The Priority of Peacemaking | Part 1

From the Love Word Finding studios in Memphis, Tennessee, I'm Byron Tyler here with Kerry Vaughn, the CEO of Love Word Finding. Gary today, Adrian Rogers picks up in our series, Keys to the Kingdom, a message called the Priority of Peacemaking.

And we'll be talking about that. But, you know, for some thinking about peace and being a peacemaker has been tough this year with the pandemic we've all been experiencing has changed our lifestyles in so many ways. But we appreciate so much our Love Word Finding ministry partners and how faithful they have been as we look at the blessings of seeing the Word of God go out, people trusting Jesus Christ as their Savior, growing deeper in their faith and relationship with Christ. You know, we could not do that without the help of our ministry partners. That's correct. And I would say this, right in the middle of a crisis, our people have been faithful.

And God has been faithful. And so I would just encourage you, if you're thinking about giving and supporting, now's the time. Do that now. It's a wonderful time as we celebrate the true gift of Christmas to give a gift to Love Word Finding.

And you can do that at lwf.org. But now is the time to step up and give at calendar year end. And Kerry, that's why those gifts are so appreciated to help get the Word of God out. We see people coming to Christ for the first time, growing, people growing in their relationship with Christ, getting responses like this. Adrian Rogers can explain biblical principles to a child, but his messages are also deep enough for adults to get something out of them. Profound truth, simply stated.

And we say that a lot here, but that is the true ministry of Love Word Finding. We're reminded of the early American psychologist, William James, who once suggested that war is so prevalent because of its positive psychological effects. It creates a sense of unity in the face of a collective threat. And his argument is that human beings need to find activities that provide the same positive effects of warfare.

In other words, we have to find alternative activities to give us that sense of feeling alive, of belonging and purpose. I would suggest that Jesus gives us the better alternative. Matthew 5, 9 says, Blessed are the peacemakers. Right. And I think a true peacemaker is this, one who stays right with God and they stay right with others.

You know, I'll say it a different way. You cannot be right with God and right with others and not have peace. And I think that's what we're talking about when we look at the fruits of the Spirit. You know, it's peace, love, joy. And the last one, self-control.

Yeah. And you know, James claims that men wage war against one another due to the war within ourselves. And the only one who can take care of that and bring that peace is Jesus Christ. Well, Jesus says, My peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you, not as the world gives, but as I give. And so I think for us to really taste and experience true peace, it can only come from above.

Well, with the priority of peacemaking, part one, here's Adrian Rogers. Befinding in the Gospels, the Gospel of Matthew, Matthew 5, and we're going to look here in just a moment at these beatitudes, the attitudes that ought to be, the characteristics of the God-like. And we call these beatitudes the keys of the kingdom.

We've been having a wonderful time studying the beatitudes. And let's begin to read verse one. In seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain, and when he was set, his disciples came unto him, and he opened his mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. That is, blessed are those who see their spiritual need, that see that they're bankrupt in the sight of a righteous and a holy God. Then verse four, blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Yes, blessed are those who are broken over their sins, who truly repent and turn from their sins. And then verse five, blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed indeed are those who are yielded to God and ready to accept his will for their lives. Verse six, blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. And our righteousness is Jesus Christ himself who is God's answer to man's sin. And then blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Those of us who have been shown mercy show mercy and thank God for the mercy we have received in the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. If we have come this route, then God purifies our heart and gives us a fresh vision of himself, and God becomes a bright living reality. And then we come to the beatitude for today. Verse nine, look at it.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. The other day when I was on an airplane, I picked up one of those magazines, and I read about a new mall that is opening in Minneapolis. It's said to be the largest shopping mall in the world. It covers 4.2 million square feet. Now, that's big. It's got stores, restaurants, nightclubs, amusement rides, all of this.

You say, how big is that? Well, you could put 88 football fields inside this mall. And ladies, listen, to visit every store, you'd have to take a three-mile hike just to visit every store in that mall. It hires 10,000 people. They expect to be doing $650 million worth of business a year.

About 40 million visitors a year are going to come to this mall. Now, when I read that article, I thought, you know, that's a big shopping mall, but there's one thing you will not be able to buy there, and that's peace. Nobody can put it in a bottle.

Nobody can put it in a jar. There's no way, no matter how big the shopping center is, you can buy the commodity that I'm talking about today, and that is a commodity that the world needs more than anything else, and that is peace. There is something desperately wrong with our world, and you don't need me to tell you about it.

Just pick up any newspaper, and you can study it. Now, we're very intelligent people. We know a lot. We can build a mall that big. We can build jet airplanes. We can build rockets. We can build all of this.

We have television that can circle the globe. We've made the world a neighborhood, but we haven't made it a brotherhood. There is a desperate cry, a desperate need for peace.

Now, what causes all of this? Well, just turn to the book of James with me. James chapter 4, I think, is one of the most significant passages in all of the Bible as we go on this search for peace. James explains the whole thing. James says in James chapter 4, verse 1, from whence come wars and fightings among you?

Why can't we live together? James says, where does all of this come from? In my reading, I read a very interesting story. There were two men who had been taken captive by the Americans in World War II. They were captured in Germany with other German prisoners.

They were brought back to the United States, and they were put in a prisoner of war camp. But these two young men were different than all of the other German soldiers. They seemed to keep to themselves. They seemed to be frightened. They seemed to be bewildered. Nobody seemed to be able to communicate with them. The other Germans said they really didn't know anything about them, and every attempt to talk to them was just led in frustration as they would shrink further and further back away from the interrogators. No one knew who they were, couldn't figure them out. They were just different.

They didn't even look like the other Germans. After a while, they brought in an expert, and he began to talk to them. He said, no wonder you couldn't talk with them. They're from Tibet. You don't even understand their language. This man understood their language, and then he got this story. Let me tell you what happened to these two fellows.

It's really not funny, but it is funny in a way. They lived in Tibet, and they were tired of living there in their little village. They'd never been anywhere, seen anything, shut off from the outside world. So they decided they would go from Tibet across the northern border. They found themselves in Russia during World War II. Immediately, they were picked up by the Russian authorities. They didn't know who these boys were.

Before long, they were on a train headed toward the west. When they got there to outside a big city, they were given an army uniform. They were sent to boot camp. They shoved a rifle in their hand, and they were there on the Russian front fighting the Germans.

They'd never seen anything like that. People in hand-to-hand combat, they were shooting each other with guns. These young men, frightened, they retreated, and when they retreated, they were captured by the Germans, and the Germans now took them, put them on another train, and they're traveling now. They end up in a German prisoner war camp. About that time, the Allies had come with the invasion of Normandy, and the Germans are retreating. They need every man that they can get, so they take these two boys, shove a gun in their hand, and tell them to go fight the Americans. And so they're out there now, again, scared to death. They begin to retreat, and the Americans capture them. And this time, they're put in an American prisoner war camp, and they end up in the United States.

And finally, the whole secret is unlocked. These boys from Tibet, they didn't know anything. Finally, after they talked to them for a while, they said, do you have any questions? They said, yes, we have a question. Why are all these people trying to kill each other?

They couldn't figure it out. What on earth is happening? And that's the question that James is asking right here. Where do these wars come from? From whence come wars and fightings among you? Now, what James does, he mentions three wars that are going on.

Listen to them. From whence come wars and fightings among you? Come they not hence even of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust and have not, ye kill and desire to have and cannot obtain. Ye fight in war, yet ye have not because ye ask not.

Ye ask and receive not because you ask amiss that you might consume it upon your lust. You adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God. Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. And here James mentions three wars. The very first war, men are at war with one another. Verse 1, from where come wars and fightings among you? We're at war one with another. Oh, every now and then we'll have a truce, but a truce is that period of time when you stop to reload. That's all a truce is.

Every now and then we'll have a truce, but there is no peace, religious, economic, racial, social, political, family, or personal peace. We are a people at war on the face of this globe. Well, why are men at war with one another?

Well, continue to read. Come they not hence even of the lust that war in your members? That's the second war. The first war is we war among ourselves. Why do we war among ourselves? Because we're at war within ourselves.

That's what James says. There is a war on the inside that wars in our members. People are not at peace. And that's the reason they can't be at peace with anyone else. Most of the folks are a fight going somewhere to happen. They're just an argument going somewhere to happen.

Why? Because they're in turmoil themselves. We live in a world that is uptight and full of turmoil.

Folks, we're just full of turmoil. And James says the war on the outside is because of the war on the inside. Well, why the war on the outside and why the war on the inside?

Because of the third war. And that is we are at war with God. Look in verse four where he says, Friendship with the world is enmity. And that word means warfare with God. See, we're at war with one another.

Why? Because we are at war with God. And there is no peace, saith my God to the wicked. Now, my dear friend, until you're right with God in this world, you're going to be a troublemaker and not a peacemaker.

Just put it down big and plain and straight. Until you're right with God in this world, you're going to be a troublemaker and not a peacemaker. Now, the Bible says, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God. First thing I want you to see today, the attributes of peace. The attributes of peace. What do we mean by peace? Peace, my friend, is not appeasement. Don't get the idea if you're a peacemaker that you are an appeaser. Appeasement never brings peace. People think that you're honor bound to get along with everybody. There is something wrong, something desperately wrong with the person who can get along with everybody. You just can't do it.

Now, you can try. The Bible says, If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men, which means that it's not always possible. As a matter of fact, sometimes you're going to be known by the enemies you make. Dr. Robert G. Lee, the former pastor of this church, was a great man, but he had his enemies and he had people who love him. Every man of God has those who don't love him. I've heard Dr. Lee say on more than one occasion, he said, One of these days somebody's going to preach my funeral. Well, literally, I preached his funeral, but I didn't know that I would when I heard him say that years ago. But he said, One of these days somebody's going to preach my funeral. And he said, When I'm in that coffin, when I'm in that casket, if that preacher has the nerve, the audacity to say, Here lies dear old Dr. Lee, he didn't have an enemy.

He said, I pray God he'll give me the courage to kick the lid off that coffin, rise up, and say, Why? He didn't want to be known as a man who did not have an enemy. All of us who stand for God will have enemies. I remember reading about some preacher boy who was in a class in a liberal college and the professor was telling us, Oh, we ought never to have any enemies. We ought never to be controversial.

There ought never to be any problems and so forth. And what he was giving was the gospel of appeasement. And then he said, What we need to do is to follow the example of Jesus. And that young preacher boy lifted his hand and he said, Professor, if Jesus Christ were so beautifully tactful and diplomatic, how did he manage to get himself crucified?

Friend, listen. Jesus Christ did not get along with everybody and everybody did not get along with Jesus Christ. And peace is not appeasement. And peace is not truce making. Now you can have a truce and a truce is better than hot war, perhaps. But that only means that is the succession of hostilities. There can still be a cold war.

It goes underground to fester and to grow and then perhaps to break out again. Peace is not even the absence of war of any kind, hot or cold. There's no strife in the cemetery. But incidentally, that's not peace.

And every now and then you go in a cemetery and you see where it says on the headstone, Rest in peace. Well, friend, I want to tell you it takes more than a grave market for peace to a troubled soul. Peace is not just simply the absence of war. When the Bible uses the word peace, the word peace is not a negative word, the absence of war. It is a positive word. In the Old Testament and today modern Jews greet one another the same way with the word shalom. Shalom. And that word means peace. Not when you meet somebody and you say to them shalom. That doesn't mean may you get out of war.

It infers there's something good, something wonderful, something positive that is happening. The Greek word for peace is the word irene. We get our beautiful name irene from that. If your name is irene, your name means peace. Peace.

Irene. That's the word that he's using here. It is a positive word. Now my dear friend, let me tell you what peace is. Peace is not appeasement. Peace is not truce making. Peace is not even merely the absence of war. What is peace? Peace is a right relationship.

Listen carefully because this is a technical point but a very important point. Peace is a right relationship with God that leads to right relationship with self and guides us in a right relationship with other people. That's what peace is. It is a sense of well-being and literally, literally peace is the result and the fruit of righteousness. Now if you don't see anything else, I want you to get this now. I want you to see how righteousness and peace are linked.

This is not an artificial link. If you're an unrighteous person, you can never have peace. There is no peace, saith my God to the wicked. The only way that you can have peace is to have righteousness.

Notice the Beatitudes. Blessed are the pure in heart and then blessed are the peacemakers. There is no peace without purity. Put these verses down in your margin. First of all, James 3 verse 17. The wisdom that is from above is first pure and then peaceable.

Did you get it? First purity, then peace. Blessed are the pure in heart, blessed are the peacemakers. The wisdom that is from above is first pure and then peaceable.

Put this one down. Psalm 85 and verse 10. Mercy and truth are met together. Righteousness and peace have kissed one another.

Isn't that a great verse? Righteousness and peace have kissed one another. There's a love affair between righteousness and peace. There's a marriage between righteousness and peace and what God hath joined together, let no man put asunder. In Hebrews chapter 7 and verse 2, the Bible shows Melchizedek as a picture, a type of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And Melchizedek is called two things. First of all, king of righteousness and secondly, king of peace. First, he must be king of righteousness. After he is king of righteousness, then he becomes king of peace. You see, righteousness and peace have kissed one another. My dear friend, you cannot have peace without righteousness. What is peace? Peace is a right relationship with God, a right relationship therefore in your heart and a right relationship with one another.

It is a positive thing. It is the righteousness of God ruling and reigning in your heart. Now, that is the attribute of peace. Secondly, not only do I want you to see the attribute of peace, but I want you to see the adversary of peace. It follows, as night follows day, if peace is linked with righteousness, then war, lack of peace, is always rooted in sin.

It always is. Let me give you these verses. Isaiah chapter 48 and verse 22. There is no peace, saith the Lord unto the wicked.

That's it. You want peace? This world wants peace? Sin is the problem. Can you imagine standing up in the Pentagon and saying, gentlemen, the problem is sin? Can you imagine standing up in one of the great universities and saying, gentlemen, the problem is sin? People are saying, what are we going to do about war?

What are we going to do about all these problems? Ladies and gentlemen, there is no peace, saith my God to the wicked. Righteousness and peace are linked together. Sin separates men from God. Sin brings inner turmoil and it separates men from men. Here's another verse.

Put it down. Jeremiah 8, 11 and 12. Key verse. For they have healed the hurt and the daughter of my peace slightly saying, peace, peace, when there is no peace. You remember back in the 60s when the hippies were going around saying, peace, brother, peace, brother.

But, my dear friend, they were living ungodly immoral lives. There can be no peace without the prince of peace. There can be no peace without purity. And so the Bible says in Jeremiah that people give a false peace saying, peace, peace, when there is no peace. And then he says in Jeremiah 8, verse 12, were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? Nay, they were not at all ashamed.

Neither could they blush. This generation of unblushables wondering why we don't have peace is very obvious. The adversary of peace is sin. That's the reason the Bible does not teach peace at any price. One of the strangest verses that ever fell from the lips of the prince of peace, Jesus, is this. He said, think not that I've come to send peace on the earth. I came not to send peace but a sword. That's incredible because the Bible calls him the prince of peace. I mean, he's known as the prince of peace. When he was born, the angel said, peace on earth, goodwill to men. The Bible says, blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God. And yet in this passage, Jesus Christ said, don't think I came to send peace. I didn't come to send peace. I came to send a sword.

What's he talking about? He is saying, I did not come to bring some sort of a false peace and amalgamation of good and evil. I came with a sword to put a line of demarcation between truth and error, between light and dark, between sin and righteousness. And what Jesus is saying is this, that when God's standard of righteousness is set, there will always be a division. Without righteousness, there can be no godly peace.

And the sword that Jesus has is like a scaffold. It must first hurt before it heals. Peace can never come. Are you listening? Peace can never come where sin remains. God will never make a peace treaty with sin.

Never. Peace can never come where sin remains. It's a convicting word from Adrian Rogers today, and we'll hear the conclusion of this important message tomorrow. Now, if you have questions regarding your faith in Jesus, we would love to offer you an insightful resource. Just go to our website and click the Discover Jesus tab at the top of the page. You'll find answers there you may need about your faith. There's a response section where you can share with us how this message or others have impacted your life. Just go to lwf.org slash radio and click Discover Jesus. Again, lwf.org slash radio. We can't wait to hear from you.

Well, thanks for joining us for the program today. I love what Adrian Rogers said about peace. Peace is a right relationship with God that leads to a right relationship with self and guides us in a right relationship with other people. Are you at peace today? Be sure to tune in next time for part two of the priority of peacemaking right here on Love Worth Finding.