Is peace even possible?

“Peace Child”  Isaiah 1:1-10, Romans 15:4-13, Matt. 3:1-12
Delivered to Church for the Highlands
on Sunday, December 5, 2010, Second Sunday of Advent
John Henson 

Is peace possible?

Have you ever heard of the Hatfields and McCoys?  Just hearing those two family names evokes imagery of people shooting at one another with as much hate as they can muster.  This hillbilly image came into my mind as I started to think about the issue of peace this week.

As I read the Scripture texts for this week, I remembered a chapter in Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Outliers.  The book is about what makes a person successful; showing how circumstances, family and even one’s birth date dictates her or his ability to succeed. The specific chapter I thought of this week is about how family traits contribute the success or failure of a person. It describes a kind of Hatfiled-McCoy war that has gone on for years, one that has been passed down within a family line, generation after generation.  Gladwell focuses in on the feuding between the Howards and the Turners in Harlan, Kentucky, located in the Cumberland Plateau of the Appalachian Mountains.  Their feud began over competition between business and then one man insulting another. Violence and killing began and escalated with reciprocating revenge. It became such a norm that even mothers developed expectations about it. Gladwell noted what one mother said,

“Stop that!” Will Turner’s mother snapped at him when he staggered home, howling in pain after being shot in the courthouse gun battle with the Howards. “Die like a man, like your brother did!” She belonged to a world so well acquainted with fatal gunshots that she had certain expectations about how they ought to be endured. Will shut his mouth, and he died.[i]

Gladwell provides a glimpse into these families and the intense hatred and violence that existed between them.  What Gladwell discovered and reveals to the reader is that these families are caught up in a vicious cycle of violence that is being passed down in the family line as surely and strongly as their hair color, personalities and abilities.  This trait is what sociologists have called a "culture of honor," leading family members to do whatever was required to protect their honor.

The sad part of this story and reality is that this kind of war and violence will continue until the cycle is broken.  It is as if the only way the feuding will stop is if someone from the outside must get into the family line in order to steer them out of it to achieve peace.  Just looking at their families generation after generation, we have to wonder, “Is peace possible for them? Ever?”

And the sad part about this feuding is that it is a microcosm for humankind these days.  It is rather apparent that humankind is, and has been for some time, in a feud that continues to get passed down generation after generation. A former president of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and historians from England, Egypt, Germany, and India have come up with some startling information: Since 3600 B.C. the world has known only 292 years of peace! During this period there have been 14,351 wars, large and small, in which 3.64 billion people have been killed. The value of the property destroyed would pay for a golden belt around the world 97.2 miles wide and 33 feet thick.[ii]

We, too, carry within us a fighting trait and inclination toward violence that is evidently unending.

Just look at us today, at this point in our history.  As we speak, the world is watching to see what will happen next after North Korea bombed South Korea recently.  Just last week, a terrorist was tying up the last details in an elaborate scheme to set off a massive explosion at a Christmas tree lighting in Oregon. As we speak, bombs are being dropped and going off in Afghanistan, some by American forces and some by Al Qaeda.  I don’t know if you saw it or not, but there was a 20/20 show on Friday about the war going on in Sudan and what George Clooney and others are doing to bring attention to it.  It was heart wrenching to see the pictures again of burned cities and bodies and to hear of the unspeakable things people are doing to each other. We see all of this and truly wonder, "Is peace really possible?"

And we know of the peace that can be lacking in our relationships, especially in our marriages.  I read an article[iii] this week about how the marriage industry is sufferung from the decline of marriages, with couples choosing not to bother with it, as they see no purpose in the formality of vows or a ceremony.  There were many reasons given for the decline, but I’m wondering if the biggest reason is the thinking that, “Why bother, if it isn’t going to last forever anyway?”  We know—either on our own or observing others—of the intensity of rage and conflict that can occur between two people who love each other very much, especially when these two people are under the strain of financial problems, parenting and the clash of expectations for one another.  As time passes in a marriage, the two people are changing and their differences are either uniting them or sending them off in two very different directions.  As we look at our marriages today, we often ask ourselves, “Is peace even possible?”

And the religions of the world know very little peace these days.  And, this from the people who are actually supposed to be the biggest advocates of peace. It is sad to realize, for example, the lack of peace in the body of Christ today. Adherents quarrel over translations, customs and traditions and even what style of music God likes best. Churches are fighting with other churches and with themselves.  And denominations are now much more familiar with protesting and voting against one another than with sharing the Gospel with the world around them. 

And then there are the conflicts religions have with each other, as witnessed throughout history, especially between Christians, Muslims and Jews.  There is also the ongoing strife between the violent edges of Hinduism and Islam in Asia. And we—and the people outside our churches especially—look at it all and wonder, “Is peace ever possible?”

Well, this is all very depressing, isn’t it?  After considering all of this, our question “Is peace even possible?” seems ridiculous and even naive in light of the facts of our history.

This question must have been on the minds of the people of Israel as they were away in exile; having been conquered and then removed from their homes and land.  And, yet, in the midst of it, they caught a glimpse of  what God wanted for them; their preferred future; of God’s plan for peace; of the day that the cycle they were swirling in would be broken.  They could see a shoot coming from the root of Jesse. You can get an idea of it here in Edward Hick's painting, "Peacable Kingdom." A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him . . . The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. As Isaiah caught the vision and conveyed it to them, they could see that, yes, peace is possible.  Peace would come.  And it would come through someone who would enter into their world, through their family line, to break the cycle and bring peace.  What was God’s solution?  And a little child shall lead them.

And we are to see what God wants for our world today, to see what God has done through that child.  And we are to see that God still has this vision out there for us to see and envision with Him.  Are you seeing God’s vision for a peaceable kingdom in these days of strife and violence? In your relationships?  In your marriage?  With your family? At work? Aren’t you tired of waiting for peace to come some other way than through Jesus?

And so how does the child lead us?  Paul knew the answer to this.  This morning we have been reminded by his letter to the Romans of how it is that we are to participate with God in the building of that peaceable kingdom, especially in our relationships.  As Paul wrote, May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another and to Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God. This kind of harmony and welcoming were to come from believing in Jesus, as seen in Paul’s words here,  May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.  We help bring peace into the world by believing in the child; in the Child who is wanting to lead us into this kingdom.  Believing results in welcoming one another and loving one another through our differences.

And John the Baptist doesn’t allow us to keep asking if peace is possible.  He just calls us to repent from our violent ways and embrace God’s vision and kingdom of peace. Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near is his simple message for his world.  We, like the crowd around John that day, can’t help but feel the conviction that we are to do some radical turning to get to peace.  As we are seeing in this season of Advent, the hope we have for a better day in the future is highly dependent on our involvement in God’s plan.  Our role is critical.

We turn to peace by developing and implementing new and creative ways to responding to violence in our world.  Jesus was the best ever at this.  Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Nelson Mandela are recent examples of how this Child can be followed.  It is learning from that ancient Chinese proverb, The more you sweat in peacetime, the less you bleed during war.  It is obvious in our world today that we aren’t sweating enough.  We repent and  turn to peace when we seek to rid the world of weapons of mass destruction, using our voices, keyboards and votes to speak for us to say this isn't God's way. We turn to peace when churches move from isolation to getting at the forefront of working underneath the problems in the community that result in violence, providing solutions to what ails communities.

We repent and turn to peace in our relationships when we are treating one another with civility and understanding with our differences rather than disdain and hatred.  And, in our homes, we turn to peace when we teach our children skills of peacemaking and negotiation with us as well as with how they deal with conflicts at school or on the ball field.  These are but a few of the ways we must work with God to bring peace into this world.

Is peace possible?  It is if we catch a glimpse of it with Isaiah, if we put it into practice with Paul and if we radically repent to it with John the Baptist. Yes, peace is possible, as far as it depends on you and me.  You and me, following the child, the Prince of Peace.

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[i] This quote found at Location 1979 on Kindle version of Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell.

[ii] Source for this is unknown, found here: http://bible.org/node/13168

[iii] http://pewsocialtrends.org/2010/11/18/the-decline-of-marriage-and-rise-of-new-families/