Short Prayers? So, what about peace? Peace on Earth? World peace? Peace of mind? Eternal peace?
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.” (Matthew 5:9)
Wars and Rumors of Wars
Wars. Terrorism. Rumors of wars. Rumors of terrorism. So, what’s new? (Mark 13).
The daily sense of dis-ease the world felt in the wake of what happened on September 11, 2001. This was followed in 2012 by the Pakistan raid and the death of Osama bin Laden, the 9/11 mastermind. Even after bin Laden’s death, international anxiety still gripped us until war broke out in eastern Europe in 2022.
The mind of Vladimir Putin grips us too
This ever present threat of terrorism or war reminds me of a precious moment some years ago, before the fall of the Berlin Wall. It was about five o’clock one afternoon in 1987—during the cold war between the U.S. and the then Soviet Union. The deeply dug Moscow subway was crowded. My two friends and I could not find a seat, so we stood. As the underground train started and stopped, our bodies listed first one way and the next.
Watching all of this was an elderly man seated in front of us. Had he looked directly forward his eyes would have fixed on our belt buckles. But his face was lifted and he was studying our countenances.
”Sprechen Sie deutsch?” he querried, giving evidence that he knew we were foreigners and not Russians.
I responded by talking to him in German. I could see he was not understanding what I was trying to say. Evidently the phrase, “sprechen Sie deutch,” is something he just heard somewhere and memorized. He interrupted and tried again in his own language, but I could not understand Russian. I heard the word “American” and responded with an affirmative head-shaking. This only encouraged what was becoming his obvious passion to communicate.
Through gyrations and contortions of his body he made it clear where he stood on international politics. “War, No! Peace, Yes!” This message was accompanied by symbolic handshakes and physical gestures of unity. His hand went from his heart to my heart and back again. The visible commitment to peace through friendship was driving this man. I speculated in my own mind: Could this fellow have been a soldier during the Second War, perhaps fighting on the German front? Might he have witnessed the devastation which left twenty million Russian casualties? He looked to me to be about the right age.
The other Soviet citizens riding in the subway car would have nothing to do with this peace-nick kook. They buried their heads in newspapers or scanned the diminished horizon in other directions. He was a loner, to be sure.
In time, our stop was being anticipated and we began the good-bye process. Tears came to his eyes. From his lap he took the bouquet of flowers—probably purchased previously for a spouse or daughter—and gave it to the one woman American in our party. We all hugged and departed.
The whole incident lasted only a quarter hour. Would that it could last a century. Beginning today. Everywhere in the world!
PRAYER
Heavenly Father, whose son is the Prince of peace, grant us peace on earth. Amen.
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Ted Peters is a Lutheran pastor and emeritus seminary professor. He is author of Short Prayers and The Cosmic Self. His one volume systematic theology is now in its 3rd edition, God—The World’s Future (Fortress 2015). He has undertaken a thorough examination of the sin-and-grace dialectic in two works, Sin: Radical Evil in Soul and Society (Eerdmans 1994) and Sin Boldly! (Fortress 2015). Watch for his forthcoming, The Voice of Public Christian Theology (ATF 2022). See his website: TedsTimelyTake.com.
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