Have you ever seen this bumper sticker?

You may have noticed it on a car, truck or van and if you are a U2 fan you may remember they used this Coexist logo on their Vertigo concert tour. Coexist image was originally created by a Polish graphic designer named Piotr Mlodozeniec for an art contest hosted by the Museum of Seam for Dialogue to promote peace and reconciliation among people of different worldviews, faiths, and belief systems. This newer version of the sticker above has an expanded message of tolerance to also include Eastern religions as well as issues surrounding gender, including homosexuality.

Seeing this sticker immediately triggered all kinds of questions in my mind. So how are we as Christians to respond to this postmodern message of Coexist? How are we to reconcile that Jesus is the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6) and at the same time He tells us that there will be division among family members about their belief or lack of belief in Jesus (Matt. 10:34-36; Luke 12:49-53).

I know what you are thinking, “Isn’t the Bible contradicting itself when it says Jesus is about peace, love and turning the other cheek (Matt. 5:39), but people’s beliefs in him will cause families to be divided and split up?” This doesn’t make any sense.  The Bible seems to be contradicting itself.  I just can’t grasp or comprehend these two differences. Well, the Good News :) is that you are not alone.

So how do we reconcile this contradiction?  The Bible does tell us that we are to love our neighbor (Matt. 22:39; Luke 6:27-36).  But it also commands us to preach the Gospel to all nations (Matt. 28:18-20), but to do this with gentleness and respect (1 Peter 3:15). You see God is not contradicting Himself. What God is saying is that Christian’s are to be in the world, but not of the world (Romans 12:2; 1 John 2:15-17).  As Christ followers we are called to proclaim the message of Jesus Christ (Mark 16:15; Romans 10:14-15) regardless if we may offend another individual, but we are to do so with gentleness and respect.

In Matthew 10:36 Jesus is not advocating literal war with your families, he is saying that as the gospel is shared it will naturally cause division between those who reject and accept Him. We need to stand up for what is right and true according to the Word of God. We are to cling to what is good and hate what is evil (Rom. 12:9).

We also need to remember that God is not only a God of mercy and grace He is also a God of justice (Matt. 24:6-8; Rev. 19:15). Jesus is not a pacifist as is seen in Rev. 19:15. The peace that Jesus brings is one of salvation and redemption of man’s sins (Heb. 9:22; 1 Peter 1:18-19).  Peace that we have a rock solid hope of an eternal future with Him after we die. Peace that we do not have to fear death if we place our faith in trust in Him (John 3:16-18; Acts 4:12).

So what’s the take away?  Well there are many, but what I want to emphasis is we cannot fall into the trap of worrying whether we may offend someone and not share the Gospel. Satan uses a postmodern philosophy to plant seeds of doubt to keep us from doing what God calls us to do. Don’t let Satan win next time you have the opportunity to share the gospel. As Christians we should strive to pray for peace and do everything within our power to live at peace with one another but at the same time we should never sacrifice the truth of the Gospel for the sake of keeping the peace.