Peacemakers are not blessed because they are other-worldly, avoid confrontations, spend all day in church praying, and never get angrythey are blessed because they are finally at rest in God. St. Augustine put it simply: “God, You have created us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You.” The meek are able to be peacemakers because they are first at peace with God; peace with self and others follows. This peace is the fruit of cooperating on ever deeper levels with God’s will and remaining open to His healing grace. Peacemakers echo the words of St. Paul: “I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through Him who gives me strength” (Philippians 4:12-13). Paul did not write these words from some ivory tower, safe and comfortable as a professor at some small liberal arts college. He wrote about the contentment of being at peace with God from a dark, dank prison cell in Rome while awaiting execution. In his life, he suffered much for the Kingdom of God: stonings, beatings, shipwrecks, physical ailments, murderous plots, and eventually martyrdom. But this is the power of meekness, withstanding all the world can dish out while allowing God’s supernatural healing to be unleashed in and through your life. It truly does surpass human understanding, and it can be yours as it was Paul’s, but only with Christ’s help. The story of Corrie Ten Boom, told in The Hiding Place, demonstrates this well.

As a young woman in Holland, she and her family used their home to hide Jews from the Nazi occupiers. When finally discovered, the Ten Booms were sent to Concentration camps, Corrie and her sister Betsie specifically to Ravensbruck. Corrie would survive the hell but her sister would not. Years later, as an internationally-renowned speaker, Corrie traveled far and wide speaking about the love of God and Christ’s ability to transform even the greatest of sinners. But her ability to be a peacemaker, to practice meekness in the face of anger, was put to the test one Sunday after she spoke at a church in Germany. One of the Nazis who had stood guard at the shower room door in the processing room at Ravensbruck approached her smiling and reaching out his hand toward her. “How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein; to think that as you say He has washed my sins away.” The horror of the camp, the taunting of the men, the pain and fear all came rushing back in an instant. Corrie tried to respond with charity, but anger paralyzed her. Silently she breathed a prayer: “Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me Your forgiveness” (p. 238). Ten Boom explained that in an instant she was given the grace to see that healing was not contingent on human ability to forgive or love, but on God’s ability to forgive and love. She took the former Nazi’s hand and gave him her blessing. God will give us what we need, if we cry out to Him for assistance. He tells us to love our enemies, and then gives us the love to do it.

The meek shall inherit the earth and the peacemakers shall be called the children of God because they rest in the Prince of Peace. And they bring His message of reconciliation to an angry and hurting world, whatever the cost.

What can you do today to be a peacemaker: in your home, at your work place, and in your heart? Simple acts of kindness, gentleness, goodness; think small, get started, and ask God to bless and mutiply. You'll be changed, and so will the world.