By Kevin Wiebe
Most of us don’t think of peacemaking as an endeavour we would call “fun.” It is hard, messy and difficult work. There is, however, a strategic element of peacemaking that includes an intentional focus on shared recreational activities.
By Kevin Wiebe
I believe that any path that leads to true peace must be based on the truth. One cannot fully reconcile with someone else without acknowledging and repenting of the ways one has wronged the other. Part of being made right with God involves acknowledging the truth of our own sinful ways.
By Kevin Wiebe
“I don’t have many friends because most people think I’m a jerk.”
I was a bit taken aback by the surprisingly blunt way my new neighbour introduced himself. I casually but curiously responded by saying, “Oh? Why is that?” Continue reading Separating Identity and Ideas
By Kevin Wiebe
Any one of us can take a quick look around us and realize that our world is full of conflict, darkness and pain. Beyond that, and perhaps as a result of that, I also believe that we all have a deep ache within our souls that longs for complete peace, for the blissful and eternal reign of God, who will remove all of our suffering and crying and pain. So what are some of the reasons there is such a need for peace in our world? Continue reading Our Profound Need for Peace
By Kevin Wiebe
Are we peace makers or peace fakers? There are times when, instead of doing the hard work of reconciliation and peacemaking, we sweep problems under the rug and equate a lack of outright confrontation with peace. When we fake peace, however, we may prolong the pain of the conflict, preventing the needed resolution because of our unwillingness to be brave and confront what is wrong. Continue reading Peace Makers or Peace Fakers?
By Kevin Wiebe
Backwater hicks. Rednecks. Trash. Uneducated hillbillies. I have heard all these labels and more applied to people in rural areas. People dismissed simply because of their postal code.
Having spent most of my life in small towns and rural areas, I have come to love living close to nature, to farms, open fields and big skies. When I think of the many farmers I have known, there is a deeply profound wisdom that comes from their lives.
Most of the farmers I have known are simple and beautiful people. They work hard, they love their families, and they enjoy their lives and work. Due to the nature of farming, many live in rural areas near their fields and animals.
For many, their day-to-day work isn’t lived in a metropolis surrounded by thousands of people and their varying opinions. As such, given that they don’t have to watch urban homelessness every day or deal with sub-par public transportation, it can seem like they are ignorant of those matters that mean a great deal to a lot of people. So these lovely farmers get dismissed as being as unknowledgeable just because their field of knowledge is different than others. And it is true that some might remark, “I don’t know about all of that stuff” and then go back to work planting their fields or harvesting their crops.
And this really is my point. They get back to work doing what they know they should. Our polarized world has a tendency to spend a lot of time talking, debating, arguing and fighting. We try to figure everything out, to understand it all, to defend our positions and convince everyone else to be like us. We debate back and forth about the minutia of politics and ideologies and spend time endlessly quarrelling over debatable things. But what if we set aside so many of those squabbles and simply got back to the work that we know we should be doing? To loving God and loving others, to being a good neighbour, to living honestly and being kind?
Ecclesiastes 11:4–6 (NLT) says, “Farmers who wait for perfect weather never plant. If they watch every cloud, they never harvest. Just as you cannot understand the path of the wind or the mystery of a tiny baby growing in its mother’s womb, so you cannot understand the activity of God, who does all things. Plant your seed in the morning and keep busy all afternoon, for you don’t know if profit will come from one activity or another—or maybe both.”
No matter if we are urban or rural, a farmer or a philanthropist, none of us will know everything, and if we wait to do what we know is right until all the conditions are perfect, we will never do anything. So let’s take a lesson from the farmer. You don’t have to know everything, and you don’t need to understand or be right about everything in order to follow God. Let’s get back to work.
By Kevin Wiebe
Often in life the things that we focus on are not the most helpful things. In the midst of conflict this happens frequently and is extremely difficult to avoid.
There are three notable things that are helpful to differentiate when we are seeking to make peace with someone. The first is the words or actions that are the source of the conflict. The second are the motives behind those words or actions, and the third is the impact of those words/actions. Continue reading How Dare You Break My Mug!
By Kevin Wiebe
We have all experienced it. We trusted someone, believed in them, and made ourselves vulnerable in some way to their choices—and they let us down. This, of course, is painful. When it happens enough times, or when the pain is severe enough, it causes us to question whether we can even continue having this relationship. Continue reading When Trust Was Broken
by Kevin Wiebe
“Problems can be solved, conflicts can be resolved, but polarization can only be managed.”
This phrase resonated with me as the instructor began her lecture about the nature of polarization. As she unpacked this sentence for the class, the wisdom in it became even more profound. Continue reading Either/Or
by Kevin Wiebe
Things were going just fine, or so you thought. Sure, it wasn’t perfect, but what is? Then out of nowhere what you thought was going well just turned out to have been naive optimism, and now you get to be the next person to take your turn going for a ride on the conflict carousel. You don’t know what to do and you could use some advice, but you truly love the people you are in conflict with and don’t want to be spreading gossip about them. And, yet, you feel that if there is any hope for things to get better you will need to talk to someone. So, what do you do? How do you involve someone without becoming a gossip? Continue reading Getting Help Without Being a Gossip
