Luke 2:8-16
Luke 10:1-6
“Peace Grows”
Many of you know that I spent a couple of days in Toronto this week. I was there in my role with the Canadian Council of Churches as we celebrated the CCC’s 80th Anniversary, and as we hosted a visit from the General Secretary of the World Council of Churches to Canada.
The itinerary on Thursday and Friday was packed full of special events, visits with particular denominational groups and ecumenical organizations. The topics of conversation were diverse, including ecumenical dialogue on faith and theology, as well as common concern and work for justice, reconciliation, and peace in the world.
But one topic that stood out, and to which we returned again and again was the war in Israel and Gaza. We met with representatives from a group called “Kairos Palestine” who told us about the suffering and struggle of Christians and others in Palestine, and how they felt abandoned by the world, and particularly by the churches worldwide. They called upon the churches to speak and act more clearly and strongly for peace.
Later we met with staff from Project Ploughshares, the peace and justice arm of The Canadian Council of Churches. They were very clear that the churches of the world must speak out against illegal and immoral acts of violence against civilians, and that we must call for an end to supplying weapons to countries that are using them in these ways.
And we also heard from leadership within ACT Canada – the alliance of church organizations that provides food and other emergency supplies to people in crisis worldwide. This group includes our own Presbyterian World Service and Development, and we heard about the need for churches to advocate for opening up routes to get aide to the starving people in Gaza.
On this Second Sunday of Advent, we are invited to reflect on peace, which feels even more elusive, given the ongoing violence, war, and turmoil in our world. As we gather in the safety and warmth of our sanctuary here in Regina, it is easy for us to turn to one another and say, “Peace be with you.” But we all know that peace is easier said than done.
Our Christmas narrative today begins just after Jesus’ birth. The scene zooms out from the manger to reveal a vast pasture. The shepherds are on night watch in the region as usual. Suddenly, the glory of God appears and surrounds them, and Luke tells us that the shepherds are terrified.
The angel comforts the shepherds, saying, “Do not be afraid… to you is born this day in the city of David, a Saviour, who is the Messiah.” This good news is then affirmed by a multitude of the heavenly host who sing: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom God favours!”
Which raises the question, I suppose, about whom God favours. In other places in Scripture we are assured that God shows no partiality. But here we see that God chooses a group of shepherds to be the first to hear the message of peace. The shepherds represent ordinary, hard-working people with no privilege.
The good news of the Saviour’s birth first reaches those who labour in the fields at night, not those who feast in palaces. The peace this Saviour brings begins with those who are humbled by God’s glory, not with those who glorify themselves.
The commentary from Illustrated Ministry explains that this contrasts sharply with the concept of pax propagated by the Roman Empire at the time. Several Roman emperors circulated coins with images of Pax, the goddess of peace, or simply the inscription “Pax.”
Also in Rome, a monument was built to celebrate Augustus, the first emperor of the Roman Empire, called the Ara Pacis Augustae, meaning “Altar of Augustan Peace.” Augustus was worshipped as a saviour who brought peace after many years of war. So, for many under this imperial rule, peace was top-down, led by a powerful individual like an emperor. Luke counters this view by placing peace among the shepherds, among ordinary people. For Luke, peace is realized not by the power of a single individual, but through a collective bottom-up effort.
Eight chapters later in Luke’s Gospel account, we see Jesus teaching his disciples to carry out this effort towards peace. Jesus appoints seventy-two people and sends them out in pairs to spread the message of peace. They can’t just declare peace and make it happen across the land in one fell swoop, but they can go to one household at a time, connecting with the people there, nurturing relationships, and building communities of peace, one family at a time.
Jesus, who comes with divine power, could have chosen an imperial way of enforcing peace. Instead, he delegates his authority to these anonymous, ordinary, seventy-two people. Jesus wants us to understand that the peace he brings is fulfilled when people work together and, thus, is not reduced to mere stability, which sometimes condones injustice and sacrifice.
The risk for Western Christian disciples today is that we might become content with the relative peace we experience in our own privileged context – and that we might remain silent in the face of injustice, violence, and desperate need. Because peace is not just quiet and calm, but it is what happens when everyone treats each other, themselves, and the world kindly.
Peace requires justice, and to proclaim peace means that we must speak and act for justice for the oppressed. When we do that, we join in Jesus’ ministry which brings “good news to the poor,” “release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind,” and “sets the oppressed free.”
A few weeks ago at our meeting, the Governing Board of the Canadian Council of Churches agreed to initiate a conversation between the churches to explore what we can say together about the terrible situation in Israel and Gaza. We know that it’s a fraught conversation to have, hampered by differences in politics and theology that make everyone wary and make it more difficult to come to agreement about the message.
But we need to find a way to speak out against acts of war that contravene international law. We need to hold our own country accountable for the ways that we continue to enable the ongoing violence. And we need to advocate for pathways to help the suffering people, giving generously to feed those who are hungry and thirsty and homeless.
The Advent Devotional for this week points out that “Injustices like poverty and genocide use enforced starvation as a weapon. Withholding food is a tactic of war; ensuring its just distribution is peacemaking.”
“On the night Jesus was born, on the ground, people (and animals!) made peace by making space for one another and tending to each other’s urgent needs. In the sky, angels sang of the world as it could be. On these Advent nights, we can make peace by offering care and nourishment to our own bodies, to the bodies of those around us, to the body of our world, and by receiving the same back again.”
Martin Luther King Jr. famously remarked, “Peace is not merely the absence of some negative force – war, tensions, confusion – but the presence of some positive force – justice, goodwill, the power of the kingdom of God.” So let’s join the angels, the disciples, and Jesus himself, in being part of that positive force. And may God’s peace grow in us and in our world.