Wind prop fan toy - “I can't change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.”You've seen it in the movies: a rugged cowboy draws his six-shooter from a holster on his hip and exclaims, "This is my peacekeeper." But it isn't true that firearms and violence keep the peace. True peacekeepers and peacemakers are not weapons, but people.
Do you remember the famous feud between the Hatfields and the McCoys? A squabble started between these families of Kentucky and West Virginia during the American Civil War. After the war, the feud was kept going by disputes over a $l.75 fiddle and a stray razorback hog.
According to Stan Mooneyham, "Dancing on The Strait & Narrow" (Harper & Row, 1989), by election day 1882 the situation deteriorated to the point that three McCoy brothers killed Ellison Hatfield because he had insulted them. "Devil Anse," head of the Hatfield clan, had the three McCoys rounded up and tied to bushes within sight of their family cabin; then he put fifty rifle bullets into them. After that it was a life for a life -- sometimes two or three -- and even women became just part of the body count. Hostilities didn't finally abate until the second decade of the twentieth century. The cost to the two families was immense. Almost thirty deaths were recorded in the most famous example of "sweet revenge" turned sour in U.S. history.
You can hardly call any of the weapons used peacekeepers or peacemakers. Widow-makers, perhaps. And orphan-makers. But not peacemakers. Weapons are not peacemakers -- people are.
It was Albert Einstein who said so well, "Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding." You and I are the only ones who will ever keep the peace. And make it.
Blessed are the peacemakers.
From Lifesupport.
Lifesigns Life Quotes
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