Birds of a Feather Flock Together: Don't Lose God's Peace

Introduction

"Birds of a feather flock together." It's an old saying, and Christian Robichaud, pastor of the Église Évangélique Paris Métropole, begins by putting a question mark after it. But he warns: "You'll see that it's actually true. The more you gather with certain people, the more you end up resembling them."

This message is part of a series on gathering. The pastor starts from a reality many believers know: the inner peace God puts in the heart. You received it freely, by grace. And you may already have lived the moment when, after an act of disobedience, that peace left. Nothing in the world is worth as much, not political peace, not economic security, not even health.

Yet this peace can be lost through what the Bible calls compromise. To show this, Christian Robichaud opens two doors: the apostle Paul, who lost everything to gain Christ, and King Jehoshaphat, a man with a good heart who allied himself with the wrong person.

Outline of the message

1. God's peace, your most precious possession

There comes a time in your walk with God when you no longer want to lose, for anything in the world, the peace he has given you. Paul puts it in one short sentence: "Don't grieve the Holy Spirit of God" (Ephesians 4:30).
This peace is not bargained over, not negotiated, not traded away. It becomes "the dearest, the most precious possession" of your whole life.
The believer who has tasted it is ready to lose everything, "but not this peace."

2. Paul, the man who lost everything to gain Christ

Throughout Scripture, God raises up models, "types." Paul is, in spite of himself, an extremely powerful type of this truth.
On Sinai, God gave Moses not only his name but his definition: a God of grace and mercy, abounding in faithfulness, "as in a marriage covenant" (Exodus 34:6). This same God appears to Saul on the road to Damascus. He could have crushed him, yet he says to him: "Why are you persecuting me?"
From this encounter, Paul receives the life that flows from Christ, a "life-giving Spirit" (1 Corinthians 15:45). He tastes grace and mercy, and he will even be caught up to heaven.
Yet from his prison, he writes to the Philippians that he has "given up everything" for Christ (Philippians 3:7-9). It was not against his will: he let himself be stripped. "God will never go against you."
After his conversion, Paul withdraws for three years to Arabia (Galatians 1:17-18). He rethinks all his theology. A Pharisee among Pharisees, perhaps a member of the Sanhedrin, which the pastor compares to the United States Supreme Court, he was at the peak of his career. He counts the cost: his Pharisee friends, his money, probably the family inheritance. The pastor adds, noting that he is speculating, that Paul may also have lost a wife.
Paul uses words from the world of economics, almost banking: gain and loss. Following Jesus is, for him, extremely profitable, but he knows there is a price. "To gain, you have to lose."
First he lost his religiosity, a whole system of beliefs and rituals. Then he goes further: compared with the excellence of knowing Christ, he regards everything else "as rubbish."

3. Jehoshaphat and Ahab: a good heart is not enough

The pastor presents what theologians consider the clearest example of someone you must not partner with: 2 Chronicles 18. The kingdom is divided: Israel in the north, Judah in the south.
In the north reigns Ahab. At his table eat, according to the pastor, 400 prophets of Baal and 400 prophets of Asherah, "sorcerers turned ministers." His wife is Jezebel. Against him, God raises up Elijah, the prophet who calls down fire from heaven, and then Elisha.
In the south, Jehoshaphat is a man of God, and his deeds prove it. "You can say many things about Jesus, but it is our actions that show who we are."
Ahab ends up repenting, in sackcloth and ashes. God sees that it is sincere and forgives him (1 Kings 21:27-29). Jehoshaphat learns that Ahab is doing better and draws close to him, to the point of marrying off their children (2 Chronicles 18:1). The two kings sit side by side on their thrones: "the greatest barbecue in the history of Israel."
During the feast, Ahab brings up Ramoth Gilead, a Levitical city he has lost, and suggests going together to take it back. Jehoshaphat answers: "I am as you are, and my people as your people" (2 Chronicles 18:3). But he first asks to inquire of Yahweh. "That's what they did in the Old Testament, and it's what you and I should do" before an important decision.
The prophets of Baal arrive, one after another, with their show. Jehoshaphat feels uneasy: "I said we were alike, but not really." He asks whether there isn't a true prophet of Yahweh.
Ahab replies that one remains, Micaiah, "but I hate him, for he never prophesies good concerning me, but always evil" (2 Chronicles 18:7). The pastor points out that Micaiah was not at the feast: he had not associated himself with any of this.
The messenger advises him to say what the king wants to hear. Micaiah answers that he will say what God tells him (18:13). He sees Israel scattered like sheep without a shepherd.
The next day, Jehoshaphat goes to war anyway. "That is what the Bible calls compromise." Ahab dies, and Jehoshaphat returns home in peace.

4. Rubbing shoulders is not allying yourself

On the way back, a prophet comes to meet Jehoshaphat: "Should you help the wicked, and love those who hate Yahweh? Because of this, wrath is on you from before Yahweh" (2 Chronicles 19:2). According to the pastor, Jehoshaphat repents, and God blesses him again.
Why does God become angry with a well-intentioned man? Because there is a difference between being around people and forming alliances, rejoicing with them. Jehoshaphat's mistake was to rejoice, to ally himself, to associate with someone who breaks God's heart.
One day, on a terrace, a pastor friend told him that some ambiguities in the Church were "not that serious." Christian Robichaud answered him: if your wife eats with friends who make fun of you, the bare minimum would be for her to get up and leave. "That's what we call loyalty."
"We are called to love everyone, but we are not called to rejoice with everyone."
He tells of a meal, years ago, where someone started speaking against a servant of God who had integrity. He stopped laughing and said: "Sorry, I don't agree." He felt the social pressure. You will meet it too: at the coffee machine, in jokes about sexuality, in conversations that belittle those in authority, when the Bible asks us to pray for them. Sometimes it is enough to say "I don't take part in gossip" and walk away.
The pastor puts this sentence on screen: "Only the one who considers grieving God a greater loss and gaining Christ a greater gain measures the value of this truth."
There will be times when you can't have it all: either the approval of people and the loss of God's approval, or the loss of people's approval and God's favor. Every day, Christians lose their jobs, go to prison, or are separated from their families because they chose Christ's side.

5. What the Bible does not forbid

The pastor has seen extremes. One brother once claimed that you should never sign a mortgage with a banker, because bankers are supposedly servants of Mammon. "No, they're not." Any reading that makes the Bible a blanket condemnation of every form of partnership with non-Christians goes beyond the texts. God is waiting for you on your moral values and on your worship.
He knew a Christian who went to China with non-believing French partners for an investment. The closer he got to the contract, the less peace he had. In his hotel room, God's peace was completely gone. The next day, in the meeting, he refused to sign, under enormous pressure and even insults. As soon as he left the room, the peace came back. Three weeks later, the project collapsed. "If peace with God is your priority, God is faithful."
The Bible doesn't forbid eating with sinners either: Jesus did. We have to distinguish a missionary presence from a commitment of loyalty. If a neighbor who doesn't live by your values invites you for coffee, "go ahead, brother."
When he was a youth pastor in Canada, parents complained about finding drugs in the church restrooms and cigarette butts in front of the door. The senior pastor replied that it was the best thing that could happen to them: young people convicted by the Holy Spirit who throw their drugs into the toilet, or who throw away their cigarettes as they leave the church.
The Church is not called to live in isolation. Jesus prayed: "I pray not that you would take them from the world, but that you would keep them from the evil one" (John 17:15).
"My neighbor is not a mere object of conversion." You can love him, open your door to him, practice hospitality toward him and receive it from him.
John 3:16 says that God so loved the world, while James 4:4 and 1 John 2:15 say not to love the world. A contradiction? No: "God loves souls, but not the values of the world. We love people, we don't love the evil they do."

6. What you watch, what you say, the church you're in

Maybe you have no relationship with anyone who does evil. But when you pick up your tablet and scroll, what does God think of what you're watching? You are the temple of the Holy Spirit, and the eyes are the gateway to the soul: the values of what you watch enter you.
David said: "I will set no vile thing before my eyes" (Psalm 101:3).
The pastor speaks "as a spiritual father," as an older brother or a younger brother in the Lord. If you feed on videos of street violence, the algorithms offer you a second one, then a third. In five minutes, violence enters your soul and you end up hating young people. Yet Jesus wants to save these young people, and their only hope, says the former youth pastor, is to meet Jesus Christ, more than better high schools.
Two questions for your screens and your mouth: Could Jesus sit on your couch and watch this movie, this series? Could he sit at your table while you speak against someone?
He goes further, specifying that he has never seen it in his church in nine years: some come back Sunday after Sunday to a church they are fighting. "You will lose, because it is the bride of Christ." It is better to come to an agreement or find a church closer to what you see. The unity of the first Christians was precious: "of one heart and soul" (Acts 4:32).

7. Walk, stand, sit

Psalm 1 describes a progression: "Blessed is the man who doesn't walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand on the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers." You walk, and you end up seated. What grieves God's heart is that we join our hearts with those who grieve him.
"Birds of a feather flock together." If you accompany someone to bring them to Christ, you hope they will become like you. But if you sit down with the scoffers, they will end up getting you.
God tells Israel not to make a covenant with the peoples who serve other gods (Exodus 23:32). The pastor says he loves people of all religions, but he declined an invitation to pray with people who do not pray to the same God. He lost friends, those who used to come for barbecues in his yard, when their paths separated. That was Jehoshaphat's serious mistake: praying with just anyone.
He calls for wisdom: don't strike anyone off your contact list on your way out of the service. Step back, think, pray, place yourself before God. But at some point, you will have decisions to make.
His closing testimony: newly married, back from a mission of several months in Haiti, he was sleeping in his parents' basement, with no apartment and no job, while continuing his theology courses. A friend was earning a very good living in a booming sector and offered to train him. The problem: this friend was stealing from his company. As soon as he picked up the phone to accept, he lost God's peace. He didn't have the strength to back out, but God was faithful: the friend called him back to say he didn't want to work with someone of integrity who would see his schemes. The pastor ended up in a minimum-wage job, a very hard one, earning five times less. "But I had God's peace."
His prayer echoes Amos 3:3: "Do two walk together, unless they have agreed?" May God give the strength to stop laughing with those who grieve him, and the strength to stay close to sinners in order to love them.

Key takeaways

The peace God puts in your heart is your most precious possession, and compromise is what threatens it.
Like Paul, you can lose everything and gain by it: "To gain, you have to lose."
Jehoshaphat had a good heart, but he allied himself with Ahab. Rubbing shoulders with people is not allying yourself with them or rejoicing in what grieves God.
The Bible forbids neither contracts with non-Christians nor meals with sinners: a missionary presence is not a commitment of loyalty.
If peace with God is your priority, God is faithful in your decisions.

Personal application

Have you ever felt God's peace leave at the moment of a decision? What did you do about it?
In your relationships, where do you move from presence to alliance: from conversation to complicity, from a shared meal to laughing at what grieves God?
Could Jesus sit on your couch in front of what you watch this week, or at your table when you talk about others?
What approval from people are you afraid of losing if you choose Christ's side?
What decision do you need to carry in prayer, with wisdom and without haste, before making it?

Verses cited

Frequently asked questions

Why did God become angry with Jehoshaphat when he had good intentions?

Jehoshaphat loved God and wanted to retake Ramoth Gilead. But he allied himself with Ahab, feasted with him, and went to war despite the word of the prophet Micaiah. The prophet Jehu then asks him: "Should you help the wicked, and love those who hate Yahweh?" For Christian Robichaud, there is a difference between rubbing shoulders with people and allying yourself or rejoicing with what breaks God's heart.

Does the Bible forbid having friends or partners who are not Christians?

No. The pastor reminds us that the Bible does not condemn every form of partnership with non-Christians, nor eating with sinners: Jesus did so. He distinguishes a missionary presence from a commitment of loyalty. You can love your neighbor, practice hospitality and receive it. What God expects is that you not ally yourself with the values that grieve him.

How can we reconcile "God so loved the world" with "do not love the world"?

John 3:16 says that God so loved the world, and 1 John 2:15 says not to love the world. For Christian Robichaud, the two verses do not contradict each other: God loves souls, but he does not love the values of the world. We love people, we don't love the evil they do.