The Peacemakers

The Peacemakers
By M.T. Clark — P-2088 | 10/07/2026 – Today’s Audio Podcast
Today’s Message on YouTube:

Today’s photo of a towering maple tree in full autumn color and a dark-leafed tree faded underneath, standing over a quiet residential street with a white house and picket fence behind, comes to us from yours truly, as I captured this ordinary morning scene while walking down Haskell Avenue in Glens Falls, NY, on October 3, 2026.

Well, it’s Wednesday, and I share this photo of a mountain of a maple tree to mark another midweek summit, so happy hump day, and to say that the Lord puts beauty in ordinary neighborhoods for the people who are willing to notice.

God is called the God of peace more than two dozen times in Scripture, and that name tells us something about how He goes about His work in us. Peace is not a mood He gives us when things are quiet and takes back when things get hard. It is a settled condition that He builds into His children over years, often while the circumstances around them are anything but quiet. Today’s photo is striking because it has three seasons visible at once: there is a maple tree showing a bright peak of orange, red, and yellow leaves, displaying autumn, and green leaves on the edges still holding on from summer; and a tree below the maple with brown leaves already fading toward winter. Walking with the Lord often looks like that. Different parts of our lives are in different seasons, but His peace can run through all of them, if we stay in His presence.

If you would like to seek the Lord’s presence and are in the Capital District, our Celebrate Freedom support group meets tonight at Starpoint Church. If you are carrying something that is costing you your peace, we would love to walk with you through it.

Our series, “The Beatitudes,” continues today with Jesus’s word for the peacemakers.

The Peacemakers

In Matthew 5:9 (NKJV), Jesus proclaims: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.” Jesus is identifying a family resemblance. The people who make peace look like their Heavenly Father, because peace is what He does.

Jesus is not blessing people who avoid conflict. Avoiding conflict is called peacekeeping.  When you keep the peace, you do your best to manage the tension but cannot necessarily heal the issues causing the tension.

Jesus is also not blessing people who pretend the problem isn’t there and call that forgiveness. That is called “peace-faking”, and it keeps people walking on eggshells and costs the relationship its honesty. “Peace-Fakers” smooth over problems because the peace they have is tenuous and can be lost in an instant if they should do or say something that would upset the person they “have peace with”.

Jesus is blessing the peacemakers, which is a different thing entirely. The peacemaker walks toward the trouble on purpose, tells the truth about it kindly, and pays whatever it costs to put something broken back together.

That is what God Himself did for us. Paul tells us in Colossians 1:20 (NKJV) that it pleased the Father to reconcile all things to Himself, “having made peace through the blood of His cross.” God did not keep the peace from a distance. He made it. He did not pretend the sin was not there. He paid for it with His Son’s blood. That is what real peacemaking cost, and it is the standard that Jesus is pointing us to.

Peace with God has to come first. Paul writes in Romans 5:1 (NKJV) that “having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” When we put our faith in Jesus, the war between us and God is over. It is settled. It is paid for. When a person actually believes this about himself, he becomes very hard to upset, because what most people are fighting to protect is already secure with them. Their standing with God is settled and secure.

When we receive God’s peace, we are to spread it to others.  In 2 Corinthians 5:18 (NKJV), Paul writes that God “has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.” Peacemaking is not a spiritual gift that some believers have and some don’t. It is given to all of us. The Father reconciles us, and then He calls us to do the work of reconciling others.

Three things make up the peacemaker’s work.

First, we are to bring people to peace with God by introducing them to Jesus. That is the deepest reconciliation there is, and every other kind of peace rests on top of it.

Second, we are to go directly to the person we are in conflict with. Most conflicts in our churches and homes get worse because no one attempts to make peace. Peacemakers go to the person, not around them.

Third, we tell the truth kindly. Peace built on a lie will not hold, and silence in the face of a wrong is not a gift to anyone. The peacemaker speaks what is true in a way that honors the person hearing it.

Peace takes two people, of course, and we can only control one of them – us. Some relationships will not come together no matter how faithfully we do our part. Our responsibility is to do our part to make peace and to leave the outcome with God. Refusing to try is disobedience. Not being able to make peace with everyone is not failure. But we have to try to bring God’s peace wherever we go.

May the God of peace Himself help you to be a peacemaker today, and may the people in your life see whose family you belong to.

Every step we take toward the Lord is a step in the right direction. So, keep on walking and talking with God.

— M.T.

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“The views, opinions, and commentary of this publication are those of the author, M.T. Clark, only, and do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of any of the photographers, artists, ministries, or other authors of the other works that may be included in this publication, and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of any entities the author may represent.”

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