Bringing Fire

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Kilgore, Texas on Sunday August 15, 2010, the 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Isaiah 5:1-7
Psalm 80:1-2, 8-19
Hebrews 11:29-12:2
Luke 12:49-56

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen

I love church signs. I love them when they are witty with messages that mean something to the average person on the sidewalk and something more when examined by a disciple of Christ. Some of my pastor friends who have seen some examples from First Presbyterian in Berryville on the internet get a smile out of them too. Folks have enjoyed, “First Pedestrian Church, Walk the Walk” and there are always comments about “Lent, It’s not Just for Belly Buttons Anymore.” (Heather and Eric Williamson reminded me that their favorite sign reads “Palm Reading This Sunday” and yes, it goes up right before Palm Sunday.) We even made both the local paper and Synod newsletter with “So…What’s the Proper Tithe on $700 Billion” a couple of years ago.

Even “Praying for Ashley,” a sign which doesn’t have an iota of double meeting, got attention when the Holy Spirit took our prayers and blessed two women named “Ashley” that I surely had never met. That’s the economy of God, multiplying blessings on blessings; taking what I intend and doing more with it than I could ever hope or imagine.

Today, the sign in front of the church reads, “Help Wanted: Disciples, Inquire Within.” May this be an invitation to anyone who seeks God.

I hope that these signs offer a gentle chuckle, an interesting opening for conversation, and a call to discipleship. I pray that they will do what the Lord intends in the lives not just of the folks at First—Berryville, but of all who see them and consider them.

This reminds me of what was on the sign when I got to Berryville about five years ago. Someone, I don’t know who, put up, “God is Peace, not War.” That rubbed me the wrong way. From a pastoral point of view, nearly half of the congregation is made up of military veterans. There were vets from World War II through Vietnam. There are those who served in peace and those who served in war. Some served at home while others served overseas. Some were in battle, others were not. So I felt it wrong to have this on our sign when so many served .

One member of First—Berryville, a young woman named Hannah, will be commissioned as a Second Lieutenant into the Marine Corp on August 28. At one time she mentioned that she wanted to fly choppers, that’s one duty that is sure to put her in harm’s way in service to our country. If she read that sign, I wonder if she would have felt welcomed.

Our reading from Luke’s gospel, a difficult writing that should always leave an odd taste in our mouths, is another reason that I wanted to change that sign. Jesus, the one who we associate with the Good Shepherd, carrying a little lamb back to the fold, tells the world that he did not come to bring peace. He came bringing division. So God is peace? Well, as much as I want to say that in every time and place that God is peace, Luke says that his coming doesn‘t bring peace.

In the end though, I’ve read Revelation. Jesus will bring peace, and it‘s going to be messy between when he comes and when the final peace is made, but that‘s not really the point.

Hebrews 12 gives us an odd perspective on our reading from Luke. This section is known as “The Heroes of the Faith.” This is God’s “Hall of Fame” paraded by for all to see. These are the people who scripture shows us are worth copying.

So we start with Rahab, the prostitute. Yes, Jericho’s favorite call girl protected the two spies sent by Joshua.[1] While we hope every girl wants to be a hero of the faith, we also hope that on her high school’s career day she doesn’t drop by the prostitute booth.

Gideon, I love Gideon, he routs the Mideonites who had oppressed Israel for seven years. This is the same Gideon who is so afraid of his own shadow, so embarrassed by his own family, so unsure of his neighbors that he tries threshing grain in a winepress, an entirely futile way to try to do a day‘s work. So when he becomes the brave man with his dog soldiers, he’s a hero. Unfortunately while Gideon’s heroic story begins with the destruction of his father’s idol, it ends when he becomes idolater.[2]

The Hero of the Faith Barak was told that he would be a hero by Deborah, a prophetess and Judge of Israel. But he refused to go into battle unless Deborah would go with him. Because Barak required Deborah’s presence, he was far less of a hero and ultimately did not defeat Sisera, the general of Jabin’s army, on his own. Sisera was eventually defeated by Jael the wife of Heber who rolled the general up in a carpet, gave him warm milk, told him a story, and put a tent spike through his temple.[3]

Samson[4] was a Nazirite, a judge who was consecrated from birth. He was destined to lead the people and lead them he did. Yet, in four chapters from the book of Judges, Samson married a Philistine, and then when she displeased him, he gave her to his best man. He ate from the carcass of a lion. As gross as this sounds to us, to a Nazirite it was a holy terror. Taking Delilah, a second Philistine bride, Samson begins on a murderous rage that ultimately leads to his death. Sure, he brought down tons of Philistines with him, but it only happened the way it did because he was disobedient to the Lord.

Friends, let’s face it, if Samson’s life were a TV miniseries it would have to be on HBO.

As for the Cliff Notes versions on a couple more of the “Heroes of the Faith,” Jephthah makes a foolish vow and sacrifices his daughter to keep it.[5] David, the man who knows God’s heart, lusts after a woman with such gusto that he takes her from her home and has her husband assassinated in battle.[6]

These are the Heroes of the Faith. These are the models scripture lifts from the Letter to the Hebrews. I don’t want to diminish the contributions of any of these heroes, but there is one thing I want to make clear, even the heroes have blemishes. Even if the Epistle to the Hebrews does not make this point, let me; all of us have our blemishes, especially our heroes.

Our blemishes lead us back to our reading from Luke this morning. John’s gospel says Jesus is the crisis of the world.[7] By crisis he didn’t mean emergency, but a moment of Truth ("Truth" with a capital “T”) where a decision has to be made.[8] Our reading today makes the point that where there are choices made, Jesus makes the difference in what and how we choose. It also shows that our decisions are difficult and have consequences that can be very painful.

These difficult decisions will bring division among families. Families will be split father against sons and mother against daughters. Jesus understands that his coming brings this division among the very people he saves. Jesus understands that his coming will cause a crisis of decision that makes peace impossible.

This Jesus who Luke tells us “will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High;” this Jesus who we are told “the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David;” the Christ who the shepherds were told was “born a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord;” our Lord who was told as the Holy Spirit descended upon him bodily like a dove at his baptism was told from on high “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased;” this Jesus will not bring peace to the world, but war.

Jesus says that he came to bring fire to the earth, fire which is often seen as judgment in both the Old and New Testaments. But here is something that is very important for us to remember, this is nothing new. In the book of Isaiah and in the Psalms, the nation of Israel is described as a vine. On this vine, the vintner seeks to produce the best vintage, the greatest of all wines. Unfortunately, Isaiah prophesies a wild vine growing in the place prepared for the good vines. The vintner chooses to destroy the vineyard rather than see it overgrown. In the Psalms, the vine is burned and cut down by the enemies of Israel. Again, this is nothing new.

Still, when we read about Jesus bringing fire to the earth and families being separated by the heat, we find it tough to accept. I believe I called it “a difficult writing that should always leave an odd taste in our mouths.”

There is reassurance in these words though. When I worked in Higher Education, a boss once told me that if people were complaining I must be doing something right. If they weren’t, I was probably letting them get away with too much. Maybe this is what’s going on here too.

The signs are all around us. It is when we interpret them as the work of God, it is when we interpret this discomfort and division as one of the ways the Lord works that we seek God and follow as Christ’s disciples. When we try to smooth all disagreement away we seek a false peace that is not Christ‘s vocation.

Perhaps when we see the challenges God places around us it is our call to respond in Christ’s name, not wring our hands praying for a miracle. It is when we become a part of the miracle that things begin to happen. Luke writes that the whole wide world won’t be happy when we serve God’s good creation as Christ’s disciples, and that could well be the good news.

Only when God is happy are we doing what is right.

As for the church sign, I changed it. I changed it to say “God is Love, not Hate.” Holy wars have been fought through history and will surely be fought again. There are wars that need to be fought to rid God’s good creation of evil. Scripture also tells us that God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them,[9] and it also tells us that Jesus came to bring a fire to the earth, a fire that will consume the dead branches from the vine. Jesus continues bringing fire that will purify us like fine metals cleared of their slag in a smelter. Jesus is bringing fire to the earth, and wishing we work to kindle it everyday.

Jesus suffered a terrible baptism of suffering, a bloody baptism in his crucifixion. It is up to us to take the baptism of water, washing us and sealing us, into God‘s family. It is up to us to take the baptism of fire, the empowering baptism of the Holy Spirit, into the Church. It is up to us to take the fire of the baptism of his crucifixion into the world. And don’t worry if someone gets upset along the way, one way to know when we know we’re doing something right.

[1] Joshua 2:1-24
[2] Judges 611-8:35
[3] Judges 4:1-24
[4] Judges 13:1-16:31
[5] Judges 11:1-40
[6] 2Samuel 11:1-27
[7] John 12:31
[8] Craddock, Fred B., Interpretation, A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching. Louisville, KY: John Knox Press, 1990, page 166. [9] 1John 4:16b