"On Fire for Christ" a sermon for the Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost, YEAR C Scripture: Jeremiah 23:23-29; Psalm 82; Hebrews 11:29 – 12:2; Luke 12:49-56 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. Whenever I read this Gospel Reading for today I feel shock. This just isn’t how I think of Jesus, at all. I tend to think of Jesus more as “gentle Jesus, meek and mild”, not talking about fire and divisions instead of peace, even pitting members of a family against other members. It’s shocking to me and it all sounds more than just a little bit scary and something to make us feel anxious. So what’s going on here? The first thing we hear is Jesus saying, “I come to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish that it were already kindled!” Fire is used as the symbol of judgment, as in burning away the useless or unnecessary. It comes as a shock to those who heard Jesus’ words and to us that he wishes for judgment. We and they would very much prefer to skip over that part. We all would rather hear about “gentle Jesus, meek and mild” wanting all of us to be saved rather than being submitted to judgment. We’re all about the salvation part of the Messiah; none of us want to even think about being judged and inevitably found wanting. We would like to think that simply by calling Jesus “Lord”, we should escape judgment altogether. These words are harsh and they sting, they serve to warn us as they were clearly intended to do. When we claim Jesus to be our Savior we also need to be aware that he will judge us on more than the words we simply speak claiming him to be our Savior. There’s a lot more at stake here. It helps to understand the context, the situation he is saying this. Jesus is under great stress. We have to remember that the baptism that he speaks of is the journey that takes him to the cross and a tomb, with a horrific amount of pain on the way. It could be that he’s feeling a bit crabby because he knows he goes to a horrible and painful death and there certainlyis a sense of urgency about the message that he wants his followers to understand. He is going to die for them and for us, and he wants us to have the full benefit of what he goes to do, he wants our salvation, he wants us to pass the judgment that he talks about earlier. He is insistent and even urgent about getting this message through to us. He then goes on to say something that completely upends about everything that we think of Jesus and what we think we know. He certainly doesn’t sound like the “Prince of Peace” in his next statement. “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." What is going on here? What could he possibly mean by saying such a thing? We tend to think of Jesus as being in the center of a loving family, this doesn’t sound anything like that! The reality that he is trying to get us to see in this passage is the fact that if we truly follow Jesus we will put ourselves against the world, which may even mean loved ones and our own family. He wants us to be completely aware of the cost of discipleship. If we follow Jesus we are against the world, we are even going against our own human inclinations. Jesus coming to us and following him will result in conflict because he is holy and stands in complete opposition of all that the world holds dear, making our own selves god instead of God, our Creator. To follow Jesus is to put our selves against the world and in conflict with all who do not follow Jesus. Simply put, to follow Jesus is to place our selves in opposition with the world and the ways of the world. Jesus wants us to know and understand that to follow him is to be in conflict with those who follow the way of the world. To stand with Jesus is to take a stand against the world with the cost of being in conflict even with those that we love. There is no middle ground with Jesus, either we follow him or we do not. Either we are loyal to Jesus and entitled to call our selves “Christian” or we are not. To truly be a Christian is to face disapproval and conflict because the world does not follow Jesus and there will be conflict; that is an inevitable part of following Jesus. To follow Jesus is to be different from those of the world whose greatest goal is to take the place of God for themselves in their lives. When there is such a division between the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the lordship of the world there will be division and conflict, there is no other way. Even God’s will to save and to fulfill the promises confronts and exposes resistance and rejection which provokes deep divisions, even with those we hold nearest and dearest. In this text we come to grips with the fact that Jesus will not be relegated to simply being a sentimental savior of a doting Father. He sets out to show us the cost of discipleship for us and for himself. In this we learn of the depth of God’s divine passion, of both the love and the anger of God that is revealed in Jesus’ word, will, and obedience, even unto death. The cost of discipleship is clearly laid out for us; we are called to be different which will place us into conflict with the world. Jesus goes on to make a rather sarcastic point of warning that the time is the present and just as the people know what the weather will be by looking at the sky or feeling the wind, so should they know that the Kingdom of God draws near and now is the time to make the most important decision of their lives, will they follow Jesus or not? The same question stands for all of us, will we follow Jesus and risk being different and in conflict with the world, or will we follow the world and face the judgment that no one can stand against, except for the one who comes to save us? God loves us and wants us to understand that our answer makes a difference in how we live and in how we share this good news we have been given. Jesus came to us bringing the fire of the Holy Spirit so that we would be on fire with God’s love, so that we are on fire for Christ. Thanks be to God, Amen.
Posted on: Sun, 18 Aug 2013 02:01:53 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015