Isaiah 57:19

The divine declaration 'I create the fruit of the lips; Peace, peace to him that is far off, and to him that is near' grounds the very possibility of peace-speech in God's creative act — he does not merely announce peace but creates the words that communicate it. The pairing 'far off and near' was read by early Christians as predicting the inclusion of Gentiles (far) and Jews (near) in the same peace — Paul quotes this very verse in Ephesians 2:17 in exactly this way: 'he came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to them that were nigh.' The 'fruit of the lips' metaphor — speech as agricultural yield — draws on the same root as the lips-praise in Hosea 14:2 ('we will render the calves of our lips'), grounding worship in the creative-redemptive act that precedes it. The verse became important in Pentecostal and charismatic pneumatologies that read inspired speech as divine creative act.