To many, I am sure that living the questions is not helpful at all because the Thomas within us wants to know all and wants to control over the situation. We want to fix the problem and then move on. We don’t like staying in an uncomfortable circumstance. From this perspective, we tend to clarify between the good and the bad, the right and the wrong, and the white and the black, and choose either. Simply speaking, the only choice we are able to make is either we live for the world or against the world. When the university of Norte Dame has decided to have president Obama as a speaker for the commencement, our answer would be limited again in choosing for the liberal president or against him.
But the true Christian spirit doesn’t go with that. When we talk about the salvation of Jesus Christ, does he mean to condemn the world and save us from it? In fact, the coming of Christ into our midst is a regular happening in the world. It is the first day of the week, that is, Sunday when Jesus is with the disciples. When they gather, he gathers with them. He is not there physically because the doors were locked. He is in the midst of the disciples, emerging from within, as the communication of deep peace. The peace that Jesus gives us is the fulfillment of his promise. “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid” (John 14:27).
Let’s think about the different peace the world promises. It is the security of one moment that is replaced by the anxiety of the next moment. The world cannot sustain an abiding peaceful presence. Yet that is precisely how Jesus sees himself, an abiding presence that transcends the chaos of the world. Jesus does not stop that. I say it again: Jesus does not stop that. Rather he is present within the world, calming and untroubling the heart, bringing peace to the world.
In Jesus’ final prayer before his death, he said, “Now I am coming to you, Father. I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely. I gave them your word, and the world hated them, because they do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world but that you keep them from the evil one. They do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. Consecrate them in the truth. Your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world” (John 17:13-19).
So when Jesus is with his disciples, he says, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” We are sent into the world with the peace of Christ to do the special mission, that is, to forgive those who against us. As St. Paul assures, we are victors over the world, neither for the world nor against the world but with the world. Jesus doesn’t promise to take us out of the world. Rather he promises to be with us, keeping us from the evil one that tempts us to separate the good from the bad, the right from the wrong, and the just from the unjust by promoting illusion, hatred and violence in which we couldn’t find the true peace. The first Christian community didn’t hate the world, being faithful to their duty and responsibility. Rather, they shared and celebrated what was right with the world because they knew they didn’t belong to the world. The world was not an archenemy but a good friend through which they tasted the kingdom of heaven and longed for it on earth.
Once we truly accept the peace with the world and live it out with unsolved questions, we are no longer afraid of anything and anyone because Jesus’ peace casts out fear and that brings about the joy and peace the first Christian community had lived out.