Not Just a Good Idea!

Peacemakers – It’s not just a good idea. It’s not something for the betterment of humanity or the future of the planet. It IS  the command of Christ. We are not to wish for peace only. We are to make peace, sometimes against what seems to be the will of the parties in opposition to one another.

The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) has called the parties involved to find ways to make peace in the Middle East. The GA has even offered some suggestions, some challenges, and identified some of the obstacles to peace in this region. The result has been attacks from almost every side. Remember, Christ did not call us to identify the party at fault. Christ called us to make peace between the parties involved, regardless who is at fault.

Romans 5:1 says We have peace with God through Jesus Christ, our Lord. That peace wasn’t easy. It was achieved through much suffering and anguish, through pain and suffering, through death and resurrection. Being a peacemaker is dangerous and difficult work. It may bring attacks on you rather than the peace for which you are working.

It is so much easier to point fingers, to lay down conditions, to accuse someone else. Fighting seems so much easier.

I Peter 3:10-12 says, Whoever would love life and seek good days . . . must turn from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it. For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous.

How do you live the good life? How do you have more good days than bad ones? Peter says we do it by seeking peace and pursuing it. We don’t just wish for it. We go out and do something to obtain it. We work for it in our personal lives and in the lives of others. We DO NOT  sit on the sidelines and make pronouncements about who is right and who is wrong. We solve the problem. That’s a tall order, considering how long some of the hot spots in the world have been hot!

We do this because the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous. That’s us, people. It’s you and me. God looks to us to take the peace of Christ that he has showered upon us and do something with it. We offer it to the enemy, even as the Jews struggled through those first attempts to offer the Gospel, the peace of God which passes all understanding, to the Gentiles.

Pastor Craig