The Park Road Pulpit

Sermons from Park Road Baptist Church  

     Russ and Amy Jacks Dean, Pastors

I Can Only Preach Peace

Psalm 46, Philippians 4.4-9

Amy Jacks Dean, September 16, 2001

            What a week! On Tuesday morning, who would have thought that we would be spending the day glued to the television and radio – sitting silently with mouths agape, shaking our heads in disbelief, tears burning our eyes – as we literally watched thousands of people die right here in our own country. As I sat and watched, huddled around a small TV with the church staff in Russ’ office, my most selfish moment started. I confess to you that the selfishness has lasted throughout the week. My selfishness centered around this persistent question, “Who am I to speak of word from God this week?” I confess to you a feeling of inadequacy to stand in this pulpit today. I have read everything that came through email. I have called people that I respect – pastors, friends, chaplains. I have searched the World Wide Web of my favorite religious sites desperately searching for a word from God for you and for me this day. On Friday afternoon, our new administrative assistant finally walked in my office and said, “Amy, I’ve got to have the Scripture and a sermon title so that I can print the order of worship.” I looked at her with tears and said, “I can only preach peace.” I didn’t get that from any one person nor did I get that from a website or from any email. I got it from what I believe about the God I worship and serve. I can only preach peace.

            Sometime during the end of the week, I went to Russ seeking his advice. I even suggested that he write it and I’d preach it – now that would be a good sermon – but he said, “Do what you do best. Don’t talk about the things you don’t know much about. Speak from your heart.” So from the bottom of my heart I say to you today: I can only preach peace.

            I have been horrified by the events of this week, as have you. But I have been terrified by some of the things I have heard some of our most prominent religious leaders say and promote. Franklin Graham said that “retaliation WAS a Christian response” and that we should seek war in response to this violence. I can only preach peace. Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson have already found a way to bring this terrorist attack back home where he blames “the feminists, gays and abortionists” and says that God is punishing us for being a secularized nation. I pray that you will turn from that rhetoric and be willing to speak a word of truth. A word of truth that says that individuals committed this evil atrocity. I can only preach peace.

I pray for our military and our government leaders. I have no answers for how to respond to this act of terrorism. I am confused about how to feel and how to deal with my own anger and my own grief and my own fears. I will tell you that I know exactly how I feel about mass destruction and mass retaliation – killing innocent people of other nations who don’t want war and have nothing to do with the evil notions which hide among them. But am I any better if I only wish for the death of one? Our leaders are faced with a difficult task, and I would not want their jobs any day, most of all this day. But the fact is that I don’t have their job, I’ve got this job – and the job of a pastor and the job of the Christian community is to preach peace. I pray that they will have the wisdom to know that vengeance belongs only to God – and in their language of retaliation that they will  not mistake defense for revenge. And that in the decision-making process, I pray that they would focus more on “God bless our World” than just “God bless America.” For God desires peace for us and peace for them and God will be just as displeased and just as grieved when we kill them as when they killed us. I pray that when we retaliate, as I know we will, that we will not parade in the streets in a victory dance, but that we will stop and be silent as we pray for peace for them, as well as, for us. I do not suggest this as easy, but no one ever said that the cost of discipleship would be cheap. The cost of discipleship is high. If we are going to be followers of Jesus, then we have to be peacemakers. I know, I make this sound simple, but it ain’t easy.

In looking at the popular polls, we know that what I am saying is a minority opinion. Most of our fellow Americans want war, want retaliation and retribution, want revenge – most want someone (anyone?) to pay for this heinous crime. Though I don’t have a military plan or defensive alternative, I do have a word of peace. It is not my job to have a military plan or a defensive alternative. It is my job and it is your job to preach peace. I fear our blood-thirstyness. I fear our desire to see an eye for an eye and a life for a life. We will never rid this world of evil. We will never return to life those who are dead. I’m unnerved by the anger swelling in our country and our craving for someone’s blood. That is revenge and hate, not justice and peace. And if we allow ourselves to be consumed with revenge and hate, will we be much different from the very ones we despise?

It is my job to preach peace and that is what I’ll do. On days when I’m mad and days when I cry and days when I’m faced with what seems like no alternative for war – I’ll preach peace. Because peace is all I know. (How little of our world can say that?) So since I have it and since I believe it, then I shall preach it. And I call on you to preach it as well. I do know that saying it will help you believe it. You cannot gather in this sanctuary of worship and pray for “them” to suffer. You simply cannot. For this is a sanctuary of grace and love and peace.

Several of you emailed us this week to say that our service of prayer on Wednesday night not only meant something to you, but it changed you. And that is precisely why I feel inadequate to facilitate worship – because this is a powerful place. That some could come here with anger and hate and leave here with a hope for peace and goodness. That is powerful and it is frightening. To give up our most basic gut feeling of anger and replace it with peace is terrifying. But if Wednesday night changed the hearts of a few, what could our world experience if we all preached peace. Would the world be able to stand it? Could Osama bin Laden tolerate it? When I pray for him and others like him, I find it easy. I pray for them what I pray for myself: that I would seek forgiveness, that I would be the first to say stop the violence and hatred, that the peace of God would be more powerful than any other alternative. I pray for him and I pray for them and I pray for myself.

Do not hear this as a sermon about what we as a country should or should not do in our response to this horrible crime of terrorism. I honestly don’t know. Do not hear this sermon as unpatriotic. I love America and am most grateful to be one American who enjoys all of the freedoms and all of the privileges that come with this country. But my only allegiance is to God. And God is a God of peace, therefore I can only preach peace. But do hear this as a sermon of responsibility. Not one of us has the responsibility to influence how we, as a nation, will respond, but each one of us has responsibility for what we will carry in our hearts. I pray that you will carry peace in your heart because I believe that will make a difference in our world.

In our passage today from Philippians, Paul is giving instruction to a church, specifically here to two women in the church who at the very least have disagreements with one another. After a slight reprimand, Paul gives these imperatives: rejoice, be gentle and forbearing, don’t be anxious, be thankful, fill minds with noble thoughts, and hold fast to the tradition as we have learned and seen it in faithful witnesses. We are assured that if we live this way rather than being filled with fits of frenzy, we will experience the peace of God even though it surpasses our capacity to understand. (Preaching Through the Christian Year, Year C, page 17) The “peace” here in Philippians is far more than an absence of conflict. Rather it is total well-being and it comes from God. (The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol XI, page 541)

On this day, I tell you that I have a word of peace. I have a Blessed Hope for those who grieve – that even today their loved ones breath the fresh air of God’s presence. That’s peace. I have faith that those who work tirelessly in an effort to find someone – everybody’s someone – will know the joy of loving their neighbor. That’s peace. I have assurance for those who escaped with their earthly life that they now know that God has called us to live an abundant life – that God desires for us fullness – and that they will see life differently from now on – they will hug their children a little tighter and smell the flowers a little more often. That’s peace. And for those who get caught in the trauma and guilt of being a survivor, they must know that the terrorist attack was not of or from God and that those who died and those who lived were not selected by God, but that their life is a gift not to be wasted or squandered. That’s peace. I have a word of grace for those involved in committing this crime and it is that God is a God of forgiveness, even when we cannot, God can. That’s peace. I have a word of peace today – and this kind of peace brings wholeness and healing and wellness to anyone who latches onto it.

It has been said, “Peace, like war, is waged.” (taken from a speech by Jimmy Carter, quote was not cited in the speech) In these days when we anticipate the phrase, “America declares war!,” I want to make a preemptive strike: “God declares peace!” That total well-being kind of peace where lions and lambs lie down together. The coming days, weeks, months, most say years, will be difficult to say the least. So my word for you this day sisters and brothers is this: May the peace of Christ be with you.

Let us pray:

When peace like a river attendeth my way

When sorrows like sea billows roll

Whatever my lot thou hast taught me to say

It is well, It is well with my soul. Amen.