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Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem...
... A Lenten Message

I was glad when they said to me let us go into the house of the Lord. Now our feet are standing within your gates. Jerusalem is built as a city at unity with itself.

There is a story of an old Jewish man who lived his entire life in the city of Jerusalem. From the time he could walk, now eighty years ago, his father would take him to the Temple to pray every morning of every day. And as a young man, he met his dad there and then he took his own sons, and then his grandsons. In recent years, now alone, he has made the twenty minute walk alone. An American reporter living in a small flat in the neighborhood for nearly two years, observed the faithfulness of this old man in this daily ritual, and one day followed him to the wall. When the man was finished with his prayers, the reporter asked him about ritual of his. With tears in his eyes he recounted the memories of his life time pilgrimage. The reporter asked the man what he prayed for. After a long pause, Abraham told the young reporter that he was praying for the Peace of Jerusalem. Now the reporter felt he had a real story. With winds of war whirling around between Palestinians and Jews, with Hamas and Iran and deeply divided Jews and with ever deepening rifts between Muslims, Christians and Jews, where was the peace?

What is your experience of these prayers in a city filled and surrounded with such hate, fear and anger?

“It is like talking to a wall”, the man said, as he shrugged his shoulders and headed back down through the streets to his home.

Do we not also come here to pray for peace? Is that not the prayer in all of our hearts… the peace of Jerusalem, the peace of all God’s people. Peace within these walls, peace within our hearts and peace throughout our world.

But perhaps the old man’s real issue was not, where was God in the midst of such trouble, but where were God’s people?

Every Sunday, we have the Exchange of Peace… what does it mean? It is a symbol of our desire for reconciliation with one another and symbolic of our part as the Body of Christ in the world. We are offering peace and reconciliation to each other and receiving the same from each other. It is not a good morning greeting, it is much more than that in its intent. Jesus told us that when we come to offer our ourselves at the altar and there we remember that someone has something against us, we should leave our gift, go and be reconciled and then come and offer that gift to the Lord. This is why we have the exchange of peace before we come to the table, offering our lives and receiving the Body of our Lord.

At this table we are fed and empowered. Here we are given the will and the strength to be instruments of God’s love and peace, something we could not do without the grace of God.

Those who differ from us are not our enemy. We will not always see things the same way as our neighbor, our brother or our sister. We will not always do what is in the best interests of all. We will hurt and anger others and they will hurt and anger us. But is this not the essence of our Christian faith. For Christ came to teach us to live in love and justice and forgiveness and peace and he died as a result of the brokeness that exists between human beings.

Lent is a critical time for us to look at our lives and ask the question of whether God’s purpose is at work in us, and are we at work in God’s purpose.

The man who went to the wall in Jerusalem to pray might be asked if he offered himself as a means of peace. If like the prayer attributed to St. Francis, he asked God to make him and instrument of peace.

Often there is need for mediators and peacemakers who can bring people together where families are torn apart. Often nations cannot sit down at the table together without a third nations hosting and facilitating the reconciliation. Blessed are the peace makers, for they shall be called the children of God.

Remember the song of the 60s and 70s during the Viet Nam War and the civil rights movement…
Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me… With God as our Father, brothers (and sisters) all are we. Let us walk with each other in perfect harmony.

Our purpose is to be instruments of God’s love in the world

How do we Find peace… the prophet of India, Mahatma Ghandi said if you want peace, bring peace and you will find it.

We will never agree on everything with our Muslim brothers and sisters, with those whose politics are different than ours, with those who walk a different path, see things in another way and do what they think they must, which differ deeply from us. Yet, unless we try, we are obstacles to God’s peace.

We can hope and pray all we want for peace, but unless we are willing to be moved to a different place by God, we are obstacles to God’s peace. If we cannot listen to the Shiites and Sunnis, the Palestinians, the Cubans or any we call ‘other’, there cannot be peace.

Jerusalem’s Temple is everywhere and we stand within its walls together today. Let us pray for peace. Let us offer peace. Let us be instruments of God’s peace here and everywhere. Peace within these walls of St. John’s. Peace within the walls of this town, within our Diocese of CT, the Anglican Communion, peace between the right and the left, peace between you and me, them and us.

The Prayer we might prayer for the peace of Jerusalem is found in the Celtic tradition, making us instruments of peace:

Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ above me, Christ under my feet. Christ within me, Christ around me and in all that I meet.

Peace before me, Peace behind me, Peace behind me, Peace above me and under my feet. Peace within me, Peace around me and in all whom I meet.

Amen.