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Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called children of God.
(Matthew 5:9)

It is no secret that our world is increasingly polarized and conflicted today.\xa0\xa0

It's true South of the border.\xa0 It's true here.\xa0 It's true in other parts of the world.\xa0 It's true in our politics.\xa0 It's true in our racial identities.\xa0 It's true in our wealth disparities.\xa0 It's true in our immigration systems.\xa0 It's true even in the church.

We are conflicted today.\xa0 And we seem to be drawing on an increasingly shallower well to address these conflicts.\xa0 Our attention span is shorter, our willingness to listen is lower, and our confidence in our own position is stronger.

What role do the children of God, walking as the contrast community of Christ play in such times as these?\xa0\xa0

We are those who know what reconciliation is, because we have been reconciled to God.\xa0\xa0

We are those who know what forgiveness is, because we have been forgiven by Christ.

We are those who know what it means to have been welcomed into a place of belonging, despite our undeserving and our inability.

We are those who claim to the One who has broken down every dividing wall of hostility between races, genders, and more, bringing peace through His cross.

We are those who know what it is to have received love, mercy, grace, hospitality, joy, peace, and more.

But our knowing and our receiving have not always translated into our living.\xa0 Sometimes we are the ones who refuse to listen, who refuse to forgive, who refuse to humble ourselves, who refuse to confess when we've been in the wrong or wronged someone else.

And yet the forgiveness of God in Christ through the Spirit comes to you and I yet again as the promise of peace is continually offered through the cross.\xa0 Will you receive it?

Because a time like this calls for "little Christ's" (i.e. Christians).\xa0 It calls for the children of God who come in open-handed humility with nothing more than they have received in Christ, ready to offer it through the Spirit for the healing of the nations and the blessing of the world.

So today: Is there forgiveness you need to seek?\xa0 Forgiveness you need to give?\xa0 A listening ear you could extend?\xa0 Humility you could show?\xa0 Unwarranted grace (gifts) that you could offer?

How can you and I be peacemakers in the humble, reconciling, forgiving way of Christ today, right where we are among the people we know best?

See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!\xa0 And that is what we are!\xa0 (1 John 3:1a).

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