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Up-to-the-minute jumping-off points for sermons, linking the reading to the latest news and global issues
War and Peace
Peace – or peace with justice?
Context
As the war in Ukraine continues to feature prominently in news headlines, some commentators have pointed out the many other wars being waged, where our sisters’ and brothers’ suffering has continued far longer. Conflict in Afghanistan, Myanmar, Nigeria, Somalia, Tigray and Yemen continues to claim of lives every year.
According to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), at least 89.3 million people around the world have been forced by war, natural disaster or climate change to flee their homes. What really strikes home, however, is the contrast between the human, material and financial resources which we as a human race are still prepared to pour into war, and the resources we commit to combatting its causes and consequences. In 2015, it was estimated that just 10% of world military spending could end poverty. This, in turn, would obviate many of the causes of conflict, especially in poorer areas of the globe where people are fighting over scarce resources.
Ideas for sermons or interactive talks
Much as we might wish it to, the Bible does not give Christians a clear answer about whether war is permitted or not. Most Christians probably believe that war should be avoided wherever possible, that a ‘just war’ may be waged only where peaceful democratic and political processes have been unable to resolve a dispute; and there have always been Christians who believe that war should never be undertaken, no matter what the circumstances.
Many Christians see war as the result of a failure to live by God's standards, and there are certainly many promises in the Old Testament that war will come to an end in the perfect Kingdom of God (cf. Isaiah 2.4).
The Bible does, however, give a number of fairly unequivocal instructions about issues of justice, the sanctity of life, resolving conflict and working for peace. These include defending the rights of the poor, widows and orphans, caring for the needy and helpless, and rescuing them from evil people (Psalm 82), and – most challengingly of all – loving your enemies (Matthew 5.44); for, in most circumstances, loving your enemies would not involve killing them.
From the conversion of Constantine in the early 4th century CE, into the early 20th century, many Christians accepted the idea of a ‘holy’ or ‘just’ war, popularised in the 13th century by Thomas Aquinas. Such wars included the 11th-12th century Crusades to win back Jerusalem from Muslim rule. As recently as 1915, the Bishop of London, Arthur Winnington-Ingram, described the First World War as a ‘Holy War’, although this must be understood in the context of the Victorian belief that Britain was chosen by God to bring the light of the Gospel to the world.
As the concept of the ‘holy war’ lost traction, so Christians turned to caring for war’s victims. The foundation of Christian Aid in 1945 by British and Irish churches to help refugees perhaps marks one of the greatest turning points in the Church’s history, when war became understood as an obstacle, rather than a road, to the kingdom of God.
Questions for discussion
- Is war ever the right answer to a dispute?
- What did Jesus really mean by loving our enemies?
- What is our next step, as Churches and as individuals, on the road to the kingdom of God?
Robert Beard works with NHS 111. He is also a Church of England priest.
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Peace to this house
This week we explore receiving and giving God’s blessing
These few weeks can be a time of great change and upheaval; finishing school, changing school, completing exams, awaiting results, open days for next steps, preparing to leave friends and family behind. It is, in many ways, a time of change and transition.
In today’s passage, Jesus was preparing his disciples for change and transition too. They had been with him, watched him and learned from him and now he wanted to prepare them to go out and do all that he had prepared them for. This was a ‘test mission,’ or ‘pilot project,’ perhaps. Through their trip, the disciples would learn what it was to fully rely on God and live out all that they had been taught.
In this period of change and transition, as you may be preparing to leave behind the relative security of the classrooms and schools you know and venture into the unknown, may you discover what it is to fully rely on God, to find those places where you receive and can give God’s blessing to others, and to grow more into the people God would have you be.
Becky May is Founder of The Resources Cupboard
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