Waging Peace in Love: 5 Practical Steps
by Thomas Davis
Our dinner club – a gathering of Christian and Muslim families – meets monthly. The only agenda we have is to do life together. At our most recent gathering we spent time thinking about ways we can serve refugees who will be coming to Raleigh in the near future. We have learned that the fruit of peacemaking is friendship.
In recent years, I have been accumulating a list of key principles I am learning from Jesus about loving others practically. These are core values that Jesus modeled and taught, and they are not optional for those who would follow the Messiah and wage peace in a broken world.
As these Jesus values fill up and flow out of our hearts, we become ever-more-effective conduits of God’s love to those around us. And when the life-changing love of God crashes into the lives of people in need (that’s all of us), all sorts of wonderful, beautiful things happen!
Thus, I invite you to prayerfully meditate on this list, asking God to grow these biblical principles in you. For a more intense spiritual workout, find and read corresponding, supporting passages in the Gospels and other New Testament letters.
Will you join me in following Jesus by working at Waging Peace in Love?
Love God with all my heart by loving my neighbor as myself (Luke 10).
Love my enemies, perceived or real; tolerance is a bar set too low (Matthew 5, Luke 7,
Romans 12).Do not cast stones at someone else, because I, too, am a sinner (John 8).
God doesn’t need a defense attorney; He wants an authentic, imperfect vessel of love; God uses broken vessels who are transparent and authentic (2 Corinthians 4, 2 Corinthians 12).
Embrace all the ways, words, works, and worth of Jesus—be a follower, not merely a fan (Matthew 4, Matthew 5).
