Peace Starts Here

Isaiah 2:1-4
Luke 6:27-36

Pastor Hunter interrupted his sermon series on The Apostles' Creed to celebrate Peacemaking and Worldwide Communion Sunday on 3 October 2004, with a sermon on how to start making peace.

"Have you," Mr. Hunter asked, "ever imagined what real world peace would be like?" Peace is difficult to recognize because we are so far from that goal. Hate crimes in Billings, Montana, and crystal meth gang-related crimes in Cody and Powell show us how close violence is to us all.

Much violence, Mr. Hunter said, results from fear and anger——the kind of fear and anger that we each experience in our hearts all the time. For instance, our fear of strangers——xenophobia——causes us to exist in a state of nervous fear much of the time.

The antidote to this kind of fear, anger, and violence is to pray for world peace, but God's peace needs to start right here . . . in our own hearts.

Christ gave us a new model for relationships in the passage in Luke 6:27-31:

[27] "But I say to you that hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, [28] bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. [29] To him who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from him who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. [30] Give to every one who begs from you; and of him who takes away your goods do not ask them again. [31] And as you wish that men would do to you, do so to them. "

Remarkable things can happen, Mr. Hunter says, if we follow Christ's directive:

• If we bless those who curse us, we get back what we give, amplified.
• If we pray for those who abuse us, our view of those people changes because hate leaves our hearts.
  
• If we do unto others as we would have them do to us, how can violence not leave the world?

Mr. Hunter concluded by saying,

We can confront our fears by seeking those who are strangers and making them friends. We also need to confront the anger in us, forgive those who have wronged us, and seek to practice the steps of active love that Jesus prescribed.

Mr. Hunter's entire sermon is available online. See Peace Starts Here (PDF).