Week of Prayer 2014: “Blessed are the peacemakers”
Topics
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Monday night: A monument in the heart of hell (Mic. 4:3-5)
Tuesday night: God has restored the peace (Col. 1:15-20)
Wednesday night: Ministers of peace (2 Cor. 5)
Thursday night: The truth both hurts and heals (John 8:13 etc.)
Friday night: God’s recipe for peace and justice (Ps. 85)
Saturday night: How beautiful are the feet of those that bring the good news (Rom. 10:9-15)
Sunday night: The communion of saints – God’s test garden (John 13:12-17; 17:20-23)
Three important remarks:
Firstly: We strongly recommend that local congregations of the DR Church family reach out to each
other during 2014’s Week of Prayer. If congregations of the DR Church family can manage hosting
their services together – praying together, singing together and listening to the Word together – much
of what is set out in the sermons below, the reconciliation that we have all been yearning after for so
long, can become a reality and be experienced! The series was prepared by a team of five, from the
different member churches of the DR Church family in Pretoria and surrounds: Piet Meiring (author),
Victor Pillay, Nico Botha, Leepo Modise and Lieze Meiring (advisors). It was our privilege to
contemplate reconciliation and decide together what we would like to communicate to the DR Church
family. It is our earnest prayer that our sisters and brothers in the church family will listen together
and pray together.
Secondly: We have placed an example from church life, especially from the DR Church family, with
every sermon. Feel free to use these to illustrate the message. However, it would be even better if you
can use a local experience or anecdote of your own.
Thirdly: Regarding some of the sermons, we have gratefully made use of Bible study material that
was written in the past couple of years for use in the DR Church family: Geseënd is die vredemakers
(Piet Meiring), CLF Bybelstudiegids (2010) and Op pad na versoening. Bybelse en praktiese riglyne
vir gemeentes (VAM Commission of the General Sinod of the DR Church, 2001).
1. A monument in the heart of hell (Mic. 4:3-5)
In the valley of Hinnom, outside and behind the wall of Jerusalem – in Biblical times the dump of the
city, where fires burned unceasingly, where dogs rummaged for carrion and the bodies of criminals
who were so guilty that they deserved no burial after their execution, were thrown – a monument
stands today. In the valley of Hinnom – such a terrible place that the name and concept of “hell” was
derived from it – the blood flowed once more during the 1948 War. The Israelis and Jordanians
fought to the death. Their bodies lay strewn over the scorched ground. After the war was over, the
Israeli authorities erected the monument as a sign that they wanted to lay down their weapons and live
in peace with their neighbours.
From afar, the monument looks strange, like a giant spider or a squid on a base of sandstone. A closer
look reveals what it really is. The tentacles that stretch out in all directions consist on the one side of
the barrel of a cannon, a machine gun, mortars and cartridge belts. In the middle, they are melded
together to protrude on the other side as a tractor’s steering wheel, a plough and a harrow. The
weapons of war are re-melted and transformed into implements of peace! And on the base of the
monument, the words of the prophet Micah are written: “They will beat their swords into
ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up swords against nation, nor
will they train for war anymore.” (Mic. 4:3)
In the time of Micah, a time of unrest and violence and fear, when the Babylonian supremacy that
could invade the country any day threatened the survival of the people, these words must have held a
wonderful comfort. A day will come when there will be peace, when the turmoil of war will cease and
people will join their hands in love. Instead of fighting each other, they will work together! Of how
this would come about, Micah and his colleague Isaiah, who also received this message from the Lord
(Is. 2:4) could but dream. But today, we know how this came true, on the day when the Lord God
again planted a monument on a hill just outside Jerusalem: the cross of Golgotha on which Jesus
Christ died for our sins to reconcile all of us with God and with each other and to bring peace in the
hell of our world. Isaiah and Mica looked forward to the day when the Emissary of the Lord, the
Messiah, would come. We know: He has come!
What does this tell us?
In our country too, in our torn and polarised society, we yearn for the day when swords become
ploughshares and spears are beaten into pruning hooks. The discord and tensions in our country are
growing on many levels:
• Political tension has rather increased than decreased in the past few years. Many reproaches
from the distant past are still tarnishing relations between South Africans. And things that are still
going awry today, people who feel now more than ever that justice and equality still elude them,
makes the problem worse. Minority groups feel that they are shoved aside. Conflicting political
ideologies, not to mention the speeches uttered by some politicians, add to the mounting tension.
• In the economic arena, the chasms are widening. People have been cherishing dreams for
years and promises have been made. Expectations were created about a more just dispensation in
the country, about homes and jobs and a proper income for all. But this has not happened. The
rich are still rich and the poor are extremely poor. Economists say that in South Africa, the divide
between the super-rich and the poorest of the poor (according to the so-called Gini Scale) is the
worst in the world. Riches and poverty see no colour, either: the richest people include whites and
blacks. The same goes for the poorest people. Unemployment causes people to lose heart and
sometimes become aggressive.
• Cultural differences are a gift from Above that can enrich a society. But when people
absolutise or disregard the differences – when the language and culture of minorities are trampled
– it ignites fires that are hard to quench.
• Racism is nowhere near gone. To write apartheid out of the law-books was one thing. To wipe
it from our hearts and minds can take generations. One only has to pick up the newspaper or
watch the news on television to see how deep the marks left by the monster of racism lie in our
homes, schools, offices and suburbs. It is a frightening experience to discover the traces of racism
in your own heart.
• Due to many factors, tensions in family life are on the increase. Daily reports about family
violence and sexual harassment, about what men and women and children are doing to each
other, appear in the newspapers.
• The levels of crime and corruption, the violence that touches all of us, lives that have become
cheap, the increase of farm attacks, are threatening the complete fragmentation of our society. The
fact that many leaders are involved in corruption makes people cynical about the future of our
country.
• On the church front, things are not going much better. Discord among Christians, the
misperceptions that we have of each other, the unwillingness of believers to reach out to one
another, are nullifying the gospel of love. The slow progress with the repair of unity within the
DR Church family is a source of great worry and frustration.
• Lastly, but ever more important in our society, are the differences between religious
communities in this country. South Africa is a country of many religions: Christians, Muslims,
Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, adherents to some of the old religions of Africa. We must learn to
respect and accept each other. But this does not just happen by itself. Differences are often
brought to a head, we misrepresent each other. The last “holy war” is nowhere near over.
To talk about the Lord’s love in our divided and broken country, to act as peacemakers, as emissaries
of reconciliation, demands great commitment and sacrifice, too. Just ask any pastor or member of a
congregation involved in the process. “Reconciliation,” one of them sighed the other day, “is not for
sissies!”
In the “hell” of our society, Jesus sends us as his ambassadors to walk in his footsteps and act as
peacemakers. What does this ask of us? How on earth will we manage to erect monuments of peace
where we live, work and move between people?
Every night of this week, we want to investigate this further. We want to hear how the Lord, who
takes us into his service, talks to us and equips us for our task.
Our prayer for the Week of Prayer
The very familiar – but always so moving – Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi can guide us on our
journey as peacemakers. Let us pray these words together throughout the week:
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is error, truth;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Pray for: Peace in our country and society; for the work of the church, church services, theological
training, etc.
2. God has restored the peace (Col. 1:15-23)
What exactly happened when the Lord God planted his monument of peace on Golgotha? Why did
Jesus die on the cross? There are so many answers to the question, answers that we grew up with: God
so loved the world that he gave us his Son. Or: Jesus has paid for our sins and gained eternal life for
us. One of the most beautiful answers – an answer so touching and rich that one struggles to grasp its
full meaning – is written in Col. 1:15-23. Paul quotes an early Christian song, a hymn in which the
first Christians celebrated the divinity of Jesus:
“The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
For in him all things were created: things in heaven and earth, visible and invisible,
whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through
him and for him.
He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from
among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy.
For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to
himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through
his blood, shed on the cross.”
The first Christians were convinced of two things, two things that are clearly emphasised in this song:
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Jesus is the Lord of creation. Through him, God has reconciled the whole world, all of
creation, with Himself. We can know: no matter how chaotic and cruel the world looks to us,
no matter the terrible marks that sin has left on the world, all of creation is reconciled through
Christ. All supremacies and powers, all authorities, are subject to him. No matter how
threatened we may feel, Christ is in control. He has repaired the peace on earth and in the
whole cosmos.
Jesus is also the Lord of the Church. Everyone who belongs to him, everyone for whom he
died on the cross, Jesus has connected as his body on earth. We may wonder about the church
sometimes, we can even despair about things happening in the congregation. But, just as
Luther sang in his famous song, Christ himself is maintaining his church! He shares his peace
with the Church.
In the song, the Colossians are rejoicing about the reconciliation that God has brought about. But what
exactly does the word “reconciliation” mean? It is not that easy to define. It can mean “to re-establish
peace between enemies”, or “to settle a quarrel or difference” or “to lead towards peace”. In the Bible,
it especially refers to “bridging the fissure between God and people, and people among themselves”.
That is what Paul is talking about in his letter to the Colossians.
This message of reconciliation was very significant for the congregation in Colossae. Paul himself
was probably never in their city. He never visited the congregation in person. Most scholars of the
New Testament reckon that the congregation was founded by one of Paul’s converts in Ephesus,
named Epaphras. But Paul knew about them and loved them. Epaphras must have given Paul regular
updates of everything going on in the congregation – also of the false teachers with strange notions
who were sowing discord and uncertainty in the congregation. Paul was also not in a good space
during this time. He had been imprisoned for his faith in Jesus. But while he was sitting in his prison
cell, his thoughts were with the people of Colossae. From his cell, with the most beautiful of songs on
his lips, Paul reminds them that their sins are forgiven, that they have become new people and that
Christ has repaired the image of God within them. As is the case with him in his captivity, they could
also know that Christ was holding them as congregation close and that nothing and no-one could
wrench them from his hand. In a dangerous world where they were threatened from all sides, also by
people who caused tension and misunderstandings in their own ranks, they could know that the
reconciliation of God, the peace that He has brought about, stands fast and true.
We have just as much reason to sing along with this Christ-song. In our country and our
circumstances, as well as our church and congregational lives, this means everything to us. We are
living in times of uncertainty. One only has to page through the newspaper to lose heart. The news on
television upsets you every night: all the evil and violence, the cruelty of people against one another,
the seeming powerlessness of our leaders to restore order and decency in society, the destruction of
nature, the world that is being rendered uninhabitable. But just like the people in his times, Paul
reminds us, too, that God is governing over everything and everyone. He has the reins of the world in
his hand. He is the Head, and through the blood of his Son on the cross, he has restored the peace;
through him, God has reconciled everything in heaven and earth to himself.
There are many people in our country and in our time who have lost their courage, who have no more
hope for the future. There was a time when we thought we would make it, when the dream of a
rainbow nation where the wrongs of the past would be righted, where people would reach out to each
other in love and peace, inspired all of us. But now it often looks as if the rainbow has lost its colour,
as if our dream is shattered in pieces. But we can lift up our heads! Our future is not in the hands of
people. God reigns! Jesus is on the throne. Two thousand years after Paul’s letter to the Colossians,
we can sing out the message once more and raise this song of the early Christians to our lips. With
millions of Christians in our time, we sing these words: “He’s got the whole world in His hands …
He’s got you and me, brother ... you and me, sister ... He’s got the whole world in his hands!”
A practical example: The Dutch minister J. Overduin was arrested by the Germans during the
Second World War for openly resisting Hitler and the Nazi ideology. With a group of resistance
fighters and a number of Jews who were arrested in Holland by the Germans, he was put on a train to
Dachau, the dreaded German camp where hundreds of thousands of people lost their lives. This was a
dreadful experience – the pain and suffering that he and all the people around him had to go through.
But in a book he wrote after the war, he tells of how often he and some of his fellow prisoners
experienced something of heaven in the hell that was Dachau.
On the parade ground, Overduin writes, where they had to stand on attention for hours at a time and
where they were often insulted and abused, a fellow minister encouraged him without saying a word.
Every day, the man wrote two letters in the dust with his shoe for Overduin to read: a J and a V.
“Jesus Victor”, the letters spelled: Jesus is the Conqueror!
Pray for: Equipment of the faithful, for the catechesis and Sunday school.
3. Ministers of peace (2 Cor. 5:17-21)
Just as profound as the scripture we read last night (Col. 1:15-23) is Paul’s message to the church of
Corinth. Here, Paul also speaks of the wonder of reconciliation. He strongly emphasises his message:
reconciliation is God’s work. He is responsible for it: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new
creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here. All this is from God, who reconciled us to
himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation…” (2 Cor. 5:17-18)
There’s a whole story behind Paul’s words. A breach of confidence had developed between Paul and a
group of people in Corinth. All sorts of rumours about the apostle went around. Feelings had been
brought to a head and now Paul was pleading, almost in tears, for the differences to be put aside and
for reconciliation between him and the congregation. Paul emphasises this: because the Lord God has
reconciled us people with himself – through Christ’s death on the cross – our relationship with him
and also with each other is restored. The old things are past, we have become new people! Therefore
we can reach out to each other in love and peace, we can forgive and accept each other.
But Paul has something else to say: although reconciliation is God’s work, it has to happen in and
through people. It almost sounds as if he is contradicting himself. First, he says: “God … reconciled
us to himself through Christ” (v. 18). And then: “We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled
with God” (v. 20). But this is not really a contradiction. God has done everything from his side. But
we have to take ownership of it. We have to return to him daily in our unreconciled and sinful state.
And we have to reach out to others every day because we have been commissioned with the ministry
of reconciliation. The Lord, the great Peacemaker, calls us to be his representatives, peacemakers in
his service.
Peacemakers who make a difference
This is quite a mouthful. How can we be peacemakers in our society on a practical level? The Belhar
Confession gives us a very clear indication (Art. 3):
We believe
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that God has entrusted the church with the message of reconciliation in and through
Christ;
that the church is called to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world;
that the church is called blessed because it is a peacemaker;
that the church is witness both by word and by deed to the new heaven and the new
earth in which righteousness dwells;
that God’s life-giving Word and Spirit has conquered the powers of sin and death,
and therefore also of un-reconciliation and hatred, bitterness and enmity;
that God’s life-giving Word and Spirit will enable the church to live in a new
obedience which can open new possibilities of life for society and the world.
During the Week of Prayer, we have to ask ourselves if we can translate the words of the confessions
into deeds – how we can truly be the salt of the earth and the light for the world; how we can radiate
the love of the Lord in a world of un-reconciliation and hate. For the church in Corinth, Paul made it
very practical. The most important of all, he wrote, is that you should love one another. That is the
first and the last word! And if you wonder what this love means in practice, in our everyday lives,
think of this (this applies to us, too):
“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast, it is not arrogant or rude. It does
not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at
wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes
all things, and endures all things.” (1 Cor. 13:4-7)
Can this ever come true, or has the standard been set too high for us? Can people still love like this in
our time?
Nico Botha tells of how profoundly he was moved at an ecumenical meeting by the testimony of a
woman from Liberia. A few years ago, there was a cruel en destructive civil war in the country. Child
soldiers were trained by the fighting groups and encouraged to conduct bloodthirsty attacks on their
own people. One day, a group of child soldiers attacked a town. One of the women tried to flee with
her baby on her back. An eleven-year-old soldier overtook her and with a vicious cry, stabbed the
baby to death on its mother’s back with a bayonet. Two years after the war was over, the woman met
the young soldier again. She would never be able to forget his face. But now the young boy was a
beggar in the marketplace, miserable an all alone without his comrades. The woman walked over to
him, put her arms around his shoulders and said to him: “I no longer have a child. You no longer have
a mother. Come home with me. I will look after you and be a mother for you. You can be my son.”
Practical example: There are stories like this in our own country, too. One of the most profound ones
is that of Amy Biehl and her parents.
In August 2010, the American couple Peter and Linda Biehl travelled to Cape Town to unveil a
memorial for their daughter Amy. They previously visited the country thirteen years ago, but then
under very tragic circumstances.
The amnesty hearings of four PAC members who were responsible for the death of Amy Biehl took
place on 8 and 9 June 1997. The shocking story was told of how, four years previously, Mongezi
Manqina and three friends wrenched the American exchange student, who had dropped off a group of
black colleagues in Gugulethu, from her car. They threw her onto the street and stabbed her with
knives. They would not allow any white person to visit their neighbourhood unscathed, they declared.
The struggle was going on and the country had to be rendered ungovernable.
The Biehls listened in horror how their daughter was murdered; heard about the knives, the rocks that
bystanders threw at her. The four men asked the parents for forgiveness during the hearings, but
added that they did feel that their acts contributed towards the struggle. “I must admit, it was very
hard,” Mrs Biehl told reporters afterwards. But when she and her husband formally addressed the
media the next day, they said that they would not oppose the grant of amnesty. “I never really
cherished any hate. Our family never felt anger or hate, just terrible sadness.”
“We came to South Africa because we wanted to know exactly what happened … I think now I know
what was passing through the young men’s hearts,” Peter added. “My wife and I came to South
Africa, just like Amy, in a spirit of friendship.”
That the people of Gugulethu not only appreciated the attitude of the American couple, but that it was
mutual, was clear when the next morning, the newspaper Die Burger showed a picture on its front
page of the Biehls who had received a painting by the local artist Tyron Appolus. Appolus made the
painting, with the title A plea for peace, on the same day when Amy was murdered, in August 1994.
In the meantime, Linda and Peter Biehl have founded the Amy Biehl foundation in Cape Town, which
renders help to society in various ways. Among other things, they train nurses for the townships and
squatter area of Cape Town. Two of the murderers are now working for the foundation.
Pray for: Families; for all the fathers and mothers in the congregation.
4. The truth hurts … and heals (John 8:32)
From a minister’s file:
In his book Op pad na versoening (“On the road to reconciliation”), Chris Spies quotes the following:
“Reverend, you just have to listen, please,” said Yvonne. She could no longer take the
keeping quiet. Nor the separation and the rift in her once close family. Yvonne wants to
talk about her pain. She was repeatedly raped by her brother Gert over a period of time.
She never saw Gert again. He fled. Their parents had cast him off and threatened him
with terrible things if he were to put his foot in their house again.
“What do you want me to do?” the reverend asked.
“I want to see reconciliation,” she answered.
“How will we manage that?”
“You have to go find him and bring him here so that I can tell him how much he had
hurt me…”
The reverend found Gert. Yes, he was willing to meet Yvonne, as long as the reverend
was present.
Gert was confused. He could not look his sister in the eyes, and yet he was so glad that
the thing was coming out in the open now. He had thought of writing her a letter and
apologising for what happened, but what if she rejected his apology?
Sobbing, with a wet handkerchief clenched in her fist, Yvonne undressed herself again,
as it were, talking and crying until she had been unburdened of all the hurt. Talking
through the pain was the only bridge across the gaping fissure between herself and her
brother.
“Gert, I did not come here to judge you. I miss you. You don’t need to defend yourself.
Just listen while I tell you how much you’ve hurt me.”
As if gently but firmly driving a chisel, her story was causing his only shelter, his mask,
to crack, piece by piece. It was showing in his face. There. Painful. Uncomfortable. It
did happen. He could no longer run away from it. Gert was sitting there, bent double.
Tangled up in self-reproach. Ensnared in self-judgement.
“What do you want me to do?” Gert asked.
“I want you and me to go to Mom and Dad together, so that we as a family can talk
about what this thing did to us.”
“You mean listen to the same story again?”
“It’s necessary, Gert. Mom and Dad also have to heal. Our whole family has to heal.”
“Reverend, will you please go and get our parents?” Yvonne asked.
The reverend gathered the whole family together. In a safe space, each of them opened
their hearts about what had happened, about the pain and about the way forward. There
was no beating around the bush. Nothing was just forgiven and forgotten “for the sake
of peace”. Everyone had suffered. Everyone had to listen. Everyone used the chance to
tell their stories.
The result was true reconciliation and the healing of the whole family.
Truth and reconciliation go hand in hand.
Without the truth, there can be no reconciliation. When tensions arise between people and reproaches
are heaped on others, truth is usually the first casualty. That is why it is so important that in the search
for solutions, when people have to be guided on the road to reconciliation, the truth must be raised.
This is not always easy. People often do not like the truth! With the work of the Truth and
Reconciliation Committee, there were many who opposed it: “Don’t open old sores! Close the books.
Forgive and forget!” The reaction of Archbishop Tutu, the chairperson, was: “Of course we are all
looking forward to the day when we can close the books. But first, we have to open them properly, or
they will never be closed! We cannot put away our past so easily. We first have to look the faults and
digressions of the past squarely in the eye. If we don’t do this, the past will keep haunting us.”
This does not apply only to our political past. Wherever injustice has occurred – whether between
man and wife in a marriage, or between parents and children, in the world of commerce, or where
people fell victim to crime and violence – the same rule applies: Don’t try to sweep the truth under the
carpet. It will not stay there in any case. It will come out, usually at the worst possible moment!
The truth can hurt. It can put the whole process of reconciliation back a long way or even halt it. But
there is no other way: truth must out. Because ultimately, just as Jesus told his followers: “…you will
know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:32) One can only imagine how difficult the
process must have been for the family of whom the reverend wrote above. But eventually, Yvonne
and Gert and their parents were one family once more, their hurts healed.
A great adventure
Luckily, the search for truth is not always painful and traumatic. It is often a wonderful adventure to
just go and sit with people we do not know well, people we often fear and keep at a distance – just to
talk a bit. To hear their stories and also share your story with them for once, opens doors of
understanding and reconciliation. Ellen Kutzwayo, the famous South African author, emphasised it
many times: “Africa is a place of storytelling. We need more stories, never mind how painful the
experience may be. This is how we learn to love one another. Stories help us to understand, to forgive
and to see things through someone else’s eyes.”
At the beginning of the new year, it befits us to pray with great humility that the Lord Jesus, who is
the way and the truth and the life, will guide us on the way forward; that the Holy Spirit will open our
eyes to the untruths and lies that we often live with – and that muddles our relationships. But our
prayer should also be that the Lord would lead us to our fellow citizens in this country, just to sit and
talk, to share our lives and our viewpoints with one another. May the Lord help us in the next twelve
months to experience once more how the truth can set us free in many ways.
A practical example: start talking, even if it is difficult.
Lieze Meiring recounts:
Something I experienced the other day is how feelings of guilt in some white people
and a deep-rooted sense of inferiority in some blacks can hinder a conversation. At a
discussion about reconciliation, myself and a black woman of my age had a chance to
talk. She was a brilliant, highly professional psychologist. We sat there looking at each
other, wondering what to say.
I, as white Afrikaans dominee in the DR Church, sat there with my feelings of guilt and
shame about the country’s history. I knew that while she and I were at school during the
same time, in the 1980’s, everything was so easy for me. For me as a teenager in the
1980’s, people like her, who had to live in a location with apartheid, the state of
emergency that was declared and all those things, were invisible. The same time, the
same country, but so far apart! What would we say to each other now? I felt ashamed
and did not want to talk first.
After a long silence, she said to me: “I didn’t feel like talking to you, because as a black
woman, I was born with a feeling of inferiority.” I couldn’t believe it! Here was a
beautiful, learned woman, and she felt inferior towards me! In turn, she could not
believe it when I told her of my shame. There was a division between us that would
only fall away during quite a number of conversations.
Pray for: Our families, especially all the young people and children in our church and our country.
5. God’s recipe for peace and justice (Ps. 85)
It was quite an experience to hear the two old ministers talking. It was during the 1980’s, when our
country was staggering from one crisis to the next, when a state of emergency had been called out for
the umpteenth time. I accompanied my own father, Rev. Arnold Meiring, who had been minister in
Heidelberg (Gauteng) for many years, to the retirement house of Rev. Ernest Buti, who himself was a
minister in Heidelberg, in the then DR Church in Africa congregation, for many years. The two
retirees had much to talk about. They had both been moderators who had to take the lead during the
difficult time just after the Cottesloe conference, which had shaken the church community. Rev. Buti
was a strong leader who did not hesitate to take a stance for justice’s sake – although he often ran into
difficulties as a result.
By the end of the morning, I also got my chance. “Oom Ernest,” I asked, “what will happen to South
Africa? Will we make it, in our country and our church? Do you have hope for the future?” I
remember his answer well. “Yes, Piet, there is hope for us, if we stop playing games, if we are
serious. There is so much injustice, poverty and pain in our country. And the church is so divided and
its testimony often so difficult to hear. But if we are really serious and we follow the Lord where he
sends us, if we stand up for what’s right – then I have a lot of hope.”
Oom Ernest was expressing that which the Old Testament prophets proclaimed with such emphasis
and which Jesus talked about so often: that God is the God of justice, who – in the words of the
Belhar Confession – “has revealed himself as the one who wishes to bring about justice and true peace
among people; … in a world full of injustice and enmity, is in a special way the God of the destitute,
the poor and the wronged and … calls the church to follow him in this … [who] brings justice to the
oppressed and gives bread to the hungry; … frees the prisoner and restores sight to the blind; …
supports the downtrodden, protects the stranger, helps orphans and widows and blocks the path of the
ungodly.” (Art. 4)
Psalm 85: Peace and justice. The one cannot be without the other.
Psalm 85 is one of the most profound scriptures in the Bible. We like using the word “shalom” in the
church, also from the pulpit. But to give a comprehensive definition of shalom is not that easy. The
concept is so full and rich! For me, Psalm 85 gives the most beautiful definition of shalom, of the
peace of God.
Psalm 85 is a song of hope written for the exiles who returned from their exile in the East to
Jerusalem. This was a time of uncertainty and fear for Israel. The land to which they had returned was
in disrepair. There was terrible poverty amongst many. The people were divided and in conflict with
each other. For many Israelites, it must have felt as if the Lord had not really forgiven their sins, for
which their fathers had been carried off in exile. Could it be that God’s judgment was still over them?
Psalm 85 can be divided in three parts:
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Part one (v. 2-4) sings of the eternal goodness of the Lord, who had calmed his wrath and
forgiven the people’s sins.
Part two (v. 5-8), however, is sombre. It does not seem as if the land is restored and the debts
redeemed. How long will the Lord stay mad at us then? The plea sounds up to the heavens:
“Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you?” We know this feeling.
As it has happened throughout the ages, and also in our time and our country, the people of
the Lord pray that the chaos and enmity in the world will make room for love and
faithfulness, for justice and peace.
Part three (v. 9-14) is a song of rejoicing, a confession of trust and hope. God will heal the
land! The Lord will give love and faith. Justice and peace will embrace.
In the ideal society, in a world as God wants it, love and faith are in force – faith in the sense of
“reliability, truth” (Hebrew: hesed). But they are accompanied by justice for all, including the
marginal, the poor and the wretched. It is also accompanied by the peace of God that repairs and
renews all broken relationships. It is good to know that God’s shalom does not only mean (negative)
the absence of enmity, but (positive) the total healing of the entire community. Please go and read
what Isaiah had to say about this, how – where the peace of God comes – the wolf shall dwell with the
lamb and the leopard lie down with the goat (Is. 11:5-7).
How can we get “serious”?
How can we help to actualise the dream of Psalm 85 in our country? On this point, too, the Belhar
Confession challenges us and gives us practical advice:
We believe –
-
-
that the church must therefore stand by people in any form of suffering and need, which
implies, among other things, that the church must witness against any form of injustice,
so that justice may roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream;
that the church as the possession of God must stand where the Lord stands, namely
against injustice and with the wronged;
that in following Christ the church must witness against all powerful and privileged
who selfishly seek their own interests and thus control and harm others. (Art. 4)
Getting serious means again reading Jesus’s words about the day of his return, from the pulpit, at
ward gatherings and Bible study evenings, and then asking of everyone present: What does this tell
our group, today? “I was hungry … I was thirsty … I was a stranger … naked … sick … in prison …”
(Matt. 25:31-46)
A practical example: Charisma Church understands how wide the gospel stretches.
Rev. Victor Pillay of the Reformed Church in Africa’s Charisma congregation (Pretoria):
In Laudium, Pretoria, the Christians are relatively few compared to the Muslim and
Hindu communities. But we have decided to tell the people of the Lord’s love in every
way possible, through our words and our deeds. We have founded a church committee to
attempt this fully.
On Fridays, our neighbourhood is full of beggars. Many black people, hungry and
unemployed, come to Laudium. This is the day on which Muslims pray together in the
large mosque and when they are supposed to give alms. Many of the beggars are lucky
and receive money. But they are hungry when they arrive there and they stay hungry,
even if they get a coin in the hand. Our church is ready with bread and soup every Friday.
Sandwiches are handed out on a large scale. Fruit is distributed. Some of the large shops
in the area have heard about this and now I can go there with my bakkie every week to
pick up groceries and fruit that have reached their sell-by date but can still be used.
While some members of the congregation are busy with the soup kitchen, others are on
their way to prison! There is a large prison right outside our neighbourhood, where we
visit some of the people in the cells, do Bible study with them and pray for them. The
prisoners really appreciate this. Another group regularly has dialogues with some of their
Muslim neighbours in Laudium. And a couple of people are busy with trauma and other
counselling at church, under the guidance of a professional lady.
The most exciting of all is our “Crossroads” programme for the teenagers of the church
and the community. We have a lot of fun together. We make music together, talk about
life and all the challenges facing young people and enjoy each others’ company. We
enjoy sharing our faith in Jesus with them. We can teach them a few things – and, believe
me, they teach us a lot!
By numbers, the Christians in Laudium are few. But we have Great News to share – and
we are trying our best!
Pray for: The church’s ministry through bread.
6. How beautiful are the feet of those that bring the good news (Rom. 10: 9-15)
A few weeks ago, just before Christmas, we took our habitual outing to listen to a performance of
Handel’s Messiah oratorio. It was an unforgettable experience. When the large mixed choir sang the
“Halleluiah” choir, everyone stood up in worship. But the piece that lingered with me the longest was
the touching soprano aria: “How beautiful are the feet of those that preach the gospel of peace…”
While the soloist was singing the words of Isaiah – the words that Paul later quoted in his letter to the
Roman church – I could see the crowd of messengers in my mind’s eye, men and women and children
carrying the good news of Jesus, of the peace he has brought, across the mountains and hills of the
world, from one home to the next in the towns and in the city streets. I could hear their footfall in my
imagination.
So I am sending you…
After his resurrection, the Lord Jesus met his disciples. John writes how he showed them his hands
and his side – the signs of his love, of the price he had paid for our redemption and to enable peace on
earth. “Peace be with you,” Jesus said, and then added: “As the Father has sent me, even so I am
sending you.” (John 20:21)
For us as believers, it is our greatest joy and also our serious commission that we must communicate
the redemption and peace that we have received to others. Paul could not stop talking about this. Just
as the Lord once laid his hand on my shoulder on the road to Damascus, he is doing this with each of
you, his children, Paul told them. Jews and Greeks, people who once stood far apart and often lived in
enmity, now receive the blessing of the Lord together. Everyone on earth who believes and calls on
the Name of the Lord will be saved. But then Paul adds these profound words: “So how can they call
on someone they don’t have faith in? And how can they have faith in someone they haven’t heard of?
And how can they hear without a preacher? And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is
written, How beautiful are the feet of those who announce the good news.” (Rom. 10:13-15)
The Lord needs our feet – and our hands and voices too. Wherever we may go, we have to announce
the good news of his peace. In a world that has grown tired and cynical, in a society full of chaos and
pain, full of enmity and hate, we can tell people: There is hope! Things can be changed and renewed.
God has reconciled the world to him. We can share in this reconciliation – we can have peace with
God and each other.
Words and deeds
We will often have to talk about the love of the Lord because, as Paul wrote above, there has to be
people who preach and talk and announce. The message must be heard. At other times, the love of the
Lord will have to demonstrated, as it must be seen and experienced. The latter is probably the hardest
and most demanding, but that is often what makes the biggest impression. It is told of Menno Simons,
the Dutch church leader during the Reformation, that he went to send off a group of his followers who
were on their way to America, the New World. “Take the good news of Jesus with you,” he said. “Go
and convince the people of the love of God – and if nothing else is working, then talk about it!” The
implication was clear: it was not the words of the Mennonites that would announce the message, but
their deeds!
Love asks a price.
To be a minister of reconciliation is not always easy. You often have to overcome your own
indolence, your reluctance to move out of your comfort zone. At other times, it can be a heavy price
that must be paid. To be a peacemaker between people, to act as a bridge builder, can take you into
troubled waters. It can even be dangerous. But this is how it should be: a bridge is for walking over.
The people will tread on you. That is your job! When God reconciled the world and all of us, it cost
an immeasurably dear price: the death of his beloved Son on the cross. To be ministers of
reconciliation can also ask a dear price of us: that we take up our cross to follow Jesus. We read above
that Jesus showed the marks of his wounds, his hands and his side, to his disciples after his
resurrection (also see John 20:25). By what marks will the people recognise us as disciples of Jesus?
Also by our wounds. It is good to remember that the cross that we mount on our churches and wear on
chains around our necks is more than just our coat of arms, our mark of recognition. It is the manual
for our ministry!
Practical example: A gruesome accident in Elliot binds the community together.
Rev. Danie Mouton tells the following story (2010):
Four children died on the spot when the taxi collided with a lorry. This tragedy
happened on a fall afternoon in May of 2009, while the taxi was transporting school
children to Elliot, a small town in the North-Eastern Cape. There were fifteen kids in
the minibus, of which a few were seriously injured. Most of them needed emergency
care. A couple of farmers from the area were first on the scene. They jumped into action
and transported the children to the hospital in Elliot. Right away – the same afternoon –
enough money was raised and ambulances organised to take the badly injured kids to
East London, hundreds of kilometres away.
The next morning, the local DR Church started a disaster fund for the victims. The
returns were used to cover the funeral costs of the deceased children and cover hospital
and medical expenses and buy new school clothes for the injured, most of whom only
had a single set of clothing. Various farmers made ample contributions to the fund.
Such spontaneous Christian support and service of love is colour blind. In the
indescribable grief of the parents who lose children, or whose children are seriously
injured, it is merely people supporting their fellow people. Nobody could foresee the
outcome.
It is a year later now. “What was the consequence of this helpfulness in the
community?” I asked Rev. Conrad Thomas, a local minister of Elliot, this week.
“Astounding consequences. There has been a dramatic increase in mutual trust in the
community,” he answered. “The taxi association in Elliot’s attitude has changed
drastically, especially toward the farmer community, but also toward the white
population in general. For example, taxi drivers are now helping us to prevent crime.
When they become aware of persons transporting illegal goods, it is reported. Various
taxi operators own agricultural land and are also farming. Farmers have come to their
help in ploughing the soil and preparing the fields for sowing. In the last harvest, the
farmers also sent in their harvesting machines to help bring in the mielie harvest.”
There has been a definite decline in the crime of Elliot. “This is in stark contrast to the
tension that reigned in Elliot a few years back,” Rev. Thomas says. “While the Lord
does not send accidents, the Lord did use this accident to turn around the situation in
our town.”
While reading the story of Elliot, I did not only hear the soprano from the Messiah oratorio. It was as
if I could hear the choir of the angels on the very first Christmas night: “Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace, good will toward men!” (Luke 2:14)
Pray for: The church’s testimony through the word; the ecology
7.
The communion of saints: God’s test garden (John 13:12-17; 17:20-23)
John 13 and 17 are two of the most important – and most profound – chapters in the New Testament.
It tells of the last hours that Jesus spent with his disciples at the table before going to Getshemane,
where he would be arrested. In his last conversations with his friends, Jesus spoke of many things – of
the cross that lay waiting, about his resurrection, about the Holy Spirit whom he would send to guide
his disciples on their way. But Jesus also spoke of the circle of disciples themselves, and that in great
earnest. They would be his representatives, his body on earth after he had ascended to heaven.
For Jesus, the unity and love of his disciples was of the utmost importance.
God’s test garden
They were a diverse group of people: Peter the Uncertain Rock; John and James, the Sons of Thunder;
Thomas the Doubter; Matthew the Tax Collector, Simon the Zealot. With all their various
characteristics and backgrounds, with their distinct fears and ideals, the group could easily shatter
once Jesus was no longer in their midst. But Jesus had advice for this. After washing their feet one by
one, he explained how they should also wash each other’s feet. And then he gave them the most
important command, the cement that would bind them together in the years to come: “I give you a
new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, so you also must love each other.”
(John 13:34)
At the end of the night, Jesus prayed for his disciples – and not just for them, but for all his disciples
through the ages, everyone who would come to believe in him. The prayer is therefore also meant for
us: “I pray that they will be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. I pray that they also
will be in us, so that the world will believe that you sent me.” (John 17:21)
When paging through the New Testament, one comes under the impression that the one great
characteristic of the early church was unity – that from all tongues and peoples and races and nations,
one community, the body of Christ, grew on earth. This was also one of the great drawing cards of the
gospel: “Just look how much the Christians love each other. Look how they care for each other! I also
want to be part of this!”
Of course there was discord, even quarrels, among the believers sometimes, and the apostles often had
to impel them to guard the unity as a precious gift. Throughout the past two thousand years, it was
often the same. Sometimes the one church was torn in pieces. Different denominations arose. Fellow
believers sometimes dragged each other to be burnt at the stake. But the commandment of the Lord
still sounds clearly: Love one another! His prayer remains the same: “Father … I pray that they will
be one.”
The big question that we have to ask ourselves at the beginning of the year is: how can a divided
church, a church that shows little of the Lord’s love in its own ranks, be an instrument of
reconciliation in society? If the church is not overflowing with love, if Christians are not tolerating
and cherishing each other, we have little to say to the world. The church’s best argument for
reconciliation is its own life. Where believers truly love and carry each other, the communion of
saints is created. The church of the Lord is supposed to be God’s test garden that shows how the
impossible has become possible; where people who had been very far apart, have become reconciled.
The church is supposed to show the world: the message of reconciliation is not a mirage. It really
works! Such a church has something to say to the world. In a confused, harassed, corrupt society, we
have a message of peace and reconciliation.
For the DR Church family, this message is of the utmost importance. The further and the faster we
progress on the road to unity in the church, the better able we will be to communicate the message of
peace and reconciliation to others. A torn church has little to say to the world. A church that has
become whole, where brothers and sisters who drifted apart through many years, embrace one another
in love once more, has a lot to say to the world.
How it should not be.
An article in the London newspaper The Times (29 Sept 2004) provides food for thought. What does
this tell us in our circumstances?
Ian MacKinnon, the paper’s representative in Jerusalem, reported:
Clerical fists fly in holiest of places
An unholy row hits holiest place
From Ian MacKinnon in Jerusalem
POLICE in Jerusalem reprimanded senior Greek Orthodox and Franciscan clerics yesterday after priest got into a brawl
inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, one of Christianity’s holiest places.
Three Greek Orthodox clergy who started the punch-up with Franciscans were released from custody but might still face
charges.
Both sides said they would try to resolve their differences. But rivalry has often boiled over between the six Christian sects
that share the church on the site at Golgotha, where tradition dictates that Jesus was crucified and buried.
A fragile peace is maintained by a book of rules, known as the ‘status quo’ that took centuries to hammer out and governs
the tiniest details of life in the church. Tensions have degenerated into violence because of some perceived infringement.
The spark for the latest fist-fight came when the Franciscans left open their chapel door as a Greek Orthodox procession
approached. Greek Orthodox priests, annoyed because the door should have been closed, insulted Fransiscans in the
doorway and a brawl ensued.
Israeli police with batons took five minutes to break up the brawl. “There was lots of hitting going on,” said Aviad Sar
Shalom, a guide. “Police were hit. Monks were hit. There were people with bloodies faces.”
One Franciscan monk came from Ghana battled his way into the fray, fist flying, to try to free his colleague. But it was an
Arab photographer and a shopkeeper who freed him, by cutting the rope. Shmuel, Ben-Ruby, a spokesman for police in
Jerusalem, said that both sides had been “told in no uncertain terms that this was no way for religious leaders to behave”.
Two years ago 11 monks from the Ethiopian Orthodox church were hospitalised after a fight with members of the Egyptian
Coptic church.
So distrustful of one another are the sects that responsibility for locking and unlocking the church each day has been in the
charge of successive generations of a Muslim family.
Which monument?
We began our series on Monday night with a narration of the monument of peace that was erected in
the Valley of Hinnom. In the following nights, we referred to this in various ways – to the miracle of
reconciliation, of the reality that swords can become ploughshares and spears pruning hooks. The big
questions with which we have to conclude and about which we have to pray tonight, is: What kind of
monument are we building in our church? Does the picture of our church sometimes resemble the one
portrayed in the newspaper article above? Or do we manage to portray the peace of God, the
reconciliation that Christ has brought about on earth? Let us pray that the Lord will make us into his
test garden of grace.
Pray for: The unity of the church; the testimony of the church in society.