace even on the cross. The peace he demonstrated and recommended to his followers is infinite, imperturbable, and divine—a quality of God which spiritual man, created in God's likeness, naturally expresses. This ideal man is your true selfhood, and mine.

The peace Jesus exemplified enters our hearts as we follow him through obeying the commands he stressed: to love God preeminently and one's neighbor as one's self. This love unfolds as we understand that God was not only Jesus' Father but our Father, too. He said, "Call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven." ^{Matt. 23:9.}

God is one, indivisible Father, Spirit, and His effect is man, His spiritual idea. Spirit, the source and substance of man, perpetuates unshakable peace in man. Indeed, Spirit—the one omnipotent Mind, Love—leaves neither opportunity nor place for unrest or disturbance. In the light of all this, there is a wealth of instruction in Jesus' saying near the end of his earthly ministry: "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." ^{John 14:27.}

Keeping peace in one's heart does mean keeping out distress, anger, and fear of what material sense suggests that people say or do, or fail to say or do. As individual after individual establishes and maintains peace in this inward way, bickering among family and friends is silenced. And warfare among nations proportion ably ceases. Clearly, the Messiahship heralded in the angels' song is at once individual peace and the way that leads to universal peace.

How tempting it is to justify waiting for the family or the world to be at peace before we accept peace as our own! Yet heavenly peace is already ours by divine reflection; it reaches humanity as individuals demonstrate peace within themselves. Of course, demonstrating peace may not prove to be an effortless activity. Jesus' life plainly shows that to be at peace with God is to be at war with evil—sin, sickness, death—as he showed in his redemptive, healing, and restorative works. To be at peace with God and with man's true selfhood is sometimes to disagree with our fellows—as Jesus did with the hypocritical Pharisees and with the merchandisers who sold secular wares in the temple. But to disagree with erroneous viewpoints is no reason to be hostile toward the people who hold them. Mary Baker Eddy writes, "In every age and clime, 'On earth peace, good will toward men' must be the watchword of Christianity." ^{No and Yes, p. 44.}

During a court trial that concerned the Christian Science movement she founded, Mrs. Eddy alerted her followers to the importance of defending their God-given right to be at peace no matter what. She arranged to have the following printed in the Sentinel: " 'Peace, be still!' our Father is at the helm." ^{Sentinel, August 3, 1899, p. 4 .} And so it proved. The trial at issue was settled in due course.

The Christmas season is a good time to begin anew to prove that divine peace is ever available, and that demonstration of this has healing effect. Those who dread the possibility of inharmony, say at holiday gatherings, can bring to them the unseen but deeply felt gift of Christly peace demonstrated. Any occasion that has been blanketed in scientific prayer, which accepts God as the only parent and Mind of all, has been disarmed of threat.

Whether we spend Christmas in a crowd or alone, we can realize more of its true meaning by gathering the whole human family into our affections as Mrs. Eddy did when she exclaimed, "I pray that heaven's messages of 'on earth peace, good will toward men,' may fill your hearts and leave their loving benedictions upon your lives." ^{The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, p. 167.}

CAROLYN B. SWAN