Blessed are the Peacemakers⤒🔗

“Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God” (Matthew 5:9). This seventh of the eight Beatitudes delivered by Jesus in his Sermon on the Mount is perhaps the only one the world views as important and relevant. What this Jewish rabbi says about the bliss of those who are poor in spirit, mourn for sin, hunger and thirst after righteousness, meek, pure in heart, merciful and persecuted, has little appeal to our materialistic, pleasure-seeking, immoral, God and Christ rejecting masses. But peacemakers? Bring them on, for we sure need them today!

What is Wrong with the World?←⤒🔗

Wherever we look, there is conflict, strife, unrest and violence, both at home and abroad. Terrorist attacks in the USA and the threat of one in Canada, suicide bombings in Afghanistan, civil war in Syria, clashes between Muslims and Christians in Egypt and Nigeria, sabre rattling of nuclear equipped North Korea and Israel-hating Iran, violence and the threat of it has become part of our everyday life.

What has gone wrong with the world, many ask? Is it then impossible to resolve our differences and live together in peace?

A good question that is! Why does it prove so difficult to maintain law and order at home and peace abroad? Just think of all the efforts in this century alone to produce lasting peace among the nations. How many conferences have been held, how many summit talks have taken place, and all in vain, it seems. The United Nations keeps on trying to broker peace, but to no avail, partly because of its built-in impotence due to veto rights of Security Council members. When one war has ceased, another has already begun. What is the reason for all such colossal failures?

The Problem is Spiritual←⤒🔗

There is only one adequate answer to these questions.

The reason for these failures is not first of all political, or economic or social, although these are definitely part of the problem. Yet the basic, underlying issue is a spiritual one. According to Scripture, the trouble lies with man himself. There is something wrong with his heart. Jesus says it is out of the heart that evil thoughts, murders, adultery, and all evils proceed. As long as mankind is like that, there will be no peace.

Characteristics of Peacemakers←⤒🔗

Although the world desperately needs peacemakers, it is a special kind of peacemakers that are wanted. Who are they? The ones Jesus describes in the Beatitudes. Peacemakers are disciples of Jesus Christ, subjects of His kingdom.

There is a definite sequence of thought and logical order in the Beatitudes. Each of them leads to the next. A peacemaker is someone who possesses all the other characteristics described by Jesus. He is poor in spirit, mourns for sin, has a meek disposition, hungers and thirsts after righteousness, shows mercy to others, and is pure in heart. Only those who possess these characteristics or traits can be peacemakers in the biblical sense of the word. As long as we are proud and arrogant and selfish, all our attempts to make peace with our fellow man will fail. Why? Because then we are still motivated by self-interest.

This is man’s problem by nature. He always asks first, what am I getting out of the deal, how is this going to affect me? And as long as individuals or nations are going to think like that, there will always be wars. Peace, lasting peace, can only be made by people who are willing to forget their own interests and do not insist on their real or imagined rights. Such people are rare indeed. Only true disciples of Christ are like that. They alone are peacemakers. Because they have seen themselves as God sees them: miserable, sinful creatures who deserve nothing but God’s wrath. Those who by the Spirit’s work have become poor in spirit, mourn over their sinful heart, and have begun to hunger and thirst after righteousness, will no longer insist on their rights, because they have none. Therefore they no longer ask, what is in it for me?

True, Christ’s disciples are not always poor in spirit, or meek. Nor do they always seek peace. They have their old nature to contend with, that sinful nature that tries to keep them from doing what God wants them to do. But in their best moments, they are enabled to rise above the petty problems and selfish concerns that characterize man by nature. At such times they can even deny themselves and turn the other cheek while they try to make peace with those who have wronged them.

Learn From Christ←⤒🔗

After all, Christians are followers of Him who said, “Learn of me for I am meek and lowly in heart.” A Christian can be a peacemaker, because Christ, his Master, is the Prince of Peace. He did not stand on His rights. If He had, He would never have come to this poor world, lost in sin. But He emptied Himself, the Bible says, meaning that Christ laid aside His glory and humbled Himself by taking on our flesh and blood, making himself of no reputation. At His birth the angels sang about peace on earth, goodwill toward men!

Where do we see peace on earth today? Nowhere it seems. But that is not Jesus’ fault. He has done everything to bring about peace. Paul says that Christ made peace through the blood of the cross. He gave Himself in order that rebellious and self-seeking sinners might be at peace with God and therefore also at peace with one another.

Notice the order – first there is peace with God and only then peace with one another. It is because this basic truth has been forgotten that our world and sadly also the church, too often, is in such a mess. Man, by nature, is first of all at war with God, and therefore also at war with his fellow man. And unless man finds peace with God first, he might as well forget about peace with his neighbour.

There is therefore only one road to peace. It is the one that leads to Calvary. There, on the cross, Christ healed the breach made by man when in Adam he rebelled against his Maker. All who truly believe in Christ, the Great Peacemaker, become peacemakers themselves.

Wisdom Comes from Above←⤒🔗

Are we peacemakers? Do we ever deny ourselves – going out of our way – to live in peace with all men? No, this does not mean that we must keep our mouth shut when God’s Word is attacked. We are to keep the peace wherever possible, but never at the expense of the truth. In James 3:17 we read:

But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.

Notice, that this wisdom of God is first pure, and only then peaceable. This is the same principle laid down in the Beatitudes. The preceding Beatitude is: “Blessed are the pure in heart.” The child of God is faithful and pure in heart and lives in peace as far as possible in conformity with this.

Spurgeon says,

We are to be first pure, then peaceable. Our peaceableness is never to be a compact with sin, or an alliance with that which is evil. We must set our faces like flints against everything that is contrary to God and His holiness.

The Test of Faith←⤒🔗

The seventh Beatitude is thus a test of the reality of our faith. If we can’t even live in peace with our brothers and sisters in church, what kind of influence will we have in society? Whatever we may think of ourselves, then we are not acting like Christians and God will not recognize us as His children. For Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.”

May God give us many true peacemakers today. It is the only hope for our poor lost world.

Bless ‘d are the men of peaceful life,
Who quench the coals of growing strife;
They shall be called the heirs of bliss,
The sons of God, the God of peace.