On this MWC World Fellowship Sunday we are guided to think about the way of peace by our Asian brothers and sisters. We want to reflect on what peace might mean in the
Asian context, hearing a story or two, and then turning to our own situation and wondering againwhat does it mean to be a people of God's shalom in the middle of our North American environment.

World Fellowship Sunday
We are taking our cues during this worship service from worship materials designed by Asian members of Mennonite World Conference. We designate this Sunday ``World Fellowship Sunday,'' a day when we are a little more conscientious about recognizing and remembering sisters and brothers of ours in Mennonite churches around the world. In particular we want to remember Mennonite Christians in Asia. Two Asian countries have by far the most members, India and Indonesia.

Those who designed the outline for this service gave it the title we are using ``Bringing peace in difficult times.'' The title seems to suggest the opinion that peace is something one actively works to bring about; and it broadly implies that the times we live in are not easy, rather, they are hard.

The Asian writers point out that their continent covers the biggest land area in the world and has the largest population, and therefore, the greatest number of non-Christians in the world. They say that the number of youth is double those in Western countries. These sisters and brothers point out that violence and conflict have been part of life in many Asian countries. Also, domestic, economic, social, and political problems are legion. On top of the serious social problems were piled natural disasters (we think especially of the December 2004 tsunami) and acts of terrorism. More than 600 churches have been destroyed in the last couple of decades in Indonesia. The writers conclude with this introduction:
These conflicts and disasters have created poverty, unemployment, plagues, and homelessness. Many seek an an Almighty Being to help them cope. This
has created an opportunity to bring peace and to proclaim the gospel.

The text our Asian friends chose is from Isaiah 9. Isaiah is speaking to the southern kingdom during foreboding times. This has the tone of a ``royal psalm,'' the kind of writing associated with the coronation of a king both in Israel, and the language is not unfamiliar in other Near Eastern royal inscriptions. But this psalm does not look back at a known kingly figure, but rather looks longingly ahead to what is to come. Succeeding generations would, each in turn, look ahead for this kind of messianic figure, one who could bear the title, among others, ``prince of peace.''

Of course the word for ``peace'' in the Old Testament is this beautiful Hebrew word ``shalom.'' The beautiful benediction that we often use, taken from Numbers 6, says
The Lord bless you and keep you;
The Lord make his face to shine
Upon you, and be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up his countenance
Upon you, and give you peace.
This describes one who is blessed, who is treated graciously by God, who is guarded by God, who is in God's presence, who is fulfilled and complete. Shalom has this rich, multi-layered meaning of well-being, in harmony with all who are around, of health, of tranquility in relationshipsall this floods the meaning of shalom.

Peace in our context
Let's think for a moment about peace in our own context. I think you would have to search long and hard for anyone who would say ``I'm not for peace, but I'm for pugilism, conflict, in fact, a continual state of animosity and conflict makes this a better world.'' How ludicrous! Of course, everyone is for peace, but we sure think about it in different ways.

Some understand peace is primarily personal ways. To reach a state of contentment with oneself, to exist in harmony with the Almighty, to be friendly and warm in all my personal relationshipsthat's peace. In a Christian context what is important is to be in a state of harmony, agreement, of peace, with God

Then there are those who just are inclined to major in the big problems: wars; divisions rooted in race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation; issues related to prisons and the death penalty; abortion, domestic violence. A commitment to peace compels a person to believe these things are wrong, and that one should work against them. In a Christian context this translates into learning about and practicing peaceful, yet purposeful, ways of resolving conflicts. It can mean educating oneself, or getting involved by writing letters or standing on a corner or in the way, or by refusing to participate, or by actively learning to know someone else.

I am being far too simple. Maybe that's a reflection of my earliest memories of peace. Peace has to do with being right with God. So peace is personal. But peace also means not going to war. That's what distinguishes us from the Baptists.

We don't have to think about peace too long until we run into all these nettlesome conundrums and inconsistencies. If you are so against war and won't fight yourself, then why are you willing to pay for others to do what you won't do? How can you be so troubled, so angry, so moved by people dying far away yet seem so unfazed by young lives that are disintegrating in a haze of alcohol, abuse and promiscuity, right here in our own community? You seem so happy about the peace you have with God, yet you appear so supportive of military activities that snuff out other people's opportunity to experience the peace with God you know. Why does it seem you are so much more at home and at ease with people who make no claim of Jesus (quickly giving them the benefit of the doubt, bending over backwards to understand) than you are with people who claim the same Jesus?

When we think about peace in our own context we have to acknowledge that we do so from a position of power. I dare say that most of us here, thanks to some combination of education, wealth, and social standing operate from a pretty comfortable base. And living in the womb of arguably the greatest political, economic, social, and military power the world has ever known, we can go about our lives without too much worry of being invaded by foreign armies, we sleep tranquilly at night, and we don't worry too much about getting roughed up when we go to the grocery store. And on top of all that, it is pretty easy to be a Christian living here. You can get bemused or condescending looks in some places, but for the most part we are treated kindly. That is our setting.

Christians in Asia, and a story about peace
What about Christians in Asia? Obviously the setting is far different from what we know. Some are living in abject poverty, others are doing well, but I think it is safe to say that generally speaking the political, economic, social, and religious systems that surround them are not as strong as what we know.

What does it mean to be people of peace in these settings?

A pastor in Indonesia, a country with the world's largest Muslim population, who also works part-time with a local Christian radio station decided to take it upon himself to approach the commander of a radical Muslim group called Hisbullah Shabillilah (the soldiers of God). The pastor and the commander both lived in the same town.

The pastor entered the Islamic group's headquarters and saw lots of swords and banners on the walls. The banners screamed ``no compromise!'' The pastor's goal was to try to befriend these people so he spent time learning to know the commander and the soldiers. He wanted to talk to them about peacemaking, and this is what he did.

He made several visits and then, on one of his visits, he noticed that something symbolic had happened. The swords and the banners were no longer on the wall. And more than that, the commander assured the pastor that he would send some of his foot-soldiers to attend a training on peacebuilding and conflict transformation that the pastor was sponsoring.

Then came the December 26, 2004 tsunami. The commander was very eager to work with the pastor and the center for the Study and Promotion of Peace in a relief and trauma healing project in Aceh and North Sumatra.

Following the project in response to the tsunami the commander told the pastor, ``If only I had known you four years ago, I would not have lost 50 of my children who died in a war, a few years earlier, between Christians and Muslims. I used to think that spilling the blood of the Gentiles and the Chinese was permissible, but why is it different now? Is there something strange within me since I learned to know you? (this is from A Culture of Peace: God's Vision for the Church by Kreider, Kreider, and Widjaja)

We might pull a couple of ideas from this story which speak to the question, what does it mean to be a person of Christ's peace in Asia? It means, for one, helping out in times of need. It was important for Mennonites in Indonesia to respond to the tsunami after it struck their country. And we see that in the prayer requests for Asia, compiled by MWC, that you see in the bulletin.

We also sense that for Asian Anabaptist brothers and sisters they live closer to realities of less religious freedom, they are aware of religious persecution or oppression, and that as Christians they are in the minority, not the majority. They suggest we pray for them to be strong in their faith, to encourage them in their suffering, and pray that they resist the temptation to react to oppression with violence. So today we remember not only our Anabaptist sisters and brothers, but all people in Asia, praying for them God's benediction of shalom.



Back to our own setting, and the call to be peacemakers
It is important for us, from time to time, to catch a glimpse of the realities facing our Anabaptist friends in other places, and how they strive to be peacemakers in their own settings. But the gospel message must always be contextualized and our life-long challenge is to figure out what it means to be followers of the Prince of Peace in our own setting. I'd like to say three things, in conclusion.

I think we have very special ``peace'' problems that are rooted in our comfortable lives. It makes it tempting to make faith, and therefore peace, a private, personal affair, just a matter of the heart. If you leave it at that it can't be too threatening to other parts of my life. Well, it can relate to the words I choose, the things I choose to look at, and my sexual ethics, but not much beyond that. We sure don't fundamentally want to upset our comfortable lives. And in doing so we make God rather small, a God only really concerned about the details, important though they are, of our private lives.

But God is big, concerned about a lot of things, enough so that followers of the Prince of Peace ought to live with some level of unease. That's the first thing I want to say, people of God's shalom ought to be uncomfortable. We might be uneasy because of our own inconsistency, or because we learn about a huge ``shalomless'' arena we've never thought about beforebut a kind of holy discontent grips us when we see shalom denied.

Second, I think being a peacemaker in our context means merging the private and the public. We don't exist, as individuals, in a vacuum, and we venture into new lands best when our own hearts and minds are nourished. A striking element of our Anabaptist setting here in Reedley and in our conference is the amazing ethnic and cultural diversity which surrounds us. To be a peacemaker means to grow in our comfort level in culturally diverse settings. We have a laboratory in our own PSMC, and we even had meetings this past weekend in LA, but none of us went. We have a laboratory right here in Reedley. I think one of the most important peace efforts that we've done here in the past several years was when Sharon took food out to those grieving Muslim neighbors on Alta avenue. She took them food. She sat and visited. She wrote letters. That is peacemaking.

Third, being people of peace means at least saying what has to be said about what our own government proposes and does. The prayer guide from MWC suggests that, in thinking of North America, we ``pray for a change of heart in the government of the United States so that it comes to an honest appraisal of the impact of the invasion of Iraq.'' That seems far too polite. In these last days we've read about the threat of cuts to vital social programs, and then the administration's proposal to increase the defense department spending to an astronomical 439.3 billion dollars.

I'm sure there are important nuances, and a certain amount of practicality must invade our thinking, but this is obscene, and people intent on being the hands and feet of Christ must, they must, object.

We are following victim to the old tricks of the devil, that our well-being and our security can actually be found in the strength of our own cleverness, our own ingenuity, our own manipulation of the world, our own lethal power. But Christians should not fall for that lie.

We are people of God's peace. This is something we believe and do. We actually believe that in serving others, in going the extra mile, in remembering to bring a cup of water, in reaching out a helping hand, in extending the olive branchthat in those ways we take the steps necessary to bring about God's shalom both in good times and in bad.

--February 5, 2006
--First Mennonite Church, Reedley