Fruitful Politics: Peace

The politics of peace can be complicated, prompting a lot of disagreement and even more labeling.

Are you a hawk or a dove? An isolationist or an interventionist? Do you favor diplomacy or confrontation? Appeasement or bullying? Unilateral disarmament or mutually assured destruction? America First or a global perspective? Or perhaps something in between those choices or way outside the box?

Or are you a peacemaker?

Regardless of your stance or the opinion of whomever you're talking to about politics, is your first impulse to be a peacemaker? Or are you an argument instigator? The guy who always has to put in his two cents. Or the girl who always has to have the last word. Or, worst of all, are you a troll?

Or maybe you're the one who is quick to turn a conversation into a debate and then into a full fledged fight. All because, of course, you believe so strongly in the right-ness of your opinions. Forget the righteousness of peacemaking, you're going to make your point and you're not going to quit until you've either convinced your opponent or they run from you in fear.

Being a peacemaker is harder than being a troublemaker. To stir up trouble in any discussion, all you have to do is react, countering every statement with one of your own, answering every claim with a counter-claim, every spin with a counter-spin.

Being a peacemaker requires not reacting with the jerk of a knee, but instead intentionally responding from the depths of your carefully tended heart.

You've been putting down deep roots into the Word of God. You've been investing intense hours on your knees, struggling with the difference between your personal desires and the things God loves, between your opinions and God's priorities. And you've come through it with a changed heart, one that always and only wants to peacefully pursue His mission, That mission is to share His shalom - "a rest of will that comes from divine assurance about how things will turn out" (Dallas Willard) - with every person in every situation in every season.

Even in political season.

Where do you think all these appalling wars and quarrels come from? Do you think they just happen? Think again. They come about because you want your own way, and fight for it deep inside yourselves. You lust for what you don’t have and are willing to kill to get it. You want what isn’t yours and will risk violence to get your hands on it.
...
Don’t bad-mouth each other, friends. It’s God’s Word, his Message, his Royal Rule, that takes a beating in that kind of talk. You’re supposed to be honoring the Message, not writing graffiti all over it. (James 4:1-2, 11-12, The Message)