I recently spent some time studying one of the simplest verses in the New Testament: “blessed are the peacemakers.” There are no tricky words in this verse, no difficult Greek to parse. To be blessed means to be happy or to experience God’s favor; to be a peacemaker is to (wait for it!) make peace. But though the words are simple, the application takes some work. Essentially, Jesus is saying that peace with God leads us to make peace like God. But how do we actually do that?

It strikes me that there are at least three ways that each of us can serve as a peacemaker: we can make peace between God and man; we can make peace between man and man; and we can make peace between church and church.
Peace Between Man and God
Once we come to peace with God we naturally want to see others come to peace with him as well. What we call “evangelism” is simply this—telling others about the good news of the gospel and encouraging them to turn to Christ in repentance and faith—encouraging them to accept God’s terms of peace.
Do you do that? Are you sharing the gospel with other people? And are you asking them, or encouraging them, or pleading with them to turn to Christ? This is a serious and sacred calling God has given us. And I fear that of all Christians, Reformed Christians are among those most likely to neglect this task.
There are so many ways to share the gospel. You can speak to people at work and home and in your neighborhood. You can speak to your Uber driver and hairdresser. You can distribute tracts and Bibles. You can reach into the online communities you are part of. You can participate in formal programs of evangelism. Less important than how you do it is the fact that you do do it.
The peacemaker is the evangelist—the one who longs to see peace between God and man, and the one who then shares the gospel and calls people to it.
Peace Between Man and Man
The second kind of peace we can bring is peace between man and man. Everywhere you go you find people who are in conflict with one another and as a peacemaker you can help bring them to a state of harmony.
While we need to be careful not to involve ourselves in conflicts that are none of our business and conflicts we can really do nothing to help, there are times where we can helpfully intervene in a conflict and assist the two sides in coming to terms with one another. That’s especially true when the conflict is between two Christians and perhaps most important of all when it’s between two members of the same church.
To bring peace between two people doesn’t mean to merely act as appeasers, people who try to paper over conflict without actually resolving it. To be a peacemaker is to bring God’s own truth to bear on a situation of conflict and then to appeal to the different parties to do what God says. This is always the question we need to be asking: What does the Bible say about this, and how am I going to apply those Scriptural truths to this particular situation?
You may come into contact with a husband and wife who are just not getting along, who are always irritated with one another. And they ask you for help. Maybe you can begin by simply opening up Ephesians 5:33 and reading what God says: “Let each one of you (husbands) love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.” And beginning right there you can help him think about how to love her and help her think about how to respect him. That may not bring full resolution, but it will at least get the process underway.
You may come into contact with two church members who have had a falling out. Perhaps one has sinned against the other and is denying it. You can speak to the one who has been sinned against and open up Proverbs 19:11 to remind that person, “It is the glory of a man to overlook an offense.” Can you overlook this offense—can you set it aside and continue to relate to that person as if it never happened? If not, then you can take that person to Matthew 18:15 and help him understand the process God gives us to resolve conflict: Go to that person alone, describe the offense, and see if they will ask your forgiveness; if not, take one or two other people and do it again; and if even then they won’t repent, take it to the church.
Of course maybe it’s you who needs to obey God when he says, “as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” Would it be said of you that you live at peace with everyone?
In these ways and so many others, you can imitate God by serving as a peacemaker. You can bring peace between man and man.
Peace Between Church and Church
And then I think there is also a way in which we together as the members of a local church can bring peace between church and church. It’s a sad fact that churches often end up isolating themselves or becoming suspicious of other congregations. We can even become competitive with one another when it comes to growing our numbers.
There is a sweet ministry of being a church that loves other churches—that makes peace with them and that fosters peace with them. You can read about one of these churches in 1 Thessalonians 4—a church that was commended for its love of other churches. There was no competition and no hard feelings. There was just love—love for other churches that were imperfect but on the same side, imperfect but carrying out the same labor and working toward the same cause. It is a beautiful thing when churches dwell together in love, trust, and unity.
We are called to be peacemakers, not mere peace-lovers or peace-attempters. And yet ultimately we need to acknowledge that the results are not up to us. We must do our utmost to make peace—but we must also then leave the results in the hands of God, trusting that he is wise and good. Sometimes, for his purposes, he will bring full resolution; sometimes, for his purposes, he will not. We can trust him with the results.
Then it’s important that we consider this: If we are called to make peace, why is there so much conflict? Why is there so much conflict even in the church, even between Christians? The simple reason is that we face strong enemies that hate peace and love war. The world around us, our own flesh, and the devil himself are all arrayed against us. They all tend toward the chaos of fighting, not the order of peace. And so we need to pray for peace—pray for peace in our own hearts, pray for peace in the world, pray for peace within the church. And then, having prayed, we need to labor for it. We need to make peace.
So, are you a peacemaker or a troublemaker? Are you a son of God in making peace, or are you a son of the devil in undermining or destroying peace? The clear calling for those who have come to peace with God is to make peace like God. The beautiful calling of the gospel is to imitate God in being one who loves peace, who values peace, and who makes peace.

Blessings to you as you work, serve, and/or worship this weekend.

Today’s Kindle deals include a few newer books as well as a few older ones.
(Yesterday on the blog: How to Read and Understand God’s Word)
Closeness Comes Through Fire: How Suffering Conforms Us to Christ
Ed Welch makes some helpful observations here about sanctification and suffering. (Though I’m not so sure about using both Ignatius of Loyola and Martin Luther as examples of the same virtue in the same article!)
Why Taiwan Loves This Canadian Missionary Dentist
With a title like that, I couldn’t help but read it. It’s a great account of a missionary that isn’t very well known outside Taiwan.
The New Public Liturgy
This is a fascinating “video essay” from Carl Trueman. (Note: There are one or two b-roll images in the early going to show just a little too much.)
Sin is Only as Hidden as God Allows
This is so important to keep in mind. “If we have been nursing secret sin and we have not been exposed, that is because up to this point, God has not decided to reveal it. Nothing we do is unknown to God, and in his omnipotence, he could expose us at any moment if he so chooses. Sin is only as hidden as God allows.”
Magnanimity and A Book Deal
“It’s been hard at times then, having been disciplined by God regarding these things, to know the difference between true humility and small-heartedness. Beset with self-doubts and fear of my own pride, and sometimes just in ignorance, I’m often slow to admit I have anything to offer. I want to grab a basket and put it over my lamp because it’s safer. This way I won’t make mistakes. Won’t sin. Won’t be tempted to boast. Won’t fail.”
Clarity from Schilder on “Paradox”
“Some theologians have a reputation for being consistently clear.  Klaas Schilder isn’t one of them.” Yet here’s one way in which he was very clear and very helpful.
Flashback: 7 Ways to Ruin a Prayer Meeting
Here are some ways you increase the likelihood that your prayer meeting will miss the mark.

Sometimes one person’s story can stand in for that of millions. Sometimes one person can explain a situation that affects not only themselves but also countless others. Those of us who were blessed to grow up with fathers who were present, active, and engaged may struggle to understand the particular sorrows and challenges that come to those whose fathers were detached, uninvolved, or perhaps entirely absent. Blair Linne’s Finding My Father: How the Gospel Heals the Pain of Fatherlessness tells her own story but, in its own way, tells the story of so many other people as well.

She begins in this way: “The section on my birth certificate reserved for my father’s name is blank. The inside of the narrow, barren horizontal box has neither been struck through nor erased. It simply lies willfully untouched. So my birth certificate, like many others, tells by omission the story of a mother and father who were never married. This piece of paper was seldom referred to. It almost didn’t exist at all, because I almost did not.”
Her mother was young when she had her first child and was young still when she became pregnant with her second. She determined she would pursue an abortion, but was dissuaded by a pastor and soon gave birth to Blair. And while Blair was much loved by her mother, she remained distant from her father—or the man she believed was her father. But that story is her’s and is best told in her own words.
The reason I read her book is that I know a number of people who have grown up without fathers and I am eager to know how to better love, serve, and support them. I know that to do that, I will need to better understand the particular struggles that are theirs. And I’m glad to say that Finding My Father has proven helpful.
Linne describes why, despite the insistence of our culture, a mother cannot be a father. “For understandable reasons, our culture tells us every day that women like her can [replace a dad]. This world pushes for a merging of parental roles. The media portrays men as inept, while women are warriors—especially Black women … Some women hint or shout out that they don’t need a man or a father. I know from experience that these things are usually said to cover the hurt: I will say I don’t need you before you show you don’t need me. But despite all that, the truth is that men are important and dads are needed. Mothers have a different calling than men. My mother was never created to take my dad’s place, any more than he could have taken hers.”
She explains why fatherlessness is so often a predictor of certain struggles and patterns of sin: “When I was younger, I thought that having my dad in our home would solve all of my problems. I thought that the presence of a father would fix everything that the absence of a father had broken. And I was right to sense that. Studies show that poverty, teen pregnancy, obesity, drug and alcohol use, criminal activity, infant mortality, and behavioral problems are all linked to fatherlessness. And this doesn’t even begin to get to the spiritual implications.”
She tells how she has come to understand fatherhood as heavenly before it is earthly, as a description of God before a description of any man. She explains how the church is able to step into the void left by absent fathers and provide some of what they have not or will not. “In church, fellow believers become our spiritual brothers, sisters, mothers, and fathers. Although we may not have had a dad, we can pray that God will send us a family in our church that will be willing to care for us and provide us with a father-figure who will be the masculine influence we need for our development. After all, in Christ, we actually have more in common with a father-figure who is a believer than we do with a biological father who is not. There are some things our fathers would have taught us had they been there. Since they were not, we’ve been left to figure these things out by ourselves. This is not God’s plan, since he has not left us alone. We have a church family to help us walk through life.”
In one chapter she hands the pen to her husband Shai who explains how he has been able to become the dad he himself never had. “Back when Blair and I first started talking, we were both struck by how similar our family backgrounds were. We were both adult converts who were raised in urban areas by single mothers. We both had fathers who were in and out of our lives. We both had a lot of brokenness and instability in our families. One of the things that excited us about coming together was the prospect of a fresh start. I’m a firm believer in the idea that just one godly married couple can have a lasting impact on many generations that follow them. As we looked in our family trees, we didn’t see that couple. We believed that the Lord was giving us an opportunity to be that couple.” And by God’s grace they are, indeed, becoming that very couple.
Finding My Father is a book that deals biblically and compassionately with a sorrow that is familiar to so many. It is no cold textbook on the matter, but rather a warm and compelling account of one daughter’s desire to know her dad and be known by him, to love and be loved. I expect that many who know that sorrow will blessed and encouraged by it; I expect that many who do not know that sorrow will be better equipped to serve those who do.

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