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Christianity Today, December, 2007 |

Blessed Are the Peacemakers

Quotations to stir heart and mind.

Compiled by Richard A. Kauffman | posted 12/17/2007 09:12AM

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BLESSED are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.
Matthew 5:9

THE FOLLOWERS of Jesus have been called to peace. When he called them they found their peace, for he is their peace. But now they are told that they must not only have peace but make it. And to that end they renounce all violence and tumult.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

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.
John R. W. Stott, The Message of the Sermon on the Mount

BEING a peacemaker is part of being surrendered to God, for God brings peace. We abandon the effort to get our needs met through the destruction of enemies. God comes to us in Christ to make peace with us; and we participate in God's grace as we go to our enemies to make peace.
Glen H. Stassen and David P. Gushee, Kingdom Ethics

[N]O ONE has ever been converted by violence.
Jim Forest, The Ladder of the Beatitudes

[MANY CHRISTIANS] demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. … I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere. "Blessed are the merciful" in a courtroom? "Blessed are the peacemakers" in the Pentagon?
Kurt Vonnegut, "Cold Turkey," In These Times

MAKING PEACE makes us God's children—and kin to each other.
Michael H. Crosby, Spirituality of the Beatitudes

THE PEACE intended is not merely that of political and economic stability, as in the Greco-Roman world, but peace in the Old Testament inclusive sense of wholeness, all that constitutes well-being. … The "peacemakers," therefore, are not simply those who bring peace between two conflicting parties, but those actively at work making peace, bringing about wholeness and well-being among the alienated.
Robert A. Guelich, Sermon on the Mount: A Foundation for Understanding

[PEACEMAKERS] are honored insofar as they speak about peace as something already victoriously won that we can celebrate as part of our glorious past or as something that will be won in the other world. They continue to be dishonored insofar as they continue to point out injustice, hypocrisy, and suffering. They are noble when their actions bring to light problems far away from us; they are an odious nuisance when they point out our own sins.
Thomas Trzyna, Blessed Are the Pacifists

Related Elsewhere:

Previous Reflections columns include several about Advent and Christmas. Other Reflections on the Beatitudes include:

Blessed Are the Pure in Heart (November 12, 2007)

Blessed Are the Merciful (October 15, 2007)

Blessed Are Those Who Hunger (September 10, 2007)

Blessed Are the Meek (August 7, 2007)

Blessed Are Those Who Mourn (July 17, 2007)

Poor in Spirit (June 27, 2007)

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December 2007, Vol. 51, No. 12

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K. Cook

Posted: December 17, 2007 4:13 PM

Jesus said blessed are the peacemakers, and also to turn the other cheek, and to forgive seventy times seven. I don't recall the Pentagon and its many minions turning any cheeks lately unless you count the ones at Abu Graihb, and forgiveness is a foreign concept to those whose mission is to promulgate conflict. Guantanamo is run by the military; where is the peace in incarcerating people whose only crime was being in the wrong location at the wrong time? Where is the peace in our foreign policy, when we threaten and coerce and withhold the means to prevent or cure disease? Where is the peace in the domestic policy if we are thought to be criminals and worthy of being spied on? Where is the peace in people going bankrupt because of overwhelming health care bills? Where is the peace? War is peace.

John	Posted: December 17, 2007 3:19 PM

Why not put "Blessed are the peacemakers" at the Pentagon? What has produced more peace in the world than the United States military. That it is currently in the hands of neocon nutjobs does not change that fact. I think people who comment on peacemakers, and the meek, etc., need to think back to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Aragorn brings peace to Middle Earth after 3 movies of harsh war and bloodshed. Sometimes that is what it takes. Hitler and Tojo were defeated not by words but by bombs and bullets. Sometimes it is God's People's role to defeat evil, and sometimes that required violence. God did not shy away from the sword in the Old Testament. Reagan said peace thru strength, and I think he was right.

RandyT/Lewisville,TX

Posted: December 18, 2007 10:29 AM

Over the week end I watched a 60 Minutes episode, "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Found it interesting from a number of angles, but those don't fit into this discussion. However in an interview of Duncan Hunter by Lesley Stahl, Duncan said a very profound thing comparing our troops (without gays) and NATO troops (many with gays serving openly). I paraphrase; "They serve, you know, mostly in peacekeeper situations, not in heavy combat like our troops." I believe what that says about our country, if one believes Hunter to be correct, is that we are warmongers and NATO, European countries are Peacemakers. Now the question; which countries then are Christian? Or actually practice His Teachings?