Skip to main content

Peace As A Response To Violence

The past couple or three weeks have been interesting; for some scary; and for others, devastating. The world carries on as the world has always carried on, with callous disregard for others in a variety of ways. Whether it is the negligent death of a man in Minneapolis or the spreading of the anger and frustration-fueled killing of others, burning buildings, and general destruction, we see the results of a society and people who know God less, and less.

Violence and greater power are used to control, to frighten, to coerce others so that we can express ourselves and achieve what we think we want. We end up with neighborhoods destroyed in the name of justice and we end up with wounded and dead innocent people in protest of abuse and brutality.

Christianity at its core values humanity and human life. Because of that, the Christian is called to live a life that is giving, open, and compassionate. Sometimes that may move us to protest, to campaign, to pressure our representatives in government for change. Those are all legitimate activities of followers of Jesus, although there are some who would even proscribe those behaviors for Christians because “we are citizens of Heaven” rather than of any country or community.

In all of our activities against injustice, against inhumanity to man, against violence, anger, and strife, we cannot ourselves become perpetrators of those things. If we are Christian policemen, we don’t neglect the welfare of those in our custody and if we are outraged at the treatment of others, we do not join in the chaos and violence toward others. We are called to work for peace, to find common ground with the hurting, the destitute, and the oppressed—however they are oppressed.

Peacekeepers will be called children of God because they live with a focus on the things of God. We are called to love as God loves even those who crucified Him; even those—like us—who made his coming to forgive sin necessary. As we have witnessed the events of the past weeks, it’s easy to pick a side, to choose a champion for our views, and to cheer or at least explain away their behavior towards others. We are to be careful of this tendency because in doing so, we contribute to division, to strife, to evil.
The challenge for followers of Jesus is how to work for peace, for reconciliation, for healing in the midst of high emotions and a seemingly endless stream of atrocities.
As you and I discern our calling and our direction in these times, let us ask that God will direct our thoughts and our minds so that rather than polarizing our world further, we can work for and example the presence of God in the world for people on all sides of these recent events.

May the Lord of peace walk with you this week.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Wineskins II

       In chapter 16 of Matthew, Peter ‘makes the great confession’ - Jesus he says is the Son of the Living God. At Covenant, when someone wants to become a member or to be baptized, we ask them who Jesus is and we expect this response. Peter is correct when he says this, but it is not clear that Peter (or the other disciples) understood the ramifications of his statement. Following Peter’s statement we find a series of incidents that make us wonder just how much Peters actually believed what he had said.      In the first instance, Jesus compares Peter to Satan. Jesus tells his disciples that he is going to Jerusalem and there he will die. Peter exclaims that he will not let that happen; Jesus will not be killed. Peter is expecting great things from Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of God on behalf of Israel and he cannot fit Jesus dying into his hope for a greater Israel under this Messiah. This cannot happen, he reasons. Jesus’s response is a harsh re...
Post a Comment
Read more

Freewheeling

Merton never disappoints. Here's an excerpt from "Love and Living," a collection of individual writings collected after his death in 1968: "Life consists in learning to live on one's own, spontaneous, freewheeling; to do this one must recognize what is one's own—be familiar and at home with oneself. This means basically learning who one is, and learning what one has to offer to the contemporary world, and then learning how to make that offering valid." This short passage is pregnant with meaning and spiritual insight (would we expect anything less?). Let's start with the last few words: "…make that offering valid." The offering of ourselves, of our lives is our calling. We offer ourselves to assist the re-creation of Creation; the reconciling of Man to God. The validity of our offering is measured in how closely we mirror the work of God; to what extent our motivations are based on knowing who we are rather than a slavish obedience to p...
4 comments
Read more

Naaman's Dipping and Requests

The familiar story of Naaman dipping in the Jordan is a story with more than a few twists. Let's review the story first. Naaman we are told had been used by YHWH to punish Israel and our story describes him as a man of valor in high regard by his boss, the King of Syria the current thorn in the side of Israel. It turns out though that Naaman suffers from some sort of leprosy.  On one of Syria's raids into Israel, the Syrians captured an Jewish girl who had found her way into Naaman's household as a servant for his wife. Knowing of Naaman's illness, she suggests to her matron that there is a prophet in Israel who could help him. This message gets transmitted to Naaman who takes it to his boss. The boss - the king of Syria, tells Naaman to travel to Israel and gives him a letter to Israel's king directing that Naaman be healed. Upon Naaman's arrival in Israel he gives the letter to Israel's king who reacts in a panic. He does not even consider finding t...
4 comments
Read more