Have we forgotten?

Do you want to live in peace? Do you want to experience peace? I have mentioned this quote in a previous post Goodness is relative, but it’s worth repeating and consideration. Mother Teresa said this, “If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other”. In this tumultuous season we find ourselves in, with politics dividing friendships and family, wars that breed deep, generational hatred, and rapidly increasing anxiety plaguing the human heart, it seems that peace is a pipe dream. World Peace can’t happen without peaceful nations. Peaceful nations don’t exist without peaceful governments. Governments, being nothing more than a collection of anxious and warring people…..well, you get the idea. Peace begins with me. Peace begins with you.

We have two different fruit trees in our front yard. One is a scraggly little peach tree. I have tried to baby that poor, old tree. I prune it, make sure it’s getting the water it needs, and check it’s growth frequently while the young fruit is starting to grow. It doesn’t produce much, but the peaches we do get are delicious. We wait patiently, watching them grow and waiting for the perfect time to harvest. Typically it produces just enough fruit to give us one, fresh, homegrown peach crisp that we share with our family. About fifteen feet away lives an old apple tree. It’s overgrown, too tall and thick to be healthy. It produces a couple hundred apples, but probably 90% of them are infested with worms. They grow too close together so many of them get rotten and deformed. I rarely water it and even the fruit that does grow, we pick far too late. Like me, the quality of the fruit is determined by the love and care that is put into the tree.

When I look at my life, the fruit that comes out of it is a product of what goes into it. If I’m neglecting my body, not eating well, exercising, and taking care of myself, I not only see it in the mirror but I feel it. When I stop caring for my soul, it doesn’t show up right away. A season or two can go by and everything seems fine, but slowly things start to get cluttered up in my mind, like overgrown branches getting all twisted up. Like an infestation, anger, fear, bitterness, envy, and all sorts of negative thoughts take over my mind. I may still be producing lots of fruit, but upon closer inspection, it’s full of worms, rotting from the inside out.

If we want to see peace in our families, in our communities, and among the nations, it starts with each individual heart being tended in love. It starts with allowing God to prune away the dead branches that are causing us to live in anxiety, full of fear and insecurity. It starts with turning our complaints about what we don’t have into thanksgiving for what we do have. And it starts with remembering that we belong to each other. I’m not alone. You are not alone. In healthy community, we find a sense of purpose and belonging when we lift each other up rather than tearing down. Love builds up. Love lays down it’s own life for a friend. Love sets aside it’s own rights for the good of others. Love restores our soul and in due season, produces in us a fruitful harvest.

Peace is not a pipe dream. It comes from God, who is love. It is possible when we remember we belong to God and to each other. My life is not my own to simply seek my happiness and serve my every desire. In that self-centered life, peace will never come. I’m not going to lie, this is a constant struggle for me. Everything in me wants to serve myself. I want to be right. I want what I want when I want it. But even when I get it, there is no peace. Then I remind myself of this truth. My life isn’t only about me, and the world doesn’t revolve around me. God’s love is bigger than my fickle happiness. I’m here to be loved by him, to love my neighbors and my enemies, to give hope to the hopeless, joy to the brokenhearted, and remember that we belong to each other. In that, I find peace for my soul and hopefully, in due season, will see peace grow throughout the world. So say this with me and we navigate the busyness and stress of the holidays, “Peace begins with me”.