Peacemakers in an Age of Violence

I started wrestling with this topic because of the movie review I wrote on The Book of Eli which has these very confused messages on the relationship between faith and violence. Movies are commonly filled with violence precisely because our society is ... they mirror our reality as an act of interpretation and dialogue. Undoubtedly, we do live in an age of violence - South Africa’s own newspapers are constantly filled with stories of violent crimes and horrible violence. This age of violence is nothing new; it probably would be an apt description for almost every generation since our earliest beginnings.

This distinct lack of peace seems to come from somewhere within humanity. We seem to be at war within ourselves in terms of our prejudices, hatred, lack of forgiveness, greed and pride, all of which spills out of us and creates societal mayhem. Even the church, which bears the name of Jesus the Prince of Peace, has to its shame, allowed the cross to be displayed on shields of war. Equally shameful, is how we have historically been involved in crusades and inquisitions.

I find it incomprehensible that Christians have ever used violence as a means to propagate their message when Jesus’ challenge for us is to act as peace-makers, and to be actively involved in matters of societal justice and righteousness. Christ-followers should be involved in bringing God’s love to all areas of need – wherever there is poverty, war, disease and strife – that’s exactly where we need to be involved in working for change. In Matthew 5, Jesus said ‘Blessed are the peace-makers, for they will be called children of God’. Children of God! Peace-makers will therefore be OF God, they will be LIKE God, they will be living life like God does.

Yet, it is difficult not to feel cynical or defeated, before we even begin trying to bring peace to our societies. As Jesus himself said, ‘the poor will always be with us’, one dictator always seems to rise up to replace another, and greed so often seems to win out in the decisions made by governments and community leaders. So why even bother then? If we are not going to ever completely rid the world of all injustice and conflict, then why don’t we just stop even trying to make a difference? We may feel like John Mayer does in his Grammy nominated song ‘Waiting on the world to change,’ where he says, “it's not that we don't care, we just know that the fight ain't fair, so we keep on waiting, waiting on the world to change.”

Yet, as small and as un-influential as we may feel, the promise is that when we go out into the world as peace-makers, we WILL make a difference. Anne Herbert came up with the wonderful phrase: “Practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty,” which to me, sums up Jesus’ gospel call for us to be peace-makers.

You see, when we refuse to return violence with violence; when we offer persistent and never-ending forgiveness; when we do small little things everyday that bless people instead of curse them; when we don’t return road rage with road rage; when we are kind instead of mean; and when we are generous instead of being petty – IT ALL MATTERS, IT ALL ADDS UP, IT ALL MAKES A DIFFERENCE! For then we are peace-makers, children of God living in his image, and little by little, step by step, we are bringing Jesus’ peace in situations of conflict.

Abraham Lincoln once said: “Die when I may die, I would like it to be said of me, that I always pulled up a weed and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.”

The small things make a difference! The small, little things we do every day transform our characters, either for good or bad. And in like manner the small, little things we do everyday can transform society bit by bit, either for good or bad.

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This article has been written by Gareth Killeen, the editor of CruxMobi.