Tuesday, October 24, 2017

Blessed are the peacemakers

When Jesus saw the crowds, He went up on the mountain; and after He sat down, His disciples came to Him. He opened His mouth and began to teach them, saying…Matthew 5:1-2
The eight sermons from the Beatitudes display the development of Christian character as each beatitude leads to the next.  The logical flow of these teachings should display the journey we make to become disciples of Christ in the way we live our lives. Yesterday’s Beatitude was Blessed are the pure in heart.  Today we look at:
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.  Matthew 5:9
We live in a world torn apart with strife.  The absence of peace is not just related to nations. Life is relationships and there is no place Satan can bring greater chaos in our lives than in the destruction of relationships at all levels.  Political, personal, public or private strife destroys peace.  We need peace. It is the cry from every corner. Everyone talks of peace and longs for peace, but few have found the secret of it. 
God is a peace-loving God, and a peace-making God. We can do nothing more God-like than bring peace to those who are separated from God and others.  The whole history of redemption, climaxing in the death and resurrection of Jesus, is God's strategy to bring about a just and lasting peace between sinful man and Himself, between man and man and also within man.  Jesus is the Prince of Peace who came to bring peace on earth.  As children of God, we should have the character of God to pass on to others.  We should love what He loves and we should pursue what He pursues.  He wants peace for us and wants us to model and help spread peace for a hurting world. 
Peacemakers:
  • Seek solutions - not arguments
  • Calm the waters - not stir them up
  • Lower their voices rather than raise them
  • Generate more light than heat
Peace does not mean the absence of conflict but the absence of strife.  There will be conflict in life.  That’s a given.  But as Christians God wants us to handle ourselves differently than the rest of the world.  …for they shall be called sons of God…  As Children of God, we should look and act like God’s family.  We should strive to resemble our roots.  When God’s love, compassion, and peacefulness pour into our lives, we can overflow to others.

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful.  Colossians 3:15

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