Peace and the Advent
"If I had a rocket launcher..." - Bruce Cockburn
There is a riddle that goes like this: All nations want me. Most men and women, too. But for all their talk of hopes and dreams, I’m diminished by what they do. I’m a grand idea, a noble cause that hopes one day to stay. For now they keep my visits brief and send me on my way. What am I?
The Answer is: Peace.
Jesus told us that “Those who use the sword will die by the sword.” We can’t achieve the shalom of God through war and violence. This moment in an olive garden is often quoted by those who want to suggest Jesus would have carried a gun because of this line, “‘Lord, look, here are two swords.’ He replied, ‘It is enough.’” Either Jesus was woefully overconfident in his disciples’ sword skills, or he said this with great sarcasm – sure guys, a couple swords against the Roman war machine. No worries.” Jesus wasn’t suggesting their hope was in self-defense.
Dr. King summed up the cycle we can contribute to with violence, or we can disrupt with love. “Hate begets hate; violence begets violence; toughness begets a greater toughness. We must meet the forces of hate with the power of love.”
The apostle Paul said, “Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.”
The mystery of the kingdom of God is that it is established by a king who comes in peace and allows his enemies to crucify him. In our story, peace comes by a king who encourages his followers to “put away your sword.” At the center of the story that shapes our lives as followers of Jesus, is a king who has come into the world to lay down his life, to deny himself, to heal rather than hurt, to forgive rather than judge, to love rather than hate.
Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “Peace cannot be achieved through violence, it can only be attained through understanding.” Usually, our conflicts arise out of our fears, misunderstandings and assumptions. If we can choose to take a posture of curiosity with one another, and one of empathy, like Jesus with the woman at the well, we may discover those sworn to be our enemies become our friends.
Stanley Hauerwas was interviewed about his thoughts on peace and pacifism. Hauerwas said,
“Because God incarnate entered our world in a manger and died on the cross. He refused to save us by coercion. Instead, he redeemed the world on the cross, and by enduring such suffering, he gave us an opportunity to see how we can live in the world without killing those who would kill us. Crucifixion is the central act that makes nonviolence intelligible and so powerful.
…it is a salvific event, all the way down. What I mean is that it is not just salvation from this world of sin and evil. Christ’s salvation offers us the possibility of being grafted in to a whole new way of life that is otherwise not possible. In him a new kind of humanity exists, a life together made possible only because of the cross, the resurrection, and the ascension of Christ. Christ does not make the world itself more peaceable. The cross itself is the world’s peace, and our task is to live into it and bear witness to it.”
This peaceable kingdom that Jesus demonstrated by the way he lived and choices he made among hostiles establishes peace in the world through simple but impossibly hard practices…
Turn the other cheek.
Forgive as you have been forgiven.
Reconcile with those who have something against you.
Bless those who persecute you. Bless and do not curse.
Go the extra mile.
Give to the one who asks of you.
Judge not.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
Love your enemy.
This way of life – though peace-making – does not play well in a culture set on the enforcement of our rights.
Mother Theresa once reflected,
“Let us not use bombs and guns to overcome the world. Let us use love and compassion. Peace begins with a smile. Smile five times a day at someone you don't really want to smile at; do it for peace. Let us radiate the peace of God and so light His light and extinguish in the world and in the hearts of all men all hatred and love for power.
Today, if we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other-that man, that woman, that child is my brother or my sister. If everyone could see the image of God in his neighbor, do you think we would still need tanks and generals?”
May this Advent season remind us that the Palestinian and the Jew, the Trans and the Cis, the Gay and the Straight, People of color and the colourless, Christians and Muslims, believers and pagans, Republicans and Democrats, all embody the image of God and we all belong to each other. May we have the eyes of Christ to see this.
