“The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver's seat.
The revolution will not be televised”
(The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, Gil Scott-Heron 1971)
Scott-Heron wrote this after the end of the 1960’s, a decade which had seen a lot of hope for change, for equality and for peace. He was reflecting on how that hope could lead to real change, and with a degree of frustration that the peace movement had become commercialised. True change, he says, will not be brought about by corporations, institutions, the media or by celebrities, but rather through a change in one’s own mind and actions. The challenge is to not be an observer, glued to the screen waiting for others more powerful or influential to make the changes we all need, for those with cultural and institutional power to make the world a better place. That change will only happen, he says, when ordinary people are prepared to get behind the wheel.
Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.”
Peace is an action, it is not what is left when the noise stops.
Peace is a choice, it will not materialise miraculously from nowhere.
Peace is a struggle for change, not a passive acceptance of what is.
Peace must be made by the willing and the heartbroken.
Peace must be built by lives of grace and determination.
Peace must be grown from deliberate acts of mercy and justice.
Blessed are the peacemakers.
(Mark Berry 2019)
What might it mean to be an active peacemaker in our world today? What might action look like for you, where you are?
As you pray during this season of rebirth and change, ask God to give you a greater understanding of what it means to be truly blessed. Pray that you would look for ways to make peace in the situations you face. Pray that being a child of God would lead you to being a peacemaker where you live and in the world. Pray that your life would be an example to others as they seek peace in their life and community.