The Seventh Blessing - Matthew 5:9

When I was in seminary, I spent a very hot summer in Texas as a faith based community organizer. The organization I worked with was called Communities of Shalom, and their vision was to help communities flourish by getting to know folks and their hopes, dreams, and desires for their communities. 

I loved that the this organization bore the name “Shalom” - a Hebrew word that means peace. Peace is one of those things that can mean so many things to different people. For some it means the absence of conflict or war. For others its the idea of serenity in the mind and heart. But I think Jesus was thinking bigger than just an absence of conflict. I think he was talking about the bigger ideas between “Shalom” peace - wholeness, health and safety. This type of Shalom wasn’t something you had once it a while, it was something that was to be permeant in the Kingdom of God. 

So when Jesus is teaching in the Beatitudes and says, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God”, that’s what he is calling the people to be about.

But being a peacemaker can be such a tricky thing. Peace isn’t something that we can simply say that we want with our lips or silently wish for in our hearts. It has to be something that we pursue. It has to be something that we pray for. 

I was recently in a Bible Study, and as we were talking about what to pray for, one of the women said peace. Then she asked a really powerful question, “what would happen if we truly prayed, as Christians, for peace?”

What could happen, friends? What could come to be because we prayed for peace, and not just any peace, but the peace of Jesus to reign amongst us. How could this world change? How could we be changed?

Because I think we also need to be a people who embody what it looks like to work towards making peace with the way we live. And a big way we can do that is to be in relationship with other people. Practicing what we want for the world as a whole in the way that we treat other people. 

Serving in Texas that summer, that was the bulk of what I did. I would get to know people in the community. Hear their stories. Talk about what breaks their hearts and what hopes they have for the future. Because that’s one of the ways we get to know people. Not just get to know about them, but truly get to know them. To talk about things big and small, with care, remind them that they have value. 

When we treat people like they have value, its about that person right there with us in the moment. It’s not about what they can possibly do for us in the future. It’s about being in relationship with them, because they are loved by God. 

We are to be the peacemakers in the world, Church, for it not us, then who? We are the people who should be working towards restoring relationships with each other and between humanity and God. But the truth is sometimes we don’t have even have peace with one another. 

That summer job I was telling you about? It was simulanituoly the hardest summer job I ever had and the most rewarding. I loved going out and meeting people and talking and dreaming together, but one of the people acting as a supervisor and I didn’t get along well. Which created a lot of tension. Not because we didn’t like one another, but because we couldn’t see eye to eye on what we were working towards, what the goal was. And as a result there wasn’t peace. 

There are times that we don’t understand peace. We think it’s an absence of conflict, but that’s not really it, is it? Because we aren’t always agree, even on the big things, like what our goals is. Instead, peace is talking about how do we live with one another, even if we don’t agree. Paul had something to say about that in Romans: Those who are strong ought to put up the failings of the weak. We should strive to put our neighbor above ourselves, so that we can build them up. It looks like living in harmony, even if we don’t always agree, so that our outward voice of witness will glorify God. 

What is Paul saying here? Peace isn’t just about how you get along with each other. It’s about what witness you are truthfully projecting out into the world. Peace is about being in relationships that are healthy and whole and working to restore weakened relationships, all for the sake of the glory of God

And that’s what peace is about. Magnifying God’s glory. Making known God’s kingdom. Many of you have commented from time to time about the stoles I wear on Sunday morning. Stoles are pieces of cloth that folks who are ordained wear to remind them that that they are first and foremost yoked to Christ. Every so often there is a woman I approach to make me a new stole based off of a scripture passage that is really speaking to me during that time. In the past year I had one created based off of the words of Isaiah 2:4, “they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more, words that are said as part of one of the communion liturgies about the Kingdom of God. Wearing that stole, a woman kept looking at it and asking me what it meant. When I told her about this scripture she said, “I didn’t even know that was in scripture.”

Friends, how often is that true in our lives as well? We don’t know what the scriptures say about peace or we don’t know how to actively try to live as people of peace? But for those who do take on the challenge of being peace makers - what does Jesus say about them? Those folks will be called children of God. Friends, our whole identity shifts when we realize that we are children of God. 

One of the interesting experiences I have living in this particular community is that people recognize my last name. They ask where I grew up and who my parents are. My identity is tied to the heritage of those who came before me. So it is with us as children of God. Who we are is completely transformed when we can say “I am a child of God.” 

But a funny thing happens when we identify as a child of God - we start to see other people with the eyes of God. We start to see them as someone who God deeply cares about as well, and as a result we want to seek peace with them and for them. We want them to be healthy and whole and we raise our lives and voices to remove any obstacles in the way of such peace. We begin to embody Shalom.

Jesus embodied Shalom, too. Jesus didn't have an agenda other then to bring about love and justice. As followers of Christ we am called to do the same thing. To embody Shalom. To be available for people. To treat them with dignity and respect. We are also called to be Shalom. To be and not to do. To be Shalom is to be authentic and available and the incarnation of love and justice. It's quite a tall order in our society, but thats part of what it looks like to be a peacemaker. Let us be the peacemakers, dear friends. Amen.