We entered the conference room in stony silence. For several weeks I had noticed the two of them – mature women, well-established, well-grounded in the Lord – but at odds with one another. They had been planning a special event, but had disagreed over the menu. One of them wanted an item dear to her ethnic tradition; the other wanted only what everyone was used to. One of them wanted to try something different; the other wanted to keep things the way they had always been. And though it seemed just to be about food, it became obvious that it was about more than food. It was about power. It was about authority. It was about pride. Who would back down? Neither of them. And when name-calling began and other church members started to notice and to take sides, I knew that as pastor I must step in. So here we were, in the conference room, in stony silence.
We prayed and then we began. I asked each to describe not only her case but also what she was feeling about the other. Each protested that she had nothing against her sister, oh, no, everything was fine, except … But after “except” came from one a torrent of complaint and criticism; I had difficulty restraining the other one from pouring out her invective during all this. And, as you might expect, when the other’s turn came, she turned on the spigot as well. The room was awash with anger and accusation. For this I went to seminary? To judge between entrée items at the next church dinner? But of course it was about far more than that. I pleaded, I interpreted, I urged, I admonished. And finally, so I thought, I had a breakthrough. Angry woman number one turned to angry woman number two and said, “I was wrong. I should not have said what I said. Will you forgive me?” Ah, great moment, “Will you forgive me?”
To which number two replied, with words that pierced like knives, “Well, no”. She proceeded to repeat the old arguments one more time. “Will you forgive?” “Well, no.” I was beaten. I left that night, worn out, because there was no resolution and no peace. However, that is not the end of the story.
In the musical, “South Pacific”, Lieutenant Cable sings, “You’ve got to be taught to hate and fear, you’ve got to be taught from year to year, and it’s got to be drummed in your dear little ear. You’ve got to be carefully taught!” The idea is that we are naturally peaceful people, but we are taught hostility by others. Supposedly if you leave us alone we are sweet innocents whom others corrupt with hateful teachings. We might wish that were so, but both history and theology teach us that it is not true. Ever since Cain rose up against Abel we have known that hostility, self-justification, and pride, are what we do. Ever since Lot argued with Abraham, ever since Sarah sent Hagar into the wilderness, we have known that what is native to us is not harmony but hatred. And that means we have to be carefully taught, all right; but it is not that somebody has to teach us how to fight. Instead somebody has to teach us the way of peace. Somebody has to teach us how to reconcile. “Why can’t we all just get along?” That is not going to happen all by itself. But we can be carefully taught the ways of peace; we can be carefully taught how to love; we can be carefully taught what reconciliation is all about.
The prophet Micah had a vision about that. In his mind’s eye he saw a place to which all the nations might go and ask to be taught the arts of peace. “In days to come the mountain of the LORD’s house shall be established … Peoples shall stream to it, and many nations shall come and say: "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths." For out of Zion shall go forth instruction … He shall judge between many peoples, and shall arbitrate between strong nations far away; 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”
What a vision that is! That to the house of the Lord all peoples would come to learn not war, but the art of peace. That to the people of God the nations might come to find out how to move from unending hostility to eternal peace. What a vision! Let’s examine this more closely, this idea that the house of God is a house of peacemaking.
I
First, notice what the house of the Lord must teach if it is to be a house of peacemaking. The house of the Lord must teach, quite simply, God’s ways, God’s truths. If we are to be a house of peacemaking, we must diligently and clearly teach the whole counsel of God. “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways … .” His ways … The most fundamental task we have is to teach our struggling world who God is and what He is about. All of it.
When I was a campus minister, I became interested in helping professors embody their Christian faith in their teaching. I had an instinct that a professor who was a Christian would handle his students in a distinctive way. And so I began my Doctor of Ministry research on methods of helping college faculty teach in a Christian way. One of my supervisors, however, asked a penetrating question that made me rethink my work. He said, “What will the outcome look like if a college professor is what you call ‘more Christian’? Will that just mean he will be nicer to the students? Is that all?” Well, that’s a good question. Christianity is more than helping people be nice to each other. It is more than just having pleasant conversations. To know the Christian faith is to know about God’s plan of salvation and God’s kind of costly peace. I believe that the world is hungry to know that. The world we encounter wants to understand how life is more than empty politeness and vacuous pleasantries. We are called to teach the ways of God, and they have teeth in them. They are substantial.
Take the Ten Commandments, for example. They are not the ten suggestions. They are moral absolutes, without which life is chaos. If the house of the Lord is to be a house of peacemaking, we must teach clearly what is right and what is wrong, what is acceptable and what is not. Is it possible that part of the issue today is that we so want to make nice with the world that we stand for very little that is straightforward and clear?
Is it possible that we have decided in the church that we are so hungry to make it easy for people to join that we have abandoned the heart of what we are about? Why, today we have churches who seem to think that changing their name is what it takes to attract the public, and so they do not want to be known as Baptist churches, because there is a perception that those crazy Baptist folks actually stand for something! We have churches who suppose that jazzing up the name of the church will somehow give it life; my wife’s cousin serves on the staff of a Minneapolis congregation named Hallelujah! Lutheran Church. That’s Hallelujah!, with the exclamation point as part of the name of the church! Well, all right, if you really teach something at a place like that; but folks, it’s not the name, it’s not the cosmetics, it’s not the superficials that matter. What matters is that there is substance in what is taught. What matters is that we understand that the core of the human problem is sin, putting ourselves in God’s place and wanting to be laws unto ourselves. Peacemaking will not come until we start teaching the truth about our human failings.
II
But then, following closely on that, Micah tells us that God’s call to be a house of peacemaking is not only teaching God’s ways; it is also walking in His paths. "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths." To be a house of peacemaking, we must not only teach substantial truths; we must model them. We must live them, act them out. If we are to be a house of peacemaking, then we must show the world what reconciled relationships look like.
Just this week I heard from someone a phrase I have heard too many times. I heard the charge that “the church is the only army in the world that shoots its own wounded.” Do you know what that means? Someone gets into inappropriate behavior, and we put him out. Someone does something wrong, and we ask him to leave. There was a young man in the church I pastored who stole from us by misusing the church’s credit card and, we think, by pocketing the Vacation Bible School offering. I confronted him to tell him we must relieve him of all leadership roles. That was the right thing to do, of course. But then we failed to take the next steps. We failed to work with him toward repentance and forgiveness. He kept on attending the church, for a while; but then we saw him less and less. Still no one intervened; no one, least of all I, did anything except let him go. It was not long until we did not see him at all, and, I am afraid, we thought, “Good riddance.” But a few months later I ran into this young man on the street and learned that he had become a Muslim, for, he said, “the Muslims really show you how to live.” Wow! We, you see, had told him the right things. But we never showed him how to live them out. We shot our walking wounded and we lost him entirely.
If the church is to be a house of peacemaking, then we must walk in God’s paths. We must model peacemaking. We must be a community where it does not matter so much where you have been or what you have done, but that you are here and that you are on the way to redemption. The church is not just a bunch of law-abiding middle-class folks who get together every Sunday to applaud one another for being nice. It is a gathering of the wounded and the hurting, the broken and the distressed, all of whom are being brought back to life by the Spirit of God. It is a fellowship of the last, the least, the lost, and the lonely, who do not prey on one another’s faults. Rather they feel one another’s pain and heal one another’s hurts. They carry the gift of peace, costly peace, to one another. To be a house of peacemaking is not only to teach God’s truths, but also to walk in God’s paths.
III
And that will require sharp instruments. That will take good skills. Peacemaking is not some vague ideal without any particular skills. If we are to be a house of peacemaking, we need to develop the right tools. Micah’s image is very apt. “They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks”. God’s people will become equipped for peacemaking. Good intentions don’t get it done; preparation is everything.
You see, sometimes we don’t focus on equipping for a difference. Sometimes what we teach is just out there and doesn’t matter where people hurt. I have a friend who said that he went to a church as the new pastor, and started out visiting the Sunday School classes to see what was going on. He went to one room, and it was a large class of older men, busily engaged in studying the ancient Hittites. Oh, my, were they having a great Bible study! They had hung maps of the ancient near East. They had posted pictures of archaeological digs. They had even found a faculty member from the nearby university who could teach them to say a few phrases in the ancient Hittite language. They knew all there was to know about the Hittites. Bible study par excellence!
But, said my friend, the next Sunday he went to another classroom, one where there were no maps, no posters, no visiting professors. But there were five or six young couples, sitting with an open Bible and a sensitive leader. They were sharing stories of their home life – about how hard it was to keep love fresh; about how the children got on their nerves and made them snap. One husband even told about how he had betrayed his wife and had indulged in six months of office romance. These folks were struggling with huge issues, relationships, trust. Asked my friend the pastor, which one do you think was really doing Bible study, the Hittite scholars or the hungry-for-health couples?
Someday, I am going to see a church that beats swords into plowshares, a church that will teach couples how to enrich their marriages. A church that will train parents in the art of positive childcare. A church that will teach conflict resolution. Someday, I will see a church that beats spears into pruninghooks and transforms ex-offenders into productive workers, develops underachieving young people into self-confident adults, takes immigrants off the street corners and provides them with dignity. Someday, God’s people are going to find fulfillment in giving real skills and in equipping for the abundant life. For if we are called to be a house of peacemaking, we will have to provide something more than a pat on the back and a breezy, “God bless you.” Swords into plowshares and spears into pruninghooks, tools for the harvest.
IV
So, where are we now? What have we learned from Micah? We have learned that to be a house of peacemaking we must commit to teaching God’s ways, all of them, the inconvenient as well as the convenient, the demanding as well as the pleasurable. It will not do to be half-hearted about who God is and what He expects. The world needs us to teach His ways.
And we have learned that to be a house of peacemaking, we need to walk in His paths, we need to model peace-filled lives. We need one another, warts and all. The world needs us to show that we can walk in His paths.
Beyond that, we have learned that to be a house of peacemaking, we need to equip ourselves with instruments we can really use. We need to do more than blunder along whispering sweet nothings. We need to teach useful stuff, swords into plowshares and spears into pruninghooks.
But Micah wants us to see one thing more. One more element in becoming a house of peacemaking. This house of peacemaking begins with people of peace. It begins with personal peace. It starts with individuals who know a peace that passes understanding. When I hear Micah promise that “they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid”, I hear him telling us that it is only when we are secure that we can be authentic peacemakers. It is only when we know peace within that we can make peace without. It is only when we have in our minds and hearts a profound peace about who we are that we can make peace for others. The world’s peace issues will never be resolved until you and I resolve our own internal peace.
Do you remember my two angry women? Do you recall the fight over the food? “Can you forgive me?” “Well, no.” That is not the end of the story.
A few weeks after the stony silence in the church conference room, angry woman number one, the one who asked forgiveness, was involved in a serious accident – one in which a child was killed. And she was held responsible. There were grieving parents, there were medical and legal bills, there were police and reporters and insurance adjusters. I don’t know that I have ever seen a more complicated life situation. She was about to drown in a myriad of problems. But she brought it all to the church and asked us to pray. She laid it all out for the community of faith, and asked that we join her in her terrifying journey. We did. We prayed, and we went to work. We found affordable legal counsel. Various ones took her to her medical appointments and her lawyer’s office, since she was now prohibited from driving. Others stayed with her at her home, just to answer the telephone and handle reporters and all the others who wanted in, for whatever reason. None of us thought her innocent of the charge of reckless driving. But neither did any of us forget about the family whose child had been killed; in fact, the church gathered a significant amount of money for that family, trying to reach out in love. It was a painful time, but it was shared throughout the church. It was taken on by a community of care.
And so after a month or two of this, as one Sunday many gathered around the altar to pour their hearts out before God, angry woman number two, the one who would not forgive, was heard to pray, “Lord, I have sinned. I have hurt my sister. I told her I would not forgive her. I was wrong. Lord, can you forgive me?”
And that very afternoon, number two took food to number one’s home, and stayed awhile. I will not likely ever know what was said; but I do know that they have become almost inseparable. Friends forever, in the Lord.
Because if you are to have a house of peacemaking, it must all begin in the heart. It must be about peace with God. It must be about being secure in the knowledge that if you forgive others their debts, so also your heavenly Father will forgive you. It is about having peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Oh, let this be a house of peacemaking. Let this be a church where truth is taught and embraced. Let this be a community where we show the world how to live in peace. Let this place be one where we are equipped with the tools that can make peace. But above all, let this very room echo, week after week, with the voices of those who have found the ultimate peace in the Prince of Peace, for “they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid”. In this house of peacemaking.
