Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Lying While Shaking Hands - A question on the source of peace

In grade school, your teachers want you to love your country and its leaders. I had a history book with something nice to say about all but one president (Millard Fillmore, his name wasn't even written in bold face. They just parenthetically threw him in there like I am now. So, just for the heck of it, I want to see what it looks like: Millard Fillmore). When they got to Jimmy Carter, the writers of the book went on and on about how he succeeded in peace talks between Israel and Palestine. I remember thinking it strange to see an illustration of Jimmy smiling with two middle eastern men as they shook hands when I had seen news footage of scud missiles and kids chucking stones in the street. I raised my hand and asked my teacher, "Were those men lying?"

Yesterday, I spent some time thinking about James 3:13-18. Verse 18 says, "And the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace." The verses leading up to this talked about the fruit of human wisdom creating disorder and evil, while wisdom from God brings reason, gentleness, steadfastness, and so on. The fact that James tied up this talk on wisdom with a verse on peace made me ask this question:

Can human wisdom ever bring true peace?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Your young question was absolutely correct. Someone was lying. A few months later Anwar Sadat was dilled vy the Arab forces that disagreed with the commitment he made.
The new question is always the point then, and now.
mem