The Beatitudes: Blessed Are The Peacemakers

Matthew 5:9 KJV
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.

I have struggled with writing this post this week. To be honest I have been at a loss for words. My family is in a situation right now that has shocked us to the core. We are reeling and grasping for a solution. And in the midst of a situation like the one we're in, dealing with inheritance and legacy, our true colors come out. We learn things about ourselves and our family that we didn't know before, or didn't want to see. It is in times like these, when money and greed pit one side of the family against another, that we need a peacemaker the most. 

Unfortunately in situations like ours, it is hard to see a solution that will be accepted by both sides and make everyone happy. Inevitably someone will feel slighted, someone will feel betrayed, someone will feel martyred, someone will feel blamed, but everyone will be hurt.

We can see it happening before our very eyes but are powerless to stop it. Things will be said and done that cannot be taken back. Lines will be drawn and crossed. Bridges burned. 

Where can we find a peacemaker in a situation such as ours? A mediator? An interceder?  I can think of only One who could ever do justice to our plight. Only One who could treat both sides with equal love, who would have only selfless motivation, who would protect the innocent, the weak, and the frail. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. He is the Peacemaker, the Mediator, the Interceder. 

Only He can melt a cold and hardened heart. Only He can calm the storm raging in a family being torn apart by greed and selfishness. Only He can mend the bond between loved ones that is fast unraveling.

What is important for us to remember is that we worship a God we cannot exaggerate. What seems a hopeless situation to me right now, is nothing compared to what He has delivered His people from for thousands of years. My God created the sun and moon, parted the Red Sea, rose from the dead and defeated death, hell and the grave, and He can do this little thing for me. If I remain true and faithful, He will make peace in my family for He is my Peacemaker and I am His child.

Didn’t I Walk On The Water

As I kneel in the darkness in the middle of the night

I’m praying for assurance everything’s gonna be alright

Lord I see another battle out in front of me

I’m afraid I won’t be able and I’ll go down in defeat

And He said,

Didn’t  I walk on the water, Didn’t  I calm the raging sea

Didn’t I speak to the wind, it hushed and I gave you peace

Didn’t I run to your rescue, didn’t I hear you when you called

Didn’t I walk right beside you just so you wouldn’t fall

Didn’t I leave all of Heaven just to die for your sin

Didn’t I search until I found you and I’d do it all again

He said, do you remember where I brought you from

Just take a look behind you at how far you’ve come

And everytime you asked me, didn’t I deliver you

So why would you be thinking that I wouldn’t see you through

And He said,

Didn’t  I walk on the water, Didn’t  I calm the raging sea

Didn’t I speak to the wind, it hushed and I gave you peace

Didn’t I run to your rescue, didn’t I hear you when you called

Didn’t I walk right beside you just so you wouldn’t fall

Didn’t I leave all of Heaven just to die for your sin

Didn’t I search until I found you and I’d do it all again

Now she’s talking to her father in a house that was once a home

She said my bills are coming due Lord and six days is not that long

She hears a voice so still and low

It says I’ve moved like that before

And I’ll do this little thing and I’ll give you so much more

And He said,

Didn’t  I walk on the water, Didn’t  I calm the raging sea

Didn’t I speak to the wind, it hushed and I gave you peace

Didn’t I run to your rescue, didn’t I hear you when you called

Didn’t I walk right beside you just so you wouldn’t fall

Didn’t I leave all of Heaven just to die for your sin

Didn’t I search until I found you and I’d do it all again

The Beatitudes: Blessed Are The Merciful

Matthew 5:7 KJV
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.

Exodus 21:22-25 KJV
22 If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.
23 And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life,
24 Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
25 Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.

Genesis 50:20-21 KJV
20 But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.
21 Now therefore fear ye not: I will nourish you, and your little ones. And he comforted them, and spake kindly unto them.

I have been tossing this post around for nearly a week. I have been putting off writing it because it was a difficult one to research. I think that anyone that knows me, know the heart that I have for babies and for children. To think of one suffering in any magnitude, breaks my heart. I rarely watch the news for this very reason, my nerves simply can't handle it. 

Yet if anyone deserves our mercy it is our children. Both born and unborn.

And so it is with a broken heart that I find myself writing this tonight. That it even needs to be written speaks to the evil that the world has succumbed to. 

I cannot tell you of the pain of rape or incest. I have never suffered such tragedies in my life. I cannot tell you of the pain of being rejected by the only family I have because of what is deemed a mistake in their eyes. I cannot tell you of the pain of being told that I am an inconvenience and I need to be gotten rid of. Or that I am deformed and therefore not worth letting live. Yet, since the legalization of abortion in 1973, millions of babies have suffered this pain, have been murdered simply because they were unwanted. 

I sit here with a lump in my throat, trying to banish the images from my mind that I have seen tonight. But I realize that it's this very mindset that let the horrors of Kermit Gosnell's abortion clinic go on for over 3 decades. Sticking my head in the sand will not unsee what I have seen and it certainly won't stop what is being done in our country. 

There are viable babies being born all over our country tonight that are being refused medical care or being flat out murdered because they are complications of abortion. As if it isn't heinous enough that we legally snuff out the lives of babies because they are "non-persons" until they are born and fill their lungs with oxygen, it is pure evil that allows a baby to die alone in a metal dish, refusing life saving medical treatment, simply because he was supposed to have died during the abortion procedure. It is the stuff of nightmares. Truly it is. I had no idea, or perhaps I just didn't want to believe that man could be so cold and callous, that there are babies who survive abortions, babies who, with medical intervention, could live a healthy life. But men like Kermit Gosnell, who perform illegal abortions on women well into their 3rd trimesters and routinely deliver viable babies, are "ensuring fetal demise" without blinking an eye. I read for myself tonight parts of the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report in Gosnell's trial and I could do nothing but sit and weep in anger, in horror, in utter sadness. I was completely unprepared for the photos that were included. Seeing the gruesome effects of his "medical practice" and knowing that for over 30 years his employees not only stood by but helped him, never questioning his obvious illegal practices, was in itself sickening. 

We have convinced ourselves that if it doesn't affect us, it's not our problem. Not my monkeys, not my circus. Maybe so, but when the monkeys show up on your doorstep, overturning your right to vote against homosexual marriage, your right to carry a gun, your right to free speech, then I guess the circus tent just got a whole lot bigger.

Women like Kay Hagan, Wendy Davis, Gloria Steinem, who support abortion, even abortion after 20 weeks, are terrifying to me. These are women brainwashing other women into believing that babies are an invasion on their bodies, inconveniences causing them to lose control of their lives. 

And let's get one thing clear, whether or not a baby at 12 weeks can feel pain or whether it can't until 20 weeks, is utterly irrelevant. Abortion is murder. Life begins at conception. 

The Bible tells us in Exodus, that if a man harms a pregnant woman and causes her fruit to depart from her, to deliver prematurely, and the baby lives then the man must pay whatever the judge determines. But if she delivers prematurely and the baby is harmed or dies, life for life is required. Can you imagine if every mother, father, friend, abortionist, nurse, or anyone else that might be involved in a woman's decision and subsequent abortion, had their life required for the baby's life they stole?

We need to stand up and speak out against abortion, in all stages of gestation. We need to speak up and put an end to an evil that man has deemed acceptable and legal. We must show these babies mercy. Because they are at the mercy of our morals, our laws, our convictions.  And regardless of how they were conceived, whether you deem it to be the right time in your life, or whether that baby is healthy or not, what man thinks as evil against us, God means for good.

I can think of another group of people deemed unwanted, unfit, and undesirable. Sinners. You and me. All it took was One Man willing to show us mercy to save us from a neverending, unceasing hellfire and damnation. Christ Jesus. He laid down His life and became our Interceder. He died so that we could have eternal life by simply believing on Him.

Let us intercede, let us show mercy to the innocent, the unborn. 

Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy.