Peace Is a Choice

Thoughts for the second Sunday of Advent.

I’ve come to realize that peace is a choice. It’s not something that will chase you down and beg you to notice it. It’s more like a big, flat rock at the perfect spot on the trail, offering you a place to rest.

Last week, a woman from Israel visited our church. Inge has spent decades ministering to Holocaust survivors, cleaning their homes, taking them to doctor visits, and providing other needs. Through her faithful service, she became their friend, and a number of them even call her their mother (even though they are much older than she is).

There were several things about her story that have been echoing in my mind this week, and I’d like to share some of them with you today.

Inge went to Israel as a young woman and a new Christian. As a German, she felt extreme guilt over what her country had done to the Jewish people. She was filled with an overwhelming need to serve the ones who lost so much.

She arrived in Israel with a backpack and very little money. She slept in people’s homes for a while, then would move to a new place, as needed. She would clean houses to make money to support herself, then cleaned and served the Holocaust survivors for free.

She was a foreign woman in a country that distrusted people like her.

She had very little money and no home—she was essentially homeless, but didn’t live in a defeated way.

She was so consumed with her purpose—her calling—that things like food, clothing, and shelter became incidental.

If I were to send my daughter to a foreign country, I’d want to know that she had a safe place to stay, plenty of money, and a solid plan. Yet this was not what God wrote for Inge. Instead, He told her to go, and to trust Him. And she did. And she continues to do so.

She has been ministering in Israel for thirty-seven years and has served hundreds of Holocaust survivors. Her diligence, friendship, and faithfulness led them to petition the government to make her an Israeli citizen. They were successful. It’s important to note that it’s nearly impossible for a foreigner to become an Israeli citizen—especially a German.

While Inge was at our church, she talked about a few different survivors she knew.

One saw the smoke rising from the chimney as her parents burned inside, then learned her brother was burned alive in a barn. Many others lost their entire families and left the concentration camps alone. After the war, troubles still came—they had no assets, nowhere to go, and no one to advocate for them.

The loss, the tragedy, and the trauma these people lived through should have rendered them incapable of normal life. But that’s not their story. She said they are some of the most joyful, peaceful people. They don’t harbor bitterness or resentment. They are grateful for each day—for the things they have, and for the blessings God has given them after enduring such horrors.

Someone asked Inge how the Holocaust survivors manage to be joyful, after living through circumstances that are beyond most of our imaginations. Today’s world would tell them they had every reason to be bitter and broken for the rest of their lives. She thought for a moment, and then said that peace is a decision they make. Every day they say, “Today, I will have peace. Yes, those awful things happened. But I will live today, and I will have peace.”

Peace is a choice. The world gives us so many ways to abandon it—a driver cutting you off in traffic, the ever-alarming news, financial uncertainty, health trials. When we’re rattled, let that be a queue to practice choosing peace. If the people who lived through the Holocaust can enjoy God’s peace—His perfect peace that transcends understanding—so can we.

During a particularly stressful time, I stumbled across Colossians 3:15: Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful.

The word that struck me that day was “let.” We have to LET the peace of Christ rule our hearts. It’s a choice. And the fact that God offers us that peace when we decide to pick it up is an amazing thing to celebrate at Christmastime.

---

Inge was interviewed by Pastor Allen last weekend, and you can see her interviews on the World Outreach Church YouTube channel. She had different things to say at the Saturday and Sunday services, and it’s worth watching both.