“Peace—Roots and Shoots”
One of the “perks” of Regional ministry is the opportunity to worship with many congregations during the year. It is informative, exciting, and helpful to participate in worship and note the similarities and differences that our Disciples siblings share. This is one way that Regional staff can connect with a congregation and their clergy. Yesterday, I worshiped at First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Norman, OK and heard a thoughtful sermon by their Sr. Minister, Rev. David Spain. His sermon coupled with the great conversation I listened too in the Chi Rho & CYF Sunday school class led by Rev. Kim Gaston McGough, Associate Minister, stirred my imagination all day. If you are in the Norman area looking for a place to worship this Advent and Christmas season and are looking for a church that looks like and sounds like a church, I suggest FCC, Norman.
When I am preparing to hear a sermon, my mental conversation to clear my mind is, “Ok, let’s see what is on your mind this morning.” Here is what Rev. Spain had to say on the second Sunday of Advent. Shalom!
“Peace—Roots and Shoots”
Isaiah 11: 1 – 9 & Romans 15: 1 – 7
December 5, 2010Of all the prophetic passages for Advent and Christmas, this is the one I always have someone else read, because I can’t get through these 9 verses without choking up—even reading silently, the tears come. Those tears come from two different places and for two different reasons. On the one hand, the tears come because we know how far we are from the wolf and the lamb, the leopard and the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling lying down together, and a little child leading them. We are a long, long way from the holy mountain, and sometimes I’m not sure hu-manity can even see the mountain anymore so obscured by the smoke and fire of so many wars and so much hostility and the utterly horrific insanity of how humans treat each other. I can only imagine how deeply this grieves God, who weeps for all the children—Christian and Jew, Mus-lim and Hindu, Taoist and Buddhist, agnostic and atheist, the neighbor and the family member—all of whom are God’s children under one divine, loving Parent. Although we are siblings with one another, God’s children are still hurting and destroying each other. And so to read Isaiah 11 is to weep over our deep and abiding estrangement.
But the tears also come from another place—not a place of despair over what is but a place of hope and wonder because God still holds on to and holds out for us the gift of peace, and here and there and now and then God’s children do actually receive that gift and share it. One of the most abiding and persistent notes that is held throughout the Biblical story is God’s song for peace. Despite evidence to the contrary, both our faith and the recesses of our deepest longings proclaim that peace is our true home and in God’s good design, peace is what we are called to abide in in this life and not just rest in when this life is over. God still speaks peace.
Edward Hicks, the 19th century American artist, loved the vision of peace that the prophet Isaiah proclaimed. Hicks famous painting, The Peaceable Kingdom, was rendered more than 100 times—and the animals are all there wide-eyed and so is the child, looking surprised, ex-pectant, startled. There is an interesting commercial currently running—several different ver-sions—that evoke Isaiah’s images from the 11th chapter; however, the commercial is not pro-moting peace. Instead it is selling insurance. Both the commercial and the characters in Hicks’ paintings of the peaceable kingdom express the artist’s intent. Peace is an unexpected reality and one that rarely if ever is experienced—yet we live wide-eyed for it.
John Buchanan has observed, “The yearning for peace is timeless and universal. All people want peace for themselves and for their [loved ones]. The longing for peace is deep within the human heart…At Jesus’ birth, angels sing about peace on earth. Old Simeon prays at the infant Jesus’ dedication in the Temple, ‘Now let your servant depart in peace.’ Jesus told his disciples to bless the homes that welcomed them with ‘Peace to this house.’ The first thing the risen Christ says to his disciples is ‘Peace be with you.’”(Journal for Preachers, Advent 2010, p. 10) Years ago, the church my family attended had a practice of “passing the peace,” which was a way of greeting one another by saying the “peace of God be with you.” One Sunday, my grand-mother was sitting next to me and missed the invitation to pass the peace, but saw that other peo-ple were turning and speaking to each other. She looked at me and with her 90 year old candor said, “I don’t know what we’re doing, but good morning and I’m glad you are here.” It made sense for her to say that—her name was Irene, which is from the Greek word meaning peace.
In fact, combining the Greek word for peace—eirene—with the Hebrew word for peace—shalom—peace is mentioned more the 360 times in the Biblical story. The Biblical concept of peace running from Genesis to Revelation is far more expansive than the absence of war. Peace is a call to embrace health, wholeness, serenity of mind, body, soul; it is the call to live in right and just relationship as a society; it is the call to affirmation, forgiveness, and reconciliation; it is the call to embrace and be embraced by the presence of God which passes all understanding.
“Peace I leave with you,” Jesus said to his disciples and in this season more than any other it is the message that is sung and our deepest yearning if for no other reason than we also know that when W.H. Auden once referred to the modern era as “the age of anxiety,” he was telling the truth. The velocity of life, the volume of work, the overload of information, the glut of choice is the steady diet that feeds anxiety and it is hard to step away from it without completely stepping out of it—and not even that guarantees the quelling of anxiety.
That the Bible speaks of peace so often is testimony to its centrality for life; yet it has to be said so often because it is so often absent. Frankly, it is a challenge to preach a sermon about peace that doesn’t end up sounding mostly like wishful thinking. To quote two voices I have heard over the years—“Wouldn’t it be nice to live in a world where we could all join hands and sing Kum Ba Yah, but that’s not the world we live in;” and the second voice not unlike the first— “Peace is a great idea, but I’m a realist.” Both statements have merit because the one thing peace can never be is naïve. Hicks was more right in his Peaceable Kingdom renderings than even he realized—peace must be wide-eyed; so when someone voices skepticism about the possibility of peace, the response must be courageous and honest. It is in that spirit that I disagree with the second statement in one tiny, yet crucial way. Rather than saying “Peace is a great idea, BUT I’m a realist,” I think the prophet Isaiah and the Prince of Peace and the apostle Paul are calling us to say “Peace is a great idea, AND I’m a realist,” or as one of our former President’s once said, “I’m an idealist without illusions.”
To be an idealist without illusions is to admit that life being what it is, conflict is unavoidable. The question is not how to avoid conflict, but how to engage it in such a way as to at the very least do no more damage and perhaps build something new. Frederick Buechner has observed “One of the titles by which Jesus is known is Prince of Peace, and he used the word himself in what seem at first glance to be two radically contradictory utterances. On one occasion he said to the disciples, ‘I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.’ Later on, the last time they ate together, he said to them ‘my peace I give to you.’ The contradiction is resolved when you real-ize that for Jesus peace seems to have meant not the absence of struggle but the presence of love.”(Wishful Thinking, p. 69).
A number of you have asked about the reaction to the letter that a group of ministers signed and printed in the paper a couple of weeks ago—a letter which appealed for love and compassion to guide our public discourse. The reaction has been largely favorable, and an interesting corol-lary is that two groups normally at polar opposites on an issue have agreed to sit down together for breakfast and conversation. It’s a small maybe even insignificant moment—but remember, Isaiah’s vision for peace begins with a tree stump, out of which a tiny green shoot emerges; and when the apostle Paul wrote to the Roman church he spoke of encouragement and harmony.Years ago the masterful preacher and author William Sloane Coffin was retelling the story of David and Goliath. In an effort to make the old story fresh, Coffin had the armor clad giant tow-ering over David say to him, “Hey, kid, whatcha got in the bag.?” With all due appreciation for the irony of using a Biblical story about war in the service of a sermon about peace, Coffin’s point was not to underestimate the power of small things and that size is not necessarily the determining factor in an outcome. (cited from Peter Gomes book The Scandalous Gospel of Jesus, p. 114). All the prophetic utterances and all the sermonic appeals for peace could be dismissed as wishful thinking except for one thing—here and there and now and then there are those who embrace and make for peace. The November 2nd edition of The Christian Century carried a stunning story about a community in Nigeria called Kaduna which is evenly divided between Christian and Muslim believers. Despite years of hostility, hatred, and horrific atrocities from both faiths, two men—Pastor James Wuye and Imam Nuryan Ashaffa—have transcended ideol-ogy and theology to found the Interfaith Mediation Center. Together, these men who still hold their own beliefs passionately, are waging peace by “teaching former opponents how to reread their own holy books to go beyond catchphrases about killing unbelievers, showing that the scriptures teach peace and love of neighbor.” Beyond the work of these two men, the women from the two faiths are coming together to share stoves—as there are not enough resources for everyone in the village to have a stove. So they share cooking, that their children will be fed.
“A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse”…“the God of steadfastness and encourage-ment grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus.” That Voice is still speaking—that Voice that calls us to live beyond violence and injustice, that Voice which has always been and will always be a summons to wholeness, healing, harmony, recon-ciliation. The fullness of life is rooted in peace, and it is peace for which we still thankfully yearn and that even in people like us a green shoot emerges, and “the cow and the bear shall graze…and the lion shall eat straw like the ox…they will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain; for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord.” It is enough to put tears in your eyes.