3.0 out of 5 stars
A worthy resource on biblical peacemaking
Reviewed in the United States on April 10, 2007
The author, Ken Sande, is an attorney and president of Peacemaker Ministries. His book, Peacemaker, is an anchor book in a growing product line of resource materials and an associated mini-industry focused on biblical peacemaking. It is designed to help readers "turn conflict into an opportunity to strengthen relationships, preserve valuable resources, and make their lives a testimony to the love and power of Christ."
HIGHLIGHTS:
Sande's approach to biblical peacemaking can be summarized as the "Four G's:" (1) glorify God, (2) get the log out of your eye, (3) gently restore, and (4) go and be reconciled. The need is international. Peacemaking does not come naturally in any culture. All people, regardless of nationality, normally respond to conflict in two ways: (1) attack and (2) escape. Each response comes in degrees. Escape may be manifested in increasing levels of intensity by denial, flight, or suicide. Attack may appear as assault, litigation, or murder. Interestingly, the extremes of both responses end in death -- i.e., murder and suicide.
Sande argues for a middle way -- the biblical way. The escape response focuses on the self -- on the "me" of conflict. The best it can achieve is "peace-faking." The attack response centers on the antagonist -- on the "you" of conflict. It is "peace-breaking." The biblical way, in contrast, is concerned about the relationship -- on the "us" of conflict. It is "peacemaking." Peacemaking is positive, fruitful. The more a person strays from peacemaking into peace-faking or peace-breaking, the more costly the negative outcomes become.
Conflict has four sources: (1) miscommunication, (2) differing values, (3) scarce resources, and (4) sin. The first three sources are aggravated by the latter. The latter, in turn, is fueled by the idolatry that fills the human heart. Constant attention is needed to root it out.
The way a person deals with conflict reveals what he or she thinks about God. People who believe God is sovereign and good have more options in dealing with conflict than those who do not. Christians are able to view conflict as being rich with opportunities for glorifying God, for serving others, and for personal growth. God therefore calls Christians to be good stewards of conflict.
The peace that comes from peacemaking has three dimensions: (1) peace with God, (2) peace with others, and (3) peace with self. Even those who have no interest in peace with God or with others are still interested in peace with themselves. Therein lies an opportunity for peacemaking even with unlikely candidates.
Churches have a neglected role in peacemaking and are able to achieve positive results that are difficult or impossible to obtain in legal channels. Legal proceedings cannot get at underlying problems and may actually make them worse. Churches, on the other hand, can address issues earlier, bring a wider variety of resources to bear on conflicts, and work out more complete and effective solutions than the legal system. Unfortunately, most churches lack faith in the power of biblical peacemaking. Sande calls for a stepwise evolution of peacemaking within churches from a culture of disbelief to a culture of faith, to a culture of transformation, to a culture of peace, and finally to a culture of multiplication.
Most of Peacemaker is devoted to technique. Although he doesn't say it explicitly, Sande obviously sees proper technique as critical to peacemaking. Knowing what, when, why, and how to overlook, confront, defer, forgive, apologize, confess, and refer offenses can make the difference between success and failure.
COMMENTS:
Biblical techniques and procedures for peacemaking face the constant risk of deteriorating into the same legalities, technicalities, and loopholes that characterize secular justice systems. In general, Peacemaker avoids those problems fairly well. Appendix D, however, is disturbing in its discussion of disputes involving members of two different churches. In that place, readers are advised that if (1) an injured party appeals to his or her church leaders, who (2) in turn, appeal to the leaders of the offending party's church, who (3) in turn, rebuff the injured party's leaders, then (4) the injured party's church should respond by not treating the offending party's church as a true church, which would (5) make the provisions of 1 Corinthians 6 inapplicable to the case at hand since (6) 1 Corinthians 6 applies only to a true church, which would (7) allow the injured party to go to court, but only if (8) the other two conditions cited in chapter 9 are satisfied. A few sentences later, Appendix D also advises injured parties to consider moving to other congregations if their church leaders refuse to take up their disputes involving members of other churches. Altogether, it is hard to imagine anything sounding less promising in terms of peacemaking -- and more importantly, less Christian. In the space of only a few paragraphs, the author finds acceptable (1) the possibility of individual conflicts cascading into the excommunication of entire churches and (2) the idea of individual Christians standing in judgment of their congregations with the intent of breaking fellowship if church leaders fail to make the "right" decision. Couple this with the five-page peacemaker checklist in Appendix A and the risk of the peacemaker program fueling the very things it seeks to extinguish becomes apparent. Perhaps peacemaking itself can become an idol with destructive consequences.
Another point worth noting is use of scripture. Sande "proof texts" his message almost to the point of distraction. As with most "proof texting," however, some of the citations have little direct connection to the points being made. Some are simply props that would be better characterized as illustrations rather than as "the Bible teaches."[1] All of this goes to provenance. It is clear that Peacemaker is an assimilation of secular wisdom to scripture rather than a product of scripture alone. That is not a bad thing. It just explains why most of the points in the book can be found in secular literature on interpersonal relations.
As a whole, Peacemaker has something of a "tipsy coachmen" quality to it -- i.e., it may arrive at the right destination (conclusion), but it sometimes gets there in a strained way. A better theological grounding would help.[2] The book's theodicy of suffering is too shallow.[3] Its theology of the church is too low.[4] Its individualistic, existential treatment of scripture is anachronistic.[5] Right now, it is mostly a rosy "God loves you and wants you to prosper; here are the rules for prosperity; go follow these rules and prosper" kind of optimism more characteristic of Proverbs than of Job and Ecclesiastes.[6]
Preceding comments notwithstanding, Peacemaker is a worthy resource on biblical peacemaking. It champions a much-neglected quality of the church and suggests a vision that many churches ought to find attractive. The techniques it recommends are grounded in solid wisdom and will improve life and ministry for anyone who puts them into practice. In the meantime, its teachings on Christian conduct, attitudes, temptations, priorities, problems, strengths and weaknesses can bless readers well beyond the relatively narrow topic of peacemaking.
-- Bill Brewer
NOTES:
[1] Take page 93 for example concerning Paul's assertion of his rights as a Roman citizen in the Book of Acts. It is hard to believe Luke, or the Holy Spirit for that matter, had Sande's points in mind when Luke wrote his account.
[2] We forgive others not because it is good for us or them -- we forgive because it is the nature of God to forgive.
[3] Resisting evil attempts to avoid suffering -- overcoming evil with good requires it. If conflict is to be redemptive, it will require suffering.
[4] Christians are peacemakers because they are citizens of the peaceable kingdom -- the church.
[5] Take page 165 for example. Note the typical use of James 1:19, not in its original context of people being quick to anger in response to the preached Word of God, but in the context of being quick to anger in their interpersonal communications. The primacy of the church is set aside in preference for primacy of the individual.
[6] Sande has a total of nine quotes from Job and Ecclesiastes compared to 55 from Proverbs.
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