Regional Synod of Canada - Reformed Church in America

Pioneer Christian Monthly

Date - Jan/87

Contributor - Freda Witteveen

Title - Dwelling in Peace and Unity

Topic - Women

The first days of our new year are already part of the past. How have you greeted this new opportunity? Is your heart filled with peace and serenity resulting from a complete trust in God the Father, or are you still frazzled from the hectic activities of the holiday season, when we all seem to think we have to be in control and when we take on more for ourselves than God is really asking or expecting of us?

When we have true serenity within us, then we can move onward to the task of establishing peace in our communities, and is that not a most desirable goal, as we see violence escalating all about us, in the family, on city streets, on the borders of countries. At the RCW Triennial, Rev. Marchiene Rienstra called this goal "The Impossible Possibility".

For guidance we look to the Scriptures: Psalm 133, Colossians 3:12-22, I Thessalonians 5:12,-19,23,24, and James 3:13-18. We read these passages for the richness of the words and the images they present to us. After you have read these selections of Scripture and considered them carefully, we must all ask ourselves what we can do to add to the wisdom there which is of God.

Let us be honest with ourselves also; it seems impossible for people to live together in peace for any length of time. Consider our family life; we all love our spouses and children and parents, but our homes are not always peaceful. This extends to our churches, our neighbourhoods, and the workplace. Although in all these places people say that they long for peace, they do not live together in peace very much. Human history is the story of one conflict after another because, truly, there have been very few powerful peacemakers among the generations of men and women who have lived on this earth. We in 1987 act in the same way still as did people in the stories of Genesis.

For an example, when Adam and Eve fell out of that trusting relationship with God which destroyed their peace, they immediately started to conceal themselves from one another and from God. We still find ways to cover up our true selves, because we carry with us the misguided idea that as Christians we are to be positive and happy always, and wonderfully successful in all that we do: and if we are not, there is something wrong with us. We don't often dare to tell each other how full of fears and doubts and sadness we are. Indeed there is no peace when there is no honesty or openness.

We still are a lot like Adam and Eve in the sense that when something goes wrong we destroy the peace we have by blaming someone else, in the church, in the family, one of the neighbours, a fellow worker. Recognize the pattern? When I am being blamed for something, I don't feel very peaceful toward that person, and when I am doing the blaming, I don't feel very peaceful toward the one I am accusing.

Then too, there is the sin of envy which Cain possessed and which we all share. How hard it is for us to rejoice for another's blessings, especially when we are lacking, and how much easier for us to compete with one another, and feel resentful when we come out second. Anger builds up in our hearts and we hurt one another and then we hold on to and feed on that resentment. James said that wherever there is jealousy, bitterness, and resentment there can be no peace. (James 3: 16) What is true in our small group, like the family unit, is equally true in the larger scale. one of the heartbreaks that cause Jesus Christ incredible grief is that CHRISTIANS are not at peace with one another. Even today, Christians will push fellow Christians out of the true Church because they don't think the same thing. We cannot sit down and have communion together at one table.

Rev. Rienstra calls this a scandal and totally unnecessary. God has not left us in this impossible situation. God has given us an inheritance of personal peace and when we lay claim to that inheritance for ourselves by specific actions, then we become capable of living in peace with other people, even difficult other people. Psalm 133: 1: "Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers (and sisters) dwell in unity!"

More even than that, God has given Christians a new identity. Who am I? I am a member of Christ and His body. This assurance comes before all other ways we are able to identify ourselves in this life, as man or woman, as parent or child, by some profession or place of origin. These labels society invents are transcended by one mighty act of God, who by the Cross of Christ not only reconciled us to Himself but reconciled us to each other and broke down the walls we have built to protect ourselves. We no longer have to act as if those dividers exist anymore, because we have been baptized into Christ and into His body, the Church - with a capital "C". Therefore we are one, we don't have to try to be one. (Col. 3:12) It is unnatural for Christians to act as if we are not one in Christ's body, because we are. That is the good news. That is the gift. it has been done for us. That is our inheritance.

"And the harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace." (James 3:18)

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