Shalom
But we are looking forward to the new heavens and new earth he has promised, a world filled with God’s righteousness.
2 Peter 3:13 NLT
Shalom is peace: a rest and repose of the heart that knocks out all disturbing and disruptive forces which would steal our fulfillment in Christ. Peace is an deep, inner sense of contentment supplied by God. This peace pervades our beings when we hold steady trusting the faithfulness of our heavenly Father.
We receive Christ’s peace for he is the Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6) into the deepest recesses of my spirit. We have peace with God through faith in his shed blood (Rom. 5:1), which establishes peace with others (Eph. 2:14), while freeing us to trust his peace (Isa. 26:3), and as a result, we can now walk in peace in the midst of our greatest needs (Phil. 4:7). At the Second Coming of Christ the whole world will experience God’s peace for all the fallout from the Fall will have been fully redeemed by the Cross of Christ.
The webbing together of God, humans, and all creation in justice, fulfillment, and delight is what the Hebrew prophets call shalom. In English we call it peace, but it means far more than just peace of mind or ceasefire between enemies. In the Bible shalom means universal flourishing, wholeness, and delight—a rich state of affairs in which natural needs are satisfied and natural gifts fruitfully employed, a state of affairs that inspires joyful wonder as the creator and savior opens doors and speaks welcome to the creatures in whom he delights. Shalom, in other words, is the way things are supposed to be.
Cornelius Plantinga Jr., Sin: Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be