Heading

You may have seen funny Church signs, but have you seen Church bulletin bloopers? Here are a few of my favorites:

• At the evening service tonight, the sermon topic will be “What Is Hell?” Come early and listen to our choir practice.
• Don’t let worry kill you off — let the Church help.
• The peacemaking meeting scheduled for today has been canceled due to a conflict.

All of those crack me up, but the last one actually made me pause when I read it. I know I have put off making things right with others. Whether it was a conflict of time, or a conflict of my selfish pride, I sometimes put off peacemaking.

For most of us, I think the natural reaction in times of conflict is either to hate others or to avoid them at all costs. I have a friend who will do truly anything to avoid conflict. He will not respond to your text, phone call, email, carrier pigeon, or knock on the door in order to avoid conflict. He got married a couple of years ago and quickly learned that that will not fly when it comes to marriage. He had been focused on keeping the peace rather than making peace.

‍

“And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.” (James 3:18)

I am not a farmer (nor am I good with keeping my plants alive), but I do know that when you plant a seed you get more back than what you started with. If you plant an apple seed, you’ll get a tree full of apples. If you plant a seed of conflict, you’ll get even more conflict back. If you plant a seed of peace, you’ll find that even greater peace will be given. Every farmer knows, you reap what you sow, and you reap more than you sow.

So how do we plant seeds of peace? I think James gives us great examples of how to be wise in peacemaking. Read James 3:17: “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.” This is James’ recipe for success:

• We bring peace to conflict when we are pure in our integrity. This means we are devoted to Him, not ourselves. We are dedicated to His purpose and not our own.
• We bring peace to conflict when we are peace loving. This means we intentionally move to make wrong things right; to heal situations and not avoid them.
• We bring peace to conflict when we are gentle. When we want someone to understand our feelings and pain, we don’t explain with anger or hostility. We communicate with gentleness, even when they are not gentle toward us.
• We bring peace to conflict when we are open to reason. This means we provide space for others to speak and we listen. We place our pride aside and are approachable.
• We bring peace to conflict when we are full of mercy and good fruits.
• We bring peace when we forgive, especially when others don’t deserve it or ask for it. That is love. We sacrifice our own wants and desires all for the sake of someone else.
• We bring peace when we are impartial and sincere. This means we don’t let our past dealings with a person determine the present or future.

‍

The more I break these down, the more insane they sound. What I mean: They all sound like the right thing to do, but they also sound extremely tough. See, I still don’t respond well when I’m irritated or annoyed by someone. Frankly, I sometimes don’t want to bring peace to situations with people I don’t like. So often, being right is better in my mind than being together.

I can even justify this mindset: They are wrong! Isn’t it better to make sure they know they are wrong so I can correct them? We just don’t get along, isn’t it better if I avoid them so nothing further can happen between us?

I’m really glad Jesus never asked these questions about me. I’m glad he didn’t determine my future based upon my past. I’m thankful he brought me into peace from the conflict we were in. As Paul explains: “But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. … For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, …” (Romans 5:8, 10a).

Our God has gone so far to make peace with us. He has gone to the ends of the earth to bring us out of conflict. He calls us to grab ahold of the wisdom he provides, and not to be keepers of peace, but makers of peace.  

‍

‍

Parting Thought:

One morning Mauricio Estrella walked into the office, sat down at his desk, and was greeted with the message: “Your password has expired. Click ‘Change Password’ to change your password.”

You know how, when you are emotionally raw, small things can be so frustrating? This, for Estrella, was one of those times. He was running late that morning, had forgotten to eat breakfast, had a meeting to attend, and then there were those nagging frustrations with his ex. Estrella had just gone through an emotionally brutal divorce that had left him in a deep depression.

At his workplace, the server is configured to ask thousands of employees around the planet to change their password every 30 days. As the empty field with the pulsating cursor awaited his input, Estrella thought to himself, “I’m gonna use a password to change my life.” His password became: “Forgive@h3r.”

Each time he came back from a break or lunch, he typed “Forgive@h3r.” For one month, the password became a mantra. And that mantra changed his life. Estrella shared: “That constant reminder that I should forgive her led me to accept the way things happened at the end of my marriage, and embrace a new way of dealing with the depression that I was drowning into.”