And they are peacemakers only in the physical sense. The reward they receive is earthly peace only, and it is a peace that never lasts. Because in the final analysis, all human peacemakers have done a terrible job. There is no lasting result. They build one after each war.
Peace is merely that brief glorious moment in history when everybody stops to reload.
But the Peace that the bible envisages is not just the absence of conflict for a while, it is more than a truce between warring factions. It is a state of being blessed by God, and true and lasting peace between people can only come through reconciliation and peace with God. Only if we have peace with God can we become the kind of peacemakers Jesus means. When Jesus says blessed are the peacemakers, he is not really talking about Nelson Mandela, or even 14 year old Nickole Evans. As noble and good as their efforts are, what Jesus is talking about is something even more significant than physical peace between nations, and something far more permanent than the mere ceasefires that we equate with peace.