Smith and Wesson shares one thing with Kum Bah Yah. They don’t work – not for making peace. You can keep peace with a S&W, hope for peace by sitting in a circle and singing, but making peace is a much tougher thing to do. Making peace is personally costly; it’s not free. Making peace does not impose my will on you. Making peace erases the tension that separates two people, and creates a bond of harmony and unity in its place. Making peace is not easy or common.
When Carlos Bledsoe shot and killed Andy Long in cold blood, what were the odds that their two fathers would one day become good friends? “Tension” is too weak a word for the natural forces separating those two grieving dads. But today, Melvin Bledsoe and Daris Long are more than friends. They work together to try to save the sons of other men (See: https://losingoursons.com). I don’t know the details of how those two men came together, but somebody made peace.
Jesus said:
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.” (Matthew 5:9)
Not peace keepers, not peace protesters, but peace makers.
When He said they would “be called sons of God,” Jesus meant that they would strongly reflect the character of God. Real peacemaking is something God does; it’s not something we humans are very good at. Peacemaking is something the Holy Spirit accomplishes through those in whom He has come to live.
The world has never seen a greater peaceMaker than God, Who loved you so much, He sent His only Son to accomplish everything necessary to erase the tension that separates you from God. Everything, that is, except for you accepting the peace He offered.