Now in our GOSPEL today, from John, chapter 14, Jesus is saying “GOODBYE” to his disciples.  But unlike you and me, he REALLY MEANS IT!  Listen:  “PEACE I leave with you; MY PEACE I give to you.  I do NOT give to you as THE WORLD gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.”


    Think with me for a moment of the HIGH COST of God’s peace.  Real DIVINE peace is costly, FIRST OF ALL, because it’s far MORE than just the absence of WAR or of CONFLICT.  NO!  In the Bible God’s “peace,” or SHALOM, ALWAYS stands for true JOY DESPITE our sorrows, true HAPPINESS DESPITE our disappointments, true HEALTH  DESPITE  our pain and sickness, and  eternal LIFE DESPITE the death that surrounds us and through which each of us must eventually pass!  THAT’S no bargain-basement, generic, dime-a-dozen brand of peace!  It’s expensive peace!

    Ask any elementary school teacher:  it’s fairly easy to keep a bully from beating up a smaller boy (or girl) on the playground at recess.  With tough enough punishment you can even make that bully think twice before picking on someone again. But for that teacher (or anyone else) to uncover what makes that boy or girl a bully is terribly costly.  To change the bully’s pattern of behavior takes loads of time and patience and understanding and counseling and (yes) prayer!

    Ask any police officer:  it’s fairly easy, when the neighbors frantically phone at two in the morning, to ask you to come stop a domestic disturbance — what they call on the police radio (I believe) a “10-16” --  it’s fairly easy for the officer to stop a violent fight between husband and wife or between a parent and an older child.  But to get to the root of that troubled marriage, that troubled teen and parent, to bring about real reconciliation between those members of the family, would be terribly costly.

    Ask former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, or present Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and the Pentagon:  it’s fairly easy for the world’s richest and most powerful nation, armed with the most advanced weapons of warfare, to invade a Middle Eastern state, overrun it in little more than a week, and topple its leadership.  But, once that’s done, once you’ve supposedly won the war and jubilantly declared victory, once your troops have BEEN in Iraq for over SEVEN LONG YEARS, how in the world do you win the PEACE?   How in the world, given the deplorable, centuries-old record of mutual hatred and atrocity and colonial imperial arrogance and brutality and mutual prejudice between the so-called “Christian” and the Islamic peoples — HOW IN THE WORLD does one go about WINNING THE PEACE in Pakistan, in Afghanistan, in Iran, in Israel, Gaza, the West Bank — in the whole Middle East?    That kind of peace, if it’s even possible any more, will be terribly COSTLY.  TRUE peace, GOD’S peace, always is!

    And, friends, think with me IN THE SECOND PLACE, of how much Jesus paid to give you and me his peace!  “Peace I leave with you!” he cries.  “My peace I give to you.”  --Tell me, just where is Jesus when he utters these words?  Do you know?  -- One is tempted to think it’s when our risen Lord, victorious over death, is about to ascend triumphantly into heaven.  After all, this past Thursday, May 13th, was Ascension Day, 40 days after Easter.  But if you think he’s speaking after Easter, you’re wrong!  Jesus here is with his disciples at the Last Supper, of all occasions!  Yes, he’s sitting on Death Row!  And the Governor has said, ‘NO!” –- No last-minute reprieves for Jesus.  The next morning is execution day.  And yet even here, and at this moment, CHRIST GIVES US HIS GIFT OF PEACE!

    SOME folks would call him crazy.  But here, in this very Upper Room (Death Row) he shows us FOR ALL TIME the PATH to TRUE peace.  For, you see, here in John’s Gospel he’s just finished girding himself with a towel and stooping down and washing the disciples’ feet!  And Jesus has declared to them (and to YOU and ME), “If I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.  For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.”

    Yes, loving SERVICE and CONCERN and acts of MERCY and JUSTICE for others — the path to TRUE peace!  It cost Jesus EVERYTHING!  In the words of First Peter, “You were ransomed . . . not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.”

    And, friends, God sends you and me out, as individuals and as congregations to shed our own blood, if necessary, to bring God’s peace to others!  This brings me to my third and last point: the high cost of peace TO THOSE OF US WHO FOLLOW JESUS!  Listen again to our Lord’s words here:  “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.  I DO NOT GIVE TO YOU AS THE WORLD GIVES.”

    Whatever does he mean?  What kind of peace does “the world” offer? — or, rather, claim to offer?  --  The illusory peace of escape!  The seductive peace of avoiding reality, as if that were really possible!   The pseudo-peace of trying to ignore trouble in hopes that it will go away!

    But the peace our SAVIOR CHRIST promises us, though precious and real, nevertheless, is costly.  It’s a peace that challenges us not to escape reality, but to CONFRONT it at its very WORST—and to OVERCOME and TRANSFORM it through his Resurrection power!

    You know, without a doubt, the most beautiful and Christ-centered creed in our Presbyterian Book of Confessions is the “Heidelberg Catechism,” written in 1563 —447 years ago— but as up-to-date as this morning’s newspaper!  And Question and Answer One of that catechism describe the glorious but costly peace God wants you and me to enjoy.  Listen.  Here’s the question:  “What is your only comfort in life and in death?”

    And the answer RINGS! – “That I belong, body and soul, in life and in death, not to myself, but to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ, who at the cost of his own blood has bully paid for all my sins, and has completely freed me from the dominion of the devil; that he protects me so well that, without the will of my Father in heaven, not a hair can fall from my head—indeed, that everything must fit his purpose for my salvation.  Therefore, by his Holy Spirit, he also assures me of eternal life, and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready, from now on, to live for him.”

    In all honesty, most of us don’t know that kind of peace, do we? We don’t know it because we’re seeking our peace somewhere else than in Christ.  In fact, Allen Verhey, the Reformed Church theologian, in a book of commentary on the “Heidelberg Catechism,” declares that many of us seem to answer Question One this way:  “My only comfort is my economic security and standard of living, which I achieve by hard work, friendliness, sharp business dealing, letting the buyer beware.  It fully pays for all my gadgets—or almost all, anyway.  I believe it is better to be young than old, rich than poor, white than black, American than anything else.  I believe it is best to be comfortable.  Oh yes, I believe in God, the kind, modern father who helps those who help themselves and blesses diligence and America; and in Jesus, who promises to take care of my soul when I die.”

    But, friends, God’s peace, real peace, is COSTLY!  To know it means TOTALLY to belong to Christ!  And that’s a risky business — at least from the world’s point of view!  Yes, it’s scary to work for peace in your marriage and in your home — for that means facing reality — and exposing yourself to possible hurt.  It means having to learn to trust someone other than yourself.  But only such a risk will bring true happiness to your home!

    It’s scary to work for peace in the church — for someone may accuse you of rocking the boat.  But when you join a Presbyterian congregation, you promise “to further the church’s purity and peace.”

    It’s scary to work for peace and justice in the world.  You may be totally misunderstood.  You may be labeled a do-gooder.  A bleeding-heart.  Unpatriotic.  But, frankly, today you and I have no choice but so to work for peace—unless all earth, including the U.S.A., descend into barbarism, terrorism, madness, darkness.

    Yes, the HIGH COST of peace—in your life, in your home, your church, the world!  But how precious God’s peace, in Christ, is!

 PRAYERS:
    O Lord, Jesus Christ, how costly was the peace you purchased for us through your Cross!  In your mercy, cause us, your adopted children, to hear and answer your call to be peacemakers ourselves.  Make us fearless of the high cost of our calling!  Give us your own courage and strength.

    We remember today, O God, all peoples and nations scarred by warfare and strife —particularly Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, the Gaza Strip, Israel, Iran, Thailand, and other places where conflict seems to prevail — and, here at home, in communities where hopelessness has taken hold.  Let your strong peace overcome all strife, and nations beat nuclear weapons into ambulances and tanks and Humvees into container ships filled with grain.  Grant that we may work for peace in our congregations and hometowns, as well.

    Healing Lord, we now lift before you the sick.  Deliver those who, in this service this morning, may be suffering in any way.  Give to all your hurting children hope for the future, in Christ, and surround them with your love.

    Finally, with thanksgiving we remember before you those of our brothers and sisters who have gone ahead of us into your perfect and eternal peace.  Keep us aware of the bonds of fellowship that continue to bind us to them, until we, too, join them in your presence.

    For we make these and ALL our prayers in Christ’s holy name.  AMEN.