Kids start learning long division in 4th-5th grade. This is also around the same time many of them will learn about even longer divisions that apply to our world. Maybe that’s when they realize that not all clothes are equally fashionable or that not all jobs pay equally well.
Maybe that’s when they become aware of racial divisions, political divisions, even religious and denominational divisions.
Kids have been learning division since way before us. Even the Christmas story is set against a backdrop of divisions. The first couple chapters in Luke’s Gospel mention groups in bitter rivalry: the humble servant and the proud ruler (1:51-52), the hungry and the rich (1:53), the conquered nation and the conquering empire (2:1-3), Israel’s North-South rivalry of Galilee and Judea (2:4), the temple authorities and the religious outsiders (shepherds).
Into this darkness and division exploded a terrifying burst of light. It turns out it was just one angel. Soon, the entire sky lit up with a whole army of them—what the Bible calls a “heavenly host.” Suddenly, Rome versus Israel and Judea versus Galilee must have felt as unimportant as Packers versus Bears, the moment you realize the nation is under nuclear attack. Those prior divisions would have fled from mind as the onlookers realized they were witnessing an angelic invasion from an infinitely more powerful dimension.
Yet the heavenly army came announcing—not war—but peace! “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests” (Luke 2:14, NIV).
Whatever our visions of progress and versions of paradise, the highest heaven was offering us peace.
“Whatever our visions of progress and versions of paradise, the highest heaven was offering us peace.”
Is that offer still on the table this many centuries later? If so, and if we surrender to this highest peace, what does it look like to be people of peace in a divided world?
We refuse to be lulled back into a night defined by external divisions and internal anxieties. If we are willing, Christmas bursts the night with news that our scariest battles—with sin, death, and the Devil—are waiting to be won by God Himself. Longstanding enmities with our neighbors who vote differently can be the next domino to fall. Now that we are given peace with God, we do with peace what we do with all the gifts God gives (love, forgiveness, truth, kindness): we pass it on to others.
Did you know that Jesus’ hometown tried to toss Him off a cliff the first time He preached there? It was largely because of two words He uttered in their synagogue. They smiled and nodded throughout His sermon—until He got to the history lesson about how God had done things for both Sidon and Syria. “All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this. They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff” (Luke 4:28-29, NIV). A night sky crisscrossed by divisions is easier on the eyes than the burst of light announcing peace.
“A night sky crisscrossed by divisions is easier on the eyes than the burst of light announcing peace.”
Yet the peace spread. Within a few years after Jesus’ crucifixion—the death that brought us peace—it could be said, “Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all” (Colossians 3:11, NIV). Dare we hope the peace could branch even into the divisions in our churches, even among Democrats and Republicans, MAGA and moderates? If Jesus’ extended arms can bring together Jews and Gentiles, Greeks and barbarians, surely He can reconcile political opponents in our churches today. 
People in your church have likely been discipled by their preferred media into a predictable cycle of us-versus-them anxiety and rage. They need heaven’s peace. They need to renew their allegiance to the Kingdom that spreads globally, lasts eternally, and pierces our nights with peace.
This peace isn’t just a subjective experience. If we lean back and scan the big picture, we’ll see Jesus enacting a much bigger plan than helping us feel good about a bad situation. He fully planned to change the situation.
Maybe you’ve been to a Christian wedding in which the officiator says something like, “By attending the wedding in Cana, Jesus sanctified and honored the institution of marriage.” The idea is that Jesus honors and sanctifies what He enters.
And what did Jesus enter at Christmas? In the Incarnation, Jesus entered human history. Our religion isn’t like Buddhism, in which the teacher teaches how to transcend and escape human history. Rather, God entered history in Jesus and began a grand project of renovation and restoration.
“The idea is that Jesus honors and sanctifies what He enters.”
In divisive times, we need reminded of who entered history and guides it toward His desired end. It’s true on a personal level, in which “God works [all things] for the good of those who love him” (Romans 8:28, NIV). And it’s true on a global scale, for whatever the geopolitical experts predict, the book that counts ends with the Lamb on the throne.
For many, political fears and hopes eclipse Christian faith as what counts. When this happens, “church” becomes a daily liturgy of anxiety and rage involving scrolling fingers and widening eyes. When Christianity is your religion, you’ve got a lot more to do. Practical things like “love your neighbor” and “speak the truth in love” and “pray for your persecutors” and “make disciples” and “do good.” If you’re weary of never-ending night, this is the religion for you.
