Birth of Jesus was a signal for peace

“Hark! The herald angels sing. Glory to the newborn king. Peace on Earth and mercy mild, God and sinners reconciled.”

This coming Sunday is the fourth Sunday of Advent. On the Church calendar, Advent is a time of preparation for the celebration of the birth of Jesus, the Christ child. All during the Advent season our congregation sings Christmas carols. We will do so until the 12 days of Christmas take us into the Epiphany season.

Oh, how we love singing those carols. Central to their message is the coming of peace on Earth. The hope for peace on Earth is the inescapable Christmas message; yet, we are all conflicted. We not only hope for peace, but also glory in the excitement of war.

There are two clearly identifiable wings to the Bible tradition. One identifies with a God of war, who leads his people to victory through bloody battle. The other is a tradition of peace and dissent against all forms of violence. All through the Old Testament there are strong arguments of support for both sides of the disagreement.

The book of Psalms is the hymnbook of the Bible. Listen to the words from Psalm 58, a prayer attributed to King David: “O God, break the teeth in their mouths; tear out the fangs of the young lions, O Lord. Let them vanish like water that runs away. Like grass let them be trodden down and wither.” The Psalm concludes, “The righteous will rejoice when they see vengeance done, they will bath their feet in the blood of the wicked.”

The Psalms are loaded with passages that glorify war and identify God as the great slayer of the enemies of Israel.

The great King David was a warrior king. The Bible presents David as the king chosen by God to replace the inept King Saul. On the political side, he was touted as the one who killed thousands, while King Saul killed only hundreds.

The tradition of strength through the killing of all enemies runs very deep in the Old Testament writings, but not without challenge.

Psalm 146 (and many others) presents a very different kind of God. In Psalms like 146, warring and killing are not a part of the character of the God of Israel; rather, the God of Israel is a god of love and compassion, who brings justice to the oppressed, food to the hungry and freedom for the prisoner.

In the eighth century B.C., when the war wing of Israel was being destroyed in battle, the prophet Isaiah wrote that a new branch of Israel would spring out of the dead stump of war. That new branch would be based not on war, but on peace. A new day was coming when “they will not hurt or destroy for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord God.”

In the history of Israel the voices of peace were always present, but much of the time the voices of peace were drowned out by the shouts of war.

Jesus was a part of the peace movement among Israelites. At the time there was no shortage of advocates of armed rebellion and the killing of enemies. Jesus taught that enemies were to be loved just like everyone else. He warned that those who live by the sword will also die by the sword.

How are we to understand his sayings about love and the ways of peace? Are they not clear enough for us to understand? The life he lived was completely consistent with his words.

Is not the Christmas season the very best time for Christians to challenge a warring world with the Jesus message of peace?

In the December issue of the Evangelical magazine Christianity Today, theologian Ron Sider challenges Christians to clean up their Christmas behavior. Sider is a pacifist in the Mennonite tradition. For a certainty we know that war does not work. Sider points out that in the years 1900 to 1989, 86 million people were killed in wars. In that same 90 years, 120 million people were killed in government-sponsored genocide. The 20th century was the bloodiest in human history. Can anyone argue that war works for anyone’s benefit?

To sing Christmas carols about peace on earth and to advocate war as a way of settling conflicts is at least thoughtless, if not hypocrisy. Christmas is a good time to re-examine what Jesus was all about.

The Rev. Howard Bess is the pastor of Church of the Covenant, an American Baptist church in Palmer. His e-mail address is hdbss@mtaonline.net.