Jesus Life Hacks // Peacemakers Matthew 5:9
We live in a world were conflict, hate and strife are all around. It seems to grow year after year.
History has shown that most peacekeeping efforts have had only mixed results and by and large have failed. In the over 3100 years of recorded world history, the world has only been at peace 8% of the time or a total of 286 years and 8000 treaties have been made and broken.
Matthew 5:9 NIV "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God."
Jesus uses a very precise word. He doesn’t say Peacekeeper but rather Peacemaker.
Peacekeepers work to keep conflict from happening.
Peacemakers bring reconciliation.
We are instruments of peace in the world.
The peacemaker is one who enters into the rough and messy of human relationships, strife and hat and brings people together into community.
2 Corinthians 5:18 “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation."
The word translated Peacemaker is found only here in the New Testament.
In the Hebrew Bible, the word for peace is “shalom” which suggests serenity, or, happiness.
It is a general word which means to make peace between any two offended parties whether individuals, groups, nations, or even between man and God.
The Bible is clear, that a person who works for peace is engaged in the very work which the God of peace is doing.
The heart of a peacemaker is servanthood.
I have to be willing to serve others, to put concern for others ahead of myself. This means I have to lay down my opinions, preferences, discomfort and self-righteousness, to seek and love others.
The greatest display for christ followers in a world of hate and bias is a position of serving and love.
Jesus taught and modeled this to his disciples and to you and I.
Read John 13:1-17
“12 When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. 13 “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. 14 Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. 15 I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. 16 Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. 17 Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.”
Jesus chose a position of serving and extended love, even to those who rejected him.
1 John 4:19-21 NIV “We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.”