The Confidence of Peace

Let there be peace on earth And let it begin with me

A song. A prayer. Maybe the words feel like not enough, hollow in the face of such an extraordinary peace. Like Miss Congeniality at the pageant smiling and saying “world peace.”

What prayer do we offer in in the face of war and lives lost on both sides of the lines?

If you are like me, maybe it seems difficult to find the words. In times like these, I like to look to the prayers of others to guide me and one of the best places for prayers that express the full spectrum of human heartache and hope is within the Psalms. David knew deeply about what it meant to exercise faith in the midst of doubt, and he wrote often about it. He covered it all: victory and defeat, honor and guilt, grief and joy, war and peace.

In today’s Psalm, the psalmist begins from a place of hope and trust in the Lord. The Psalmist does this by naming who God is. The Lord is light. The Lord is salvation. The Lord is a stronghold, hiding us in his shelter in our day of trouble.

Seith says “David boldly declares that ADONAI is his warmth, direction, sight, wisdom, splendor, glory, life, victory, guidance, righteousness and deliverance...the LORD is my salvation, my deliverance, hope, liberty, victory, welfare, and shelter, from the Hebrew word yesha—from whence comes the name of Messiah, our salvation.”

If the Lord is all of this and more, then the Psalmist asks “who should I fear?” “of whom should I be afraid?”

When evil assails and adversaries surrounds you, David says they shall stumble and fall. When even an army encamps around you, he says “yet I will be confident.”

David’s confidence in the Lord continues as he desires to dwell in the house of the Lord, to feel God’s presence, to be hidden by God in the midst of trials, or to even be raised above his enemies and protected.

But then in verse 7 there is a shift in tone. The blessed assurance turns into begging and pleading. There is a cry for help here. Sometimes in our prayers, the reality of what we see with our eyes leads us to this kind of prayer, to this raw and honest pleading before the Lord.

David cries out “Hear O Lord when I cry for help.” “Do not hide your face from me.” “Do not turn your servant away. Do not cast me off. Do not forsake me. Do not give me over to my enemies who are breathing out violence.”

Do you hear this desperation? These are end-of-the-rope prayers, the please Lord can you hear me prayers. These are the prayers we pray when we didn’t get the news we hoped to hear, when things seem impossible, when terror is real, and when faith feels like a shot in the dark.

But then something else rises up from this prayer. Almost like a faint echo from the beginning, David returns to confidence in the Lord saying “I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord.”

In other words, wait. Have hope. As the Message translates it, “stay with God. Stay with God.” Richard Stern says “Be clear, however, this is not a psalm about how God answers our prayers. It is a prayer, even a plea, for patience, for trust, for the ability and the endurance to wait for the Lord, even when there is no sign that prayers may be answered, when the Lord’s arrival is a long, undetermined way off.”

Today David prays a prayer that reminds us even when it is hard and others are breathing out violence, “take heart, have courage, stay with God.”

But sometimes this is so very hard to do. Sometimes the only prayer we can muster is “help.” But the world deserves more than the soundtrack of crushed concrete and the wails of grief.

Let there be peace on earth And let it begin with me

Shane Claiborne in reflecting on this said “I’m pretty sure Jesus is weeping over Jerusalem… and Gaza… right now. Maybe we should be weeping with him.

Let us each take a moment to pause and pray…Let’s ask ourselves and our God, what are the things that lead to peace? What does love require of us at such a time as this?What does it look like to resist injustice without mirroring injustice? What does it look like to stand against terror without becoming terrible? What does it look like to choose the way of the cross rather than the sword, and to follow the enemy-loving Jesus, the Prince of Peace?”

Just recently dozens of protesters were arrested outside Senator Schumer’s home on Friday calling for the U.S. government to push for a cease-fire. The arrests included rabbis and several descendants of Holocaust survivors (ages 20-80 years old) according to Jewish Voices for Peace.

Let there be peace on earth And let it begin with me

In 1944, a woman named Jill Jackson attempted to take her life but it failed. In the wake of this experience she described coming to know the unconditional love of God for herself and for each person. 10 years later in 1955, she wrote the lyrics to “Let There Be Peace on Earth.” The song was first introduced to people of all religious, ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds.” Jill said “One summer evening in 1955, a group of 180 teenagers of all races and religions, meeting at a workshop high in the California mountains locked arms, formed a circle and sang a song of peace. They felt that singing the song, with its simple basic sentiment—‘Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me’—helped to create a climate for world peace and understanding.”

Let there be peace on earth And let it begin with me Let There Be Peace on Earth The peace that was meant to be

As a community of faith, we hold on to peace that passes our understanding. Peace beyond what seems possible right now. Peace beyond the categorization of friend or foe. Peace that melts enemy lines through enemy love. Peace beyond the launch of weapons designed to destroy property, creation, and human life. Peace of one day the weapons being formed into gardening tools for the new creation. The peace of the lion and the lamb. This peace is our hope. This peace is our cry. This peace is our prayer. This is our song.

With ev'ry step I take Let this be my solemn vow To take each moment and live Each moment in peace eternally Let there be peace on earth And let it begin with me