Where is the Peace on Earth that Advent Promised?

In a 1966 Time Magazine interview, the infamous German theologian Karl Barth recalled, on the occasion of his retirement, some advice he had given to young preachers 40 years earlier:

“Take your Bible and take your newspaper, and read both. But interpret newspapers from your Bible." Newspapers, he says, are so important that "I always pray for the sick, the poor, journalists, authorities of the state and the church—in that order. Journalists form public opinion. They hold terribly important positions. Nevertheless, a theologian should never be formed by the world around him—either East or West. He should make it his vocation to show both East and West that they can live without a clash. Where the peace of God is proclaimed, there peace on earth is implicit. Have we forgotten the Christmas message?

“The Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other” has become axiomatic to many a preacher. In all honesty, today the newspaper and its online equivalents feel too heavy for me to keep holding. The mass shootings in 2023 alone are enough to take away all the light of hope that Advent managed to shine into our world - the peace candle snuffed out by guns and rolled over by tanks. 

I don’t know about you, but I want the way I live out my faith to make an actual difference in the world - to bring peace into violent places and to shift the direction of history so no one has to say sudden and painful goodbyes to those they love. I want the light of Advent to keep shining - I want the Gospel of God’s peace to be proclaimed and for it to actually make a difference. Sometimes the newspaper casts all kinds of doubt on this - as I’m sure it does for some of you.

Peace making is hard work. It takes all of us. In his 1963 “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” When Monterey Park, Colorado Springs, or Half Moon Bay are violated as they have been this winter, we are too - for we are all part of God’s beloved creation. I think part of the fatigue we feel with the constant news is because we are all hurt as well - hurt and discouraged and enraged.

Peace is hard work, but peace is what we are called to as followers of the Prince of Peace. The Apostle Paul, in his letter to the Galatians, exhorted his reader to “not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up. So then, whenever we have the opportunity, let us work for the good of all, and especially for those of the family of faith” (6:9-10).

Friends, let us be the peace this world needs.

Lord grant us the strength for the work. Help us to not grow weary.

Blessings,

Pastor Amy