God’s Favor Is on the Peacemakers

Jesus has asked a lot out of us in the Beatitudes, but all of them, this is the one that hits me the hardest. When former US president Barack Obama reflected on the Sermon on the Mount, he called it:

a passage that is so radical that it’s doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application[i]

This quote, set in the context of a speech about the connection between religion and politics, seems to imply that—for the United States—the Sermon on the Mount is unworkable. And while Obama will eventually, I believe, draw the wrong conclusion on that—that we must lay aside the Sermon aside—you have to admit that he’s right. The empires of men and the kingdom community of God stand in diametrical opposition.

The seventh Beatitude: God’s favor is on the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

Peace is not simply the absence of conflict. In Zechariah 1, Zechariah is given a vision of four horsemen who travel all throughout the world.

They reported to the angel of the Lord standing among the myrtle trees, “We have patrolled the earth, and right now the whole earth is calm and quiet.”- v 11

And this seems like a good thing, right? The whole earth is calm and quiet. The sounds of war are not heard in the mountains or on the plains. But is this peace?

In Zechariah 1, the people of Judah are beginning to regather in Jerusalem following the Babylonian exile. It’s been twenty years since their initial return. They rebuilt the foundation of the Temple, but opposition had prevented them from making any further progress. The surrounding nations were still overwhelming and overpowering. Oppression and persecution were still daily realities within Israel.

There was no war, but neither was there peace. The whole earth was calm and quiet, but in times of injustice and oppression silence is itself war. Peace is not peace when it comes at the silencing of the oppressed.

In verse 12, the angel of the Lord responds. In the Old Testament, this phrase “angel of the Lord” is very likely a reference to Jesus himself. Elsewhere in Scripture, this messenger of Yahweh accepts worship and behaves as God, so many scholars believe that it is only natural that this is God. So Jesus responds, pleading with his Father:

Then the angel of the Lord responded, “How long, Lord of Armies, will you withhold mercy from Jerusalem and the cities of Judah that you have been angry with these seventy years?”

The silence and the calmness wasn’t seen as peace. It’s seen by Jesus as a withholding of mercy. Then in verse 15, Yahweh says:

I am fiercely angry with the nations that are at ease

These are nations without conflict, without turmoil. The economy is only getting better. Taxes are only getting lower. Life is easy. And God says that he is angry with them. Because the absence of conflict is not peace.

Indeed, the absence of conflict may mean that the oppressed are so subjugated that they cannot fight back. In the years leading up to the American Civil War—which is an awful name because there’s nothing civil about war—there was peace. And presidents before Lincoln had desperately attempted to keep the peace. Lincoln himself attempted peace until war was thrust upon him.  This did not mean that was no persecution or oppression, just that it had been systematized and legitimized by the ruling authorities.

There is no better example of this than in the time of Jesus. Historians have romanticized this time as Pax Romana—Roman Peace. From 27 BC to 180 AD, during this period of approximately 207 years, the Roman empire achieved its greatest territorial extent and its population reached a maximum of up to 70 million people – a third of the world’s population. And there was peace. And there was only peace because Rome squashed any rebellion.

Herod Archelaus killed 3,000 Jews on Passover, in response to a protest of his desecration of the Temple. Pontius Pilate had his soldiers bludgeon a crowd of Jews protesting his stealing from the temple treasury on one instance and, at another, massacred Jews on the Temple grounds and spread their blood over the sacrificial altars.

The absence of conflict simply meant that conflict was not allowed, and that is abundantly different than peace. Into a world too afraid to protest, to powerless to stand up for themselves, Jesus says go and make peace.

He says this to the people who have no power. He says this to the people who he has are blessed because they are persecuted. He puts the onus of peacemaking onto the oppressed. Why? Because those in power aren’t going to do anything to change the system that’s worked for them.

It’s not fair. It’s not equitable. But it is the powerless and the persecuted who must become the peacemaker. They must initiate reconciliation with their enemy.

Peace in the Hands of the Persecuted

How can the powerless make peace? How the persecuted create peace? How can there be peace in the hands of the persecuted? You would think that peace would only be possible if the powerful acquiesce. You would think that peace can only come when those with the ability to create war turn around.

But the truth is, Jesus says, you change systems by changing yourself. Biblical social justice must be preceded by individual repentance and change. You cannot offer to the world on the outside what you do not have on the inside.

In Luke 13:1–5 some people confronted Jesus with one of Pilate’s atrocities. Here’s the way he responded:

There were some present at that very time who told him of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.”

He took a major social outrage of injustice and turned it into a demand for personal, individual repentance. “Unless you repent you will all likewise perish!”

That’s what he always did. Why did he do this? Because for Jesus the eternal destiny of a human soul is a weightier matter, a bigger issue, than the temporal destiny of a nation. Because the key to reforming a nation or challenging an empire begins with internal and individual change.

If you come to Jesus with a question about the justice of taxes to Tiberias Caesar, he will turn it into a personal command aimed right at your own heart: “You give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:15–21).

If you come to Jesus with a complaint about the injustice of your brother who will not divide the inheritance with you, he will turn it into a warning to your own conscience, “Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you? . . . Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:14–15).

Jesus is clear that the heart of peace begins with a personal responsibility to it—even when you are the oppressed. And it doesn’t seem right. It doesn’t seem fair. But history has proven that it works. When the oppressed become peacemakers—when they rise up in non-violent protest against their oppressors—they ultimately win.

Erica Chenoweth and her colleague Maria Stephan painstakingly collected data on 323 violent and nonviolent political revolutions since 1900.  To qualify for the analysis, the movement had to be substantial in size, involving at least 1000 people active in the movement.  They counted a campaign as successful if the goal had been achieved within one year of the peak of the event.

Non-violent campaigns were successful or partially successful 80% of the time. Violent campaigns were successful or partially successful 33% of the time. Resorting to violence makes a protest more likely to fail. Peace within oneself leads to peace on earth, goodwill toward men.

Jesus teaches that change starts with us. It must go in that order. Changing your nation begins by changing yourself. Those in power are never going to change the system that put them in power. The persecuted must themselves become the peacemakers.

Which brings us to this all-important question: what is peacemaking? For some of us, it might conjure up the image of a United Nations soldier. They’re often called peacekeepers. Maybe you think of American soldiers called into different areas of the country. I’m going to suggest that you cannot hold an instrument of war in your attempt to bring peace. You cannot rain fire and fury down on a nation and then hold free elections. Also, you cannot keep a peace that is not there. You have to make it.

What you win people with is what you win them to. It’s a truism in ministry. It’s the same in war and peace. Overview a dictator with violent action and you’ll find him replaced with violent action. History and current events bear this out. Violence breeds violence—and not of the same kind. Violence escalates violence.

Peacemaking is the opposite of all that. Peacemaking is about going out into war and creating peace and reconciling human beings to one another.

Jesus says in Matthew 5:9 that people who have become sons of God have the character of their heavenly Father. We know from Scripture that the heavenly Father is a “God of peace”

Now may the God of peace…equip you with everything good to do his will – Heb 13:20-21

 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. – 1 Thess 5:23

The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. – Romans 16:20

That last one’s an interesting one. Nice study in contrast. Satan is crushed, he is defeated, not through war but through peace. And this peace, we are told, came through the shed blood of Christ.

For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20 and through him to reconcile everything to himself, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. – Col 1:19-20

Peacemaking can be a bloody enterprise, but it is done with our own blood and sacrifices. Later in Matthew 5, Jesus expounds on this premise. Love your enemies, he says. Do good to those who hate you. Show kindness and hospitality to those who despise you. And this makes you children of your Father in heaven.

John Stott writes:

NOW PEACEMAKING is a divine work. For peace means reconciliation, and God is the author of peace and of reconciliation. … It is hardly surprising, therefore, that the particular blessing which attaches to peacemakers is that “they shall be called sons of God.” For they are seeking to do what their Father has done, loving people with his love.

And yet this peacemaking does not put us in a passive position. We are not a neutral people who must refuse to take sides. One of the great dangers in our society comes from those who imagine they can best serve by never taking a clear stand on anything. If a peacemaker is one who never takes sides then Jesus failed miserably at it. He is continually on the side of the persecuted and the oppressed and he calls out the religious and political establishment.

The life of Jesus, the supreme peacemaker, reveals how difficult and dangerous this work often is.

The word peace is the Hebrew word shalom. Often used as a greeting word or a departing word in much the same way we would utter “hello” or “goodbye,” it is a broad term related to health, prosperity, harmony, and wholeness. It means perfect welfare, serenity, fulfillment, freedom from trouble, and liberation from anything which hinders contentment. When a Jew said “Shalom” they were wishing on another the full presence, peace, and prosperity of all the blessedness of God.

Peace in the Bible is always based on justice and righteousness. Where justice prevails and righteousness rules, there you will also have peace. But without those two virtues, lasting peace is not possible.

The word make in the term “peacemakers” comes from the Greek verb that means “to do” or “to make.” It is a word bursting with energy. It mandates action and initiative. Someone has to drag the combatants to the table and give them a reason to put down their arms. Notice Jesus did not say “Blessed are the peacewishers or the peacehopers or the peacedreamers or the peacelovers or the peacetalkers.” Peace must be made. Peace never happens by chance. A peacemaker is never passive. They always take the initiative. They are up and doing.

So when these two words are taken together, “peace” and “maker,” it describes one who actively pursues peace. The peacemaker pursues more than the absence of conflict; they don’t avoid strife (in fact, sometimes, peacemaking will create strife); they aren’t merely seeking to appease the warring parties; they aren’t trying to accommodate everyone. Instead, they are pursuing all the beauty and blessedness of God upon another.

As William Barclay translates this verse, “They are people who produce right relationships in every sphere of life.”

Peacemaking is loving your enemy. It is standing up for the right thing. Speaking truth to power and loving and praying for those in power. It is not compromising or changing the message to make peace easier, but confronting one’s enemy with the paradox of someone who deeply disagrees also deeply loving them.

The children of God are called to makers of peace. War and violence have no place within the community of God. While empires are built through the shed blood of enemies; the kingdom community is built upon the shed blood of Jesus.

[i] https://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/28/us/politics/2006obamaspeech.html