Every so often, out of the thousands of words that reign down upon us day-after-day, one word gets through and sticks.  It captures the attention and sends the imagination soaring.  Recently the word “approach” struck me in this way.

 

In a world such as ours, a world of bridges and tunnels, huge buildings and superhighways, approaches are critically important.  Functionally, of course, there must be a way of getting to the bridge, or into the building, or off the freeway.  I sometimes think that speed reading should be required in our schools to prepare us for getting off the freeway at the right time.

 

However, approaches are more than functional; they are psychological as well.  Maurice Chevalier, the French singer and actor who died in 1972, was once asked to explain the French practice of kissing friends of either sex on both cheeks.  “It is simply that we like to renew acquaintances,” replied Chevalier.  “We may kiss a man we haven’t seen for five years -- or a woman we haven’t seen for five minutes.”

 

There are not only functional and psychological approaches; there are a variety of spiritual approaches as well.  As a long-time fan of the novelist Chaim Potok, I have built up a fascination with the Hasidim of Brooklyn.  There live in Brooklyn two dominant sects of the ultra conservative Hasidic Jews -- the Lubavichers who make their home in Crown Heights and the Satmars who live in Williamsburg.  In outward appearance it would take a practiced eye to distinguish differences in the drab dress worn by both.  But there are other differences in their approach to their faith which have put them virtually at war with one another.  The one believes in the State of Israel while the other opposes it as an unworthy effort to preempt the purposes of God.

 

And these are only illustrations because we know there can be a variety of spiritual approaches.  This morning I want to consider with you how we approach what is perhaps the most universally sought after aspect of the spiritual life -- peace with God.

 

 

I.         There is Approach / Avoidance

 

Approach / avoidance is a psychological term used to describe something one may want very much but is afraid to try.  Peace with God is in that category.  It is something which according to George Gallup, Americans want more than anything else.  In an article in the New York Times, the Religion Editor writes, “Spirituality is what people want.  People are hungry for a direct relationship with God.”

 

But our approach / avoidance in this matter may be well illustrated by a criticism of Winston Churchill, who although he was a magnificent war leader, he failed to provide the country with the strong spiritual guidance some people felt it needed.  Churchill’s reaction:  “Since I became Prime Minister, I have appointed no fewer than six new bishops.  What more do they want?”

 

Another way of thinking of the approach / avoidance which we experience when we contemplate peace with God is set forth by sociologist, Allan Bloom who says, “The task is equivalent to squaring a circle.”

 

Our text this morning is taken from II Peter and places us right in the middle of this double bind.  “Do your utmost to be found at peace with him.”  The bind has to do with the fact that there is nothing we want more than to be found at peace with God.  But the question is always before us -- are we willing to do what is necessary in order to be found at peace with God?

 

We get the feeling that the task before us may be the true equivalent of “squaring a circle” when we read our Old Testament lesson from Isaiah, Chapter 40.  Those middle verses -- 4 and 5 -- are the source of our approach / avoidance.

 

We read them every year at this time with tongue in cheek and fingers crossed:  “Every valley shall be exalted and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.”

 

That is what peace looked like to the prophet Isaiah.  That is the vision which he held before his people during the time of their distress.

 

And the people of Israel were very receptive to this vision.  These words came at a turning point in their history.  Historians speak of it as the end of the Babylonian and the beginning of the Persian period.  For Israel it meant a release from captivity, an end to their exile, and a beginning of a benevolent period ruled by the Persian, Cyrus, who was considered tolerant and sensitive to religious difference.

 

The beginning of the chapter strikes a note of compassion and urgency.  This was a people who stood under the judgment of God and paid her dues -- “double for all her sins”.  But now her sins are forgiven and there is a new chance, a new opportunity to pursue the path of peace -- that path which will put her in harmony with the purposes of God.

 

But even then, the people who needed the comfort so desperately could not quite believe the vision.  And unless I terribly misread the degree of pragmatism which is present among us, even here at Westminster Presbyterian Church, there is considerable skepticism as to whether such a vision of peace can ever be achieved -- the achievement of perfect love and harmony among all people. 

 

II.     Approach Through Justice

 

That skepticism may increase when you hear what I believe is a second approach to peace with God.  Another approach to be made when we are doing our utmost to be found at peace with God is the approach through justice.  Let it be understood that this is not just one approach among many, but rather it is a key element of what any approach to God will look like.

 

Martin Luther once admonished those who got caught up in the tinsel and the trimmings of Christmas by attacking “hearers who cooed sentimentally over the infant Jesus and clucked over his poverty by saying, ‘If only I had been there; how quick I would have been to help the baby’.”  Luther retorted to these, “Why don’t you do it now?  You have Christ in your neighbor.”

 

My goal this morning is to focus on personal peace -- not to get our minds so cluttered with the problems of the world, and our hearts so frustrated by the lack of the solutions that we leave here this morning with something less than the comfort which the prophet Isaiah promised.

 

I really want nothing more than to be able to talk about personal peace this morning -- like that which a friend of mine experienced while being wheeled into the operating room in a life-and-death situation.  As he described it, a sense of euphoria came over him and he knew that whatever would happen, everything was going to okay -- he was at peace with God.

 

However, the danger of saying that all I want to talk about is personal peace is to give the impression that theologically we have a choice between what makes us feel good and a world where peace and justice prevail.  And I don’t believe that.

 

Scripturally, our only approach to personal peace is through justice.  We cannot have peace with God while ignoring human need.

 

God is not in the business of making us feel good just because we are believers.  This passage in II Peter is an advent passage.  It is a passage which has to do with waiting.  Waiting for the hungry to be fed, the homeless to be housed, and for the oppressed to know justice.

 

You see, sometimes when we are doing our utmost to be found at peace with God, it may merely mean that we are being good waiters.  The message in this passage is that God is always on time even though we may not know what time that is.  And because we don’t know what time that will be, what we do while we wait becomes important.  And for Isaiah what we do while waiting for the fulfillment of the vision is justice.

 

III.    Approach Through Imagination

 

The final approach to peace with God, which overcomes our instinctive avoidance and incorporates the proper concerns for justice without which there can be no peace, is the approach through imagination.

 

I submit to you that many of us do not have peace with God because we cannot imagine it.  We cannot imagine how the mountains will be made low and the crooked ways made straight.  We cannot imagine how God can work through a controversial war or a devastating hurricane any more than the people of ancient Israel could imagine how God could work through the pagan monarch, Cyrus of Persia, to deliver them from exile.  We cannot even imagine what personal peace might feel like in the midst of an uncertain economy or a business environment where having a job doesn’t represent the security it used to because any minute our wages can be cut, our health insurance can disappear, and pension benefits can vanish. 

 

Psychocybernetics is the science of imaging, which operates according to the hypothesis that imagination precedes reality.  According to Psychocybernetic research you have to be able to imagine it before you can achieve it.

 

When Peter urged, “Do your utmost to be found at peace with God,” that word “peace” flashed an image on the mental screen of the hearers.  Their image was a very personal one because it was an image of a person.  For them, peace originated and multiplied “in the knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ, our Lord”.

 

To be found at peace with God meant that Jesus Christ was at the center of one’s life and that is a matter of imagination.  There is that verse in Philippians, “Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus.”

 

As the song says, “Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me.”  With that prayer the issues of justice and personal serenity can never be divorced.  And so this Advent as we pray for peace, may God help us to imagine through the mind of Christ how we can develop approaches that will bring us closer to the kind of universal harmony God intends.

 

We’re waiting!  And we work while we wait until there is peace on earth and goodwill among all of God’s people.