Sermon for July 12th

Peace. Peace. It’s a fickle thing to hold onto, isn’t it? We’re all for peace, but we seldom find it. Sometimes, we don’t even want it, for the moment at least, but, even if we are fighting, we’re often doing it for peace, right? Doing it for a good cause. For our peace of mind. Fight for peace! How many times have I heard that said, or read it on a sign somewhere within a peaceful demonstration—against fighting. Peace is truly hard to come by. In our world. In our community. Even, and especially, within our hearts.

We need peace right now. Especially right now at Saint Peters. Our peaceful lives were interrupted by tragedy just a little over a week ago. And now we are trying to find our way again. A good friend of ours is at peace with the Lord, but, for the rest of us, well, it is a little harder to come by. Even those of you who are our honored guests this morning know what I’m talking about even though you may not know the exact details of our tragedy. You’ve had your own along the way, maybe you are having one right now. Peace is a fleeting wish so often in our lives. We want peace, but how to get it is another thing entirely.

The writer of psalm 85 was also in the midst of a crisis when he wrote the words we read today. The Psalm, this prayer, begins by telling about what God has done, those marvelous things done in he past when their community was under stress. Let me read for you what was said since it’s not typed out for us in the insert, “Lord, you were favorable to your land; you restored the fortunes of Jacob. You forgave the iniquity of your people; you pardoned all their sin. You withdrew all your wrath; you turned from your hot anger.”

You see, this community had also seen its share of devastation and wrath. Both this community so long ago as well as ours. The question is, “Was God faithful?” Through those times of trial and tribulation? You’ve all had your times of burden and despair. What happened next? What did God do with that despair? What did God do with those burdens? On the back of our church’s card, it is written that Jesus said, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens and I will give you rest.” What did he do with yours? With your heaviest of burdens. Why do you continue looking to God for peace? Because he has given you peace before.

Today’s Psalm continues by explaining that tragedy has struck the community again and the writer cries out to God for help, “Restore us again, O God of our salvation, and put away your indignation toward us. Will you be angry with us forever? Will you prolong your anger to all generations? Will you not revive us again, so that your people may rejoice in you? Show us your steadfast love, O Lord, and grant us your salvation.”

I don’t know how many times I’ve heard in the past week, “Cornwall has had enough!” I think that there is both frustration and fear behind these words. We’ve had a lot of sadness in the past several weeks, too much for us to take. And we are scared because we know that at some point in all of our lives, we’ll each be going through tough times like this again. Not just here, not just with friends, not just with death, but with finances, and with our children, or with our cars, or with our nation. It’s just a matter of time—and that’s kinda scary. We want peace now and we want it to stay. Peace for our hearts. Peace for our world.

Peace is more than just the absence of war or the absence of fighting. The Hebrew word for peace is Shalom and it refers to one’s whole well-being. There are times in my life when the world seems at one and peaceful yet within myself, my own heart, the world is shattering all around me. The sun is out, the breeze is calm, but there is a gray cloud over my spirit. Shalom seeks to speak of that time when the fullness of God’s presence fills your heart, your mind, your household and the world. All of it. As you can see, we may seek peace ourselves, our country may seek peace, even the world may become peaceful, but “Shalom,” true peace, only finally comes from God.

And that’s I guess why we are all finally here this morning. Because peace is so fleeting, so fickle, so far from us at times. We come here to seek peace from its only source and pray that God creates this peace, promotes peace and does peace even through us, using our hands, our feet, our hearts and our voices. It is why we come together and continuing grieving ones we love while at the same time promising life and salvation to the little children in our midst.

In baptism, God gives life, peace and salvation. We can trust that little Charlie here this morning has peace with God not based on how much or how loudly he cries, but because his sins have been washed clean away in God’s sight. We find peace through trusting God’s promises. Remember when you heard the promises spoken and watched water poured over him? Charlie’s baptism today is an example of how God “does” peace to us. We can all fight for peace or pray for peace, but true “Shalom” only comes from God. He’s got to GIVE us peace and DO peace to us.

The last part of Psalm 85 expresses this: What is God doing to create peace, “Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, to his faithful, to those who turn to him in their hearts.” Sometimes I think that we all have the tendency, myself included, to believe that, somehow, being faithful and having peace are contradictory. Perhaps we get that false impression from stories about Martin Luther and the Reformation. We believe that in order to reform ourselves and the church, to be faithful to God’s Word, we must also be at odds with others and not at peace. The same is true of tolerance which also gets a bad rap so often. But tolerance means to be at peace with others, no matter how different from you they are or how different your opinions are than theirs'. Tolerance doesn't mean "compromise" but being at peace with others--loving others-- even when fighting might be easier. To be faithful to God’s Word means to desire and move toward peace with others always and in all ways.

God’s righteousness and his faithfulness are notsimply adjectives describing God they are so much more than that! God’s faithfulness DOES something. It’s an action word. God is always creating peace; He is always desiring peace. God’s faithfulness creates peace in your heart by never abandoning you even when the earth is falling apart around you. Finally, God promises to create peace in this community and in this world by staying faithful to it despite our social injustices, our wars and our hatred. He will not abandon our world to fall in upon itself; instead, he comes deep down into your life and is faithful to you and your struggles.

What is the result of all this talk and promising of peace, love and righteousness? The Psalm says that “Faithfulness will spring up from the ground, and righteousness will look down from the sky.” And smack, when the two meet, when they kiss, the world won’t collapse on itself, it will become whole. The place between my hands isn’t the world, the whole world is all around them.

What might this faithfulness look like, springing up from the ground? For those of you at the funeral yesterday, it might look like God creating a celebration out of a tragedy. We came in sadness and perhaps, even for a moment, you found peace. What might faithfulness look like, springing up from the ground? Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream, that little children of every color, race and creed would not just hold hands but maybe even change the world, their institutions and the content of their character. We're called to continue that dream and work for tolerance that is a part of peace. What might this faithfulness look like, springing up from the ground? When a sinner comes to hear God’s promise, gets water splashed on him and finds himself at peace with God forever. This happens both at baptism and when you hear that your sins are forgiven on account of Jesus Christ alone. Peace, Shalom is difficult to find. Peace, it's hard to find because it doesn’t happen just through your efforts, but because God is faithful to you. He has been before. And he will be again. Amen.