Bringing the Heat 8-14-22
Bringing the Heat
Jer 23:23-29; Luke 12:49-56
Jer 23:23-29
Am I a God near by, says the Lord, and not a God far off? Who can hide in secret places so that I cannot see them? says the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the Lord. I have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy lies in my name, saying, “I have dreamed, I have dreamed!” How long? Will the hearts of the prophets ever turn back—those who prophesy lies, and who prophesy the deceit of their own heart? They plan to make my people forget my name by their dreams that they tell one another, just as their ancestors forgot my name for Baal. Let the prophet who has a dream tell the dream, but let the one who has my word speak my word faithfully. What has straw in common with wheat? says the Lord. Is not my word like fire, says the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?
Luke 12:49-56
“I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.” He also said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, ‘It is going to rain’; and so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, ‘There will be scorching heat’; and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?
Prayer – Lord Jesus, this morning you surprise us; reminding us you came to bring the heat and passion of your love upon us. You came to show us what a faithful life looks like and frankly Lord, many times, we wish you would just take that passion and heat somewhere else. Give us the wisdom to see the world through your eyes – that we are called to live life today, differently, passionately, compassionately and with haste. May it be so – amen.
We live in an era, a present time in which we get a daily dose of hard news in hatred, division and violence. If we watch the nightly news, which I have chosen not to do anymore, we can see the impact of hatred, division and violence all across our cities, countries and world. Churches and religious leaders search for words that may speak to these divisions, and communities long for action that may bring peace and healing across the divides. And then we have this head-scratching gospel passage this morning.
Most pastors will tell you it is easy to preach the pleasant Jesus – Jesus who heals, loves, comforts, feeds and restores. The problem is that the gospel story is more than one of a pasteurized and homogenized pleasant Jesus. Some of Jesus’ words disquiet us, make us uncomfortable. And most pastors will quickly choose to walk away from difficult words. But, if one desires to proclaim an authentic picture of Jesus, then we must be prepared to hold the tension bewtween the good and encouraging words with the hard, head-scratching words.
Our gospel passage this morning draws us into words of fire, stress and divided families – of shattered peace and brewing storms. These are difficult and unsettling words from Jesus. In Luke’s gospel, one feels the growing intensity from the moment Jesus, Peter and John come down from the Mount of Transfiguration leading up to this moment in time. As Jesus comes down from the mountaintop experience he does so with some harsh words of judgment on the generation that stood before him and his prophetic words of woes for cities, Pharisees and lawyers. These strong indictments set the context for Jesus’ difficult words this morning.
Jesus proclaims, “I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” The scriptures the people would have heard taught in the synagogue in that time would have depicted fire as the symbol of God’s judgment, purification and the presence of the Spirit of God. Their religious vocabulary would have been filled with stories like the ones of Moses at the burning bush, the presence of God in the pillar of fire leading the people into the desert, and fire raining down and destroying Sodom and Gomorrah. Perhaps some of Jesus’ listeners would have known the Deuteronomic language “the Lord your God is a consuming fire.” Perhaps others might have heard John’s baptismal announcement over Jesus – ‘I baptize you with water. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.’ Jesus’ language in our gospel passage beckons and longs for a time when God’s unrestrained work would burn deeply among God’s people.
Jesus is bringing the heat when he proclaims, “Do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!” This word is followed by a litany of relationships that would be divided against one another. This list of divided relationships is hard to digest. This word from Jesus stands in sharp contrast to what we are accustomed to hearing about peace from Paul’s epistles. The picture of Jesus as bringer of division rather than peace is counterintuitive. However, as Luke pens his gospel account, these words likely resonated with a people who had to endure broken relationships because of the faith they had claimed in Jesus Christ. These words of division in our current context as our communities struggle with divisions along most every cultural line.
Clearly we are all aware of the great divides around our cities, country and world today. Partisan politics doesn’t just occur in Washington and Austin – it occurs in families and I’m sure no surprise to anyone here, in churches as well. Churches across all denominations today are struggling with any number of issues – the authority of scripture, the ordination of people called to ministry who may be of a different sexual orientation or gender, who will be saved by God and who is condemned to hell, or if there is even a hell. Differences between denominations, differences within denominations, differences between ruling bodies and local churches, differences between pastors and congregations, differences between congregants – it’s any wonder anything can be accomplished in churches today. Sadly, but true, many people are leaving ‘the church’ today because of the myriad of differences that exist and are highlighted in the news seemingly every day.
For all of our passage’s words of explicit divisiveness, it shouldn’t come as a shock. Jesus’ own family was pierced by the division and reordering of God’s annunciation. And certainly Luke’s readers living in a time of persecution and oppression would have recognized that there is a cost of following Jesus. The Prince of Peace puts them at odds with rule of Rome – which divides them from family members wo would prefer to ‘keep the peace’ with the powers that be.
Clearly our passage this morning is not a reading for Sunday School. It is not a reading that comforts. It is not a reading for polite society. It is a reading that is difficult for mature Christians, with Jesus’ destructive fire, stress, division and judgment. We read this morning that Jesus is more than a peace-bearer, that he also brings division, brings heat and discomfort, and perhaps that is new news.
One interpretation is that division among family members is something that Christians may experience as a result of following Jesus to the cross. I can relate to that to a degree when while in seminary my wife, at the time, looked at me and said, “I don’t want to be preacher’s wife. You need to decide which to choose.” I was shocked because we had talked about it before packing up and moving to Richmond for me to attend seminary. Yes following Jesus frequently means family divisions – remember the disciples who were called left families, left family jobs and responsibilities to follow Jesus. It is not easy and can cause division as Jesus is painfully reminding us of that this morning.
On the face of it, our reading of Jesus as the divider is in conflict with claims that it is actually the devil who is the great divider. French Philosopher Jacques Ellul thought the division was the politics of the devil – the one who not only tries to divide individuals from both the Creator and creation, but also brother from brother, sister from sister, and nation from nation. As Ellul saw it, in the devil’s political realm, there are only winners and losers, and never a win-win situation.
But in our text this morning, bringing the heat Jesus is the sole cause of division. It is Christ and his message which causes division and conflict. What causes this division? Is it the message of the gospel, which not all will accept? Some interpret our passage such that one must choose the gospel or reject it. Some are Kingdom and some are not. There is a time of decision and not all will be found ready. Division resulting from separation of the faithful from the profane is a part of the biblical tradition and this is not a foreign concept for the Christian tradition.
Jesus lets those gathered know that following him will not be easy, particularly because the gospel will not always bring peace. Families were being torn apart when the gospel spread because it changed everything. Given our contexts of today, this may not always happen, but there certainly could be some disagreement or strife in families as the nature of the call is worked out and understood. Whether it to be attend church, go to seminary, engage in social justice issues; the gospel’s effect can create division. There is no doubt that many churches have experienced division at various times in their histories. Perhaps the problem may not lie in the division itself, rather in how we respond to the divisions that happen in our lives.
I can imagine that one possibility may be to see that God’s is at work in all realities, and that division is not the problem. Perhaps it is in our own naïve expectations that we have more truth than others. Instead, could God be at work on both sides of an issue? There have been calls within the Christian church to become one church so that all might believe. Jesus’ talk about division may point to a broken reality for Christianity no matter how hard we work toward unity. Perhaps this is Jesus’ point, that human togetherness is not what the gospel is about; rather, the gospel preached into the life of an individual person will do its work, and we are left to trust that it is God at work, and resist our attempts to control the outcome.
Our need for control may be the point of the whole passage, but particularly the last section where Jesus addresses our inability to realize what’s happening in our present time. Why do we remain blind to all that is happening around us concerning Christ and God? The accusation against hypocrites is an interesting one here, since Jesus is talking about those who can read the signs, but can’t or don’t respond. I’m not sure if this hypocrisy, it sound like blinders or narrow-mindedness. The hypocrite label might make sense if the hypocrites believe that Jesus brings grace, yet who continue to work under the law to achieve their own righteousness. Or, we might be hypocrites when we believe that we have a monopoly on truth, about ourselves and our world. The hypocrite thinks they have everything figured out, but keeps using human actions to guarantee God’s presence and remain in control.
I would suggest that Jesus’ accusation of hypocrisy is an important one to consider seriously as we live out life in the church. Do we allow ourselves to hear God’s call again and again, or do we rest comfortably in our perfect church attendance or other human work? Another way to put this is, why do we insist on pretending to ignore the injustices we see across our cities, country and world? Most likely the answer is that we don’t want to see what’s really happening or our role in the injustices of the world. There is clearly an opportunity to talk about the ‘elephant in the room’ for many contexts. Simply naming an issue might be gospel for many, and may be the kairotic event that changes everything. It may lead to division, but, at some point we have to trust that God is at work in all situations.
Amidst Jesus’ bringing the heat words, we have to respond, or not. And that may very well keep us divided. And at the end of the day, we have to decide, as individuals, just how much we are willing to bear Jesus’ burning words of following, as a community, a city, a nation, and a world, in the present time. May God bless your decision just as God may bless mine – and remember, together, anything is possible – thanks be to God – amen.