First Reading: Jeremiah 23:16-29
16Thus says the Lord of hosts: “Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you, filling you with vain hopes. They speak visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the Lord.” 17They say continually to those who despise the word of the Lord, ‘It shall be well with you’; and to everyone who stubbornly follows his own heart, they say, ‘No disaster shall come upon you.’” 18For who among them has stood in the council of the Lord to see and to hear his word, or who has paid attention to his word and listened? 19Behold, the storm of the Lord! Wrath has gone forth, a whirling tempest; it will burst upon the head of the wicked. 20The anger of the Lord will not turn back until he has executed and accomplished the intents of his heart. In the latter days you will understand it clearly. 21“I did not send the prophets, yet they ran; I did not speak to them, yet they prophesied. 22But if they had stood in my council, then they would have proclaimed my words to my people, and they would have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their deeds. 23Am I a God at hand, declares the Lord, and not a God far away? 24Can a man hide himself in secret places so that I cannot see him? declares the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? declares the Lord. 25I have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy lies in my name, saying, ‘I have dreamed, I have dreamed!’ 26How long shall there be lies in the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies, and who prophesy the deceit of their own heart, 27who think to make my people forget my name by their dreams that they tell one another, even as their fathers forgot my name for Baal? 28Let the prophet who has a dream tell the dream, but let him who has my word speak my word faithfully. What has straw in common with wheat? declares the Lord. 29Is not my word like fire, declares the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?”
Psalm 119:81-88
81My soul has longed for your salvation; I have put my hope in your word. 82My eyes have failed from watching for your promise, and I say, “When will you comfort me?” 83I have become like a leather flask in the smoke, but I have not forgotten your statutes. 84How much longer must I wait? when will you give judgment against those who persecute me? 85The proud have dug pits for me; they do not keep your law. 86All your commandments are true; help me, for they persecute me with lies. 87They had almost made an end of me on earth, but I have not forsaken your commandments. 88In your lovingkindness, revive me, that I may keep the decrees of your mouth.
Second Reading: Hebrews 11:17-31; 12:1-3
1117By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, 18of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” 19He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back. 20By faith Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau. 21By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing in worship over the head of his staff. 22By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones. 23By faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents, because they saw that the child was beautiful, and they were not afraid of the king’s edict. 24By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, 25choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. 26He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. 27By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible. 28By faith he kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood, so that the Destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them. 29By faith the people crossed the Red Sea as on dry land, but the Egyptians, when they attempted to do the same, were drowned. 30By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days. 31By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient, because she had given a friendly welcome to the spies.
121Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. 3Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.
Gospel: Luke 12:49-56
49{Jesus said to his disciples,} “I came to cast fire on the earth, and would that it were already kindled! 50I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how great is my distress until it is accomplished! 51Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division. 52For from now on in one house there will be five divided, three against two and two against three. 53They 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.” 54He also said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, you say at once, ‘A shower is coming.’ And so it happens. 55And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, ‘There will be scorching heat,’ and it happens. 56You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?”
Fire From Heaven
As a child, I, like most boys, was fascinated by fire. We lived in Arizona, thus no fireplace, so the only time I was around fire was when we burned the trash at Grandma’s house, went camping, or fired up the BBQ grill. Needless to say, that wasn’t often enough to satisfy my curiosity. As a young boy, the neighborhood boys and I would find and play with matches setting little campfires, usually in the dirt alley or unpaved parking area where no harm could come. However, on one occasion, we decided to build our campfire across the railroad tracks in the drainage ditch next to Mr. Shumway’s, very ripe, wheat field. Everything was going well until one of the boys decided to see what would happen to an old tire that someone had rolled into the ditch.
Long story short, they burn. And despite our best efforts, we weren’t able to put it out before someone called the fire department. Luckily, the fire department was less than 10 blocks away and was able to extinguish the fire before too much of Mr. Shumway’s field was burned. Needless to say, it was a relief to know that despite our carelessness, the local fire department was there to keep our shenanigans in check. This flashback got me to thinking about our First and Gospel readings for today.
Hear again the words of the prophet Jeremiah, “Thus says the Lord of hosts: “Do not listen to the words of the [false] prophets who prophesy to you, filling you with vain hopes. They speak visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the Lord.” They say continually to those who despise the word of the Lord, ‘It shall be well with you’; and to everyone who stubbornly follows his own heart, they say, ‘No disaster shall come upon you’” (Vss. 16-17). Then down in verse 29 we read, “Is not my word like fire, declares the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?”” And Jesus’ words in our gospel reading, “I came to cast fire on the earth, and would that it were already kindled!” (vs. 49). What do these words of our prophet and of Jesus tell us today?
These are words of warning. The false prophets in Jeremiah’s day, like in Jesus’ day, and in our day as well, were leading people astray with flowery words that seemed good to a sin sick society, but were words that went against God’s commands. These were cleverly worded teachings that told people to do what seems right to them, instructions that says people can do whatever they want, so long as it doesn’t hurt anyone, directions that often say, you’ve misunderstood Biblical teaching, let me explain it to you from a culturally centered perspective.
The false prophets of today twist the words of the Bible to justify their stance on the sanctity of life, on marriage, and on sexual behaviors outside of Biblical defined marriage. The bottom line is all these worldly teachings go against Biblical authority. The false prophets of today teach that we should view the Bible through the lens of society, not society through the lens of the Bible. It’s a subtle but profound shift in teaching, but one that places us as the god of our lives. The truth is we have to many churches and denominations that these words of Jesus and the prophet are aimed at even today. And what is the result of sticking to the true teachings of the Bible? Division, strife, and resistance with fiery emotion.
Jesus came to remind the people of the truth, God’s truth, and what did our prophet and Jesus get for sticking with God’s truth? In Jeremiah’s case, persecution and an attempt on his life, and in Jesus’ case, death on a cross. The truth is satan is alive and well even today and is working to undermine God’s truth in every way he can, and he’ll do whatever it takes to destroy anyone who stands by, and confesses, God’s truth. Far too often the truth burns like fire within those who resist God’s truth, and they will resist anyone who shares and lives out God’s truth. Fire burns, it purifies, and it consumes what is impure.
For the last couple of weeks, the gospel lessons have come from the 12th chapter of Luke. Here, Jesus has spent much of the chapter reassuring and encouraging His followers that despite those who would resist them and God’s truth, God has everything under control and that the faithful will see better days. In verse 4 we read, “I tell you, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that can do nothing more.” Then down in verse 22 we heard, “Therefore, I tell you, do not worry about your life.” Then again in verse 32 we read, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” Then Jesus ends this same chapter with a warning of what’s coming for those who are faithful to God and His truth.
Instead of encouraging words of reassurance, we hear Jesus say that He and the truth He brings will be divisive. After spending 45 verses, trying to quiet the anxiety of His followers, Jesus tells them, that He came to bring fire to the earth. He reinforces this proclamation with the fact that God’s truth will not bring peace. In reality, the truth He brings will divide families and pit individual members of households against each other. It’s an ominous passage and one that leaves many scratching their heads wondering, why the sudden shift in language. But is it really a shift? Or is it the same message that was brought by the prophets of old?
I suspect His first century audience understood the imagery of fire more readily than we do today. Generally speaking, we have only a passing acquaintance with the power of fire. With the prevalence of all electric homes, about the only time we see flames is in the fireplace or in our BBQ grills. Today, fire has become a relatively foreign element in many peoples’ lives. About the only time we encounter fire is when we hear of forest fires or hear the occasional siren of a racing fire truck. But for the most part, fire is relegated to grandma and grandpa’s fireplace or the BBQ grill. However, Jesus’ audience had a much more intimate need for, and knowledge of, fire.
For folks living in the 1st century, their only nighttime illumination came from the flames of oil lamps. The smoke of the cooking fire on the kitchen floor constantly irritated their eyes. Everyone’s hands were calloused from cutting wood for the household fires. From their earliest days, a child learned that food tasted better cooked, that flames tempered metal tools, and that the kiln’s heat hardened pottery. People also knew firsthand the danger of uncontrolled fire.
Homes regularly burned because of an overturned lamp or a carelessly maintained kitchen fire. Well into the nineteenth century, devastating fires shaped communities. In fact, fire, in some cases, spurred on the next urban renewal. So, for the modern-day hearer, we read this passage and wonder why Jesus used the image of fire. In the 1st century ear, this Gospel recalls an ancient belief that fire was a manifestation of God. What the modern ear needs to bear in mind, is that Jesus, in this passage, is reminding us of the radical nature of the truth He brings and is demanding we step up to the plate. To do this, we need to first see fire, as Jesus’ audience did, as a Manifestation of God.
This intimate acquaintance with the power and the paradox of fire moved the ancients to think of fire as a theophany — that is, fire as a sign of God. When Moses was tending the flocks of his father-in-law, Jethro, near Mount Horeb, the Lord spoke to him out of a burning bush. When the Hebrew people were wandering in the wilderness, God led them at night with a pillar of fire. On the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit, appeared to the apostles as tongues of fire. With the Old Testament stories very much a part of their formal education, it didn’t puzzle Jesus’ listeners, when He said that He was to bring fire on the earth. They believed Jesus to be God’s representative, and it was an ancient idea for God’s presence to be manifested by fire.
It also wasn’t a surprise, to those gathered that day, that Jesus spoke of God’s presence as being divisive. The ancients knew both fire and God as both purifying and punishing. They knew how to put metals to the flame to temper and to separate out impurities. The Old and New Testaments use fire as a metaphor to talk about how God punishes, purifies, and strengthens the world. Those listening that day believed that God worked through fire, as well as various fire-like disasters. And with a little poetic imagination, we, even today, can understand that God, at times, works with “fire.”
Loren was a troubled young man and by age fourteen, was involved in a life of petty crime. By the time he was seventeen, he had become a regular in the juvenile justice system. At age eighteen, the judge gave him a choice: join the army or do hard time in a state penitentiary. He volunteered for the army and was sent to Vietnam at the height of the conflict. He was assigned to a “graves unit” where he worked to identify, tag, and then ship those killed in battle, back to their loved ones. The judge’s intensions were good; he hoped that military service would discipline Loren. Unfortunately, it didn’t. When he returned home, he was even more troubled. In Southeast Asia, he compounded his alcohol problem with drugs. And with this new addiction, his life of crime took a leap into an abyss. This one-time juvenile delinquent escalated his criminal activity and started committing armed robbery.
One night he and a friend robbed a liquor store. The clerk managed to notify the police, and the car chase was on. Loren admits that he considered using the gun he had with him to shoot it out with the police. But God was merciful, and something caused him and his friend to surrender instead. Having been found guilty, the judge sentenced Loren to the Illinois state prison at Joliet.
To Loren the sentence was no big deal. In his mind he had plenty of experience in county jail and the local juvenile detention center. He was tough. He thought he knew how to do hard time. Unfortunately, he didn’t know Joliet. He described his years there as, “being burned alive at the stake.” Loren paid his debt to society and his first job as a free man was as a church custodian. The congregation frequently used that position as a ministry. Reformed, Loren quickly proved that he had learned his lesson.
On his first day of work, he walked up two flights of steps to give a quarter to the church treasurer that he found in the coin return of the soda machine. He was serious about turning his life around. And, Loren wasn’t shy about giving his testimonial. When he came home from Vietnam, he was angry and bitter. He didn’t believe in anyone or anything. He knew he was traveling the road of self-destruction and that was fine with him. Loren had chosen the hard way to commit suicide. But through God’s grace, and the faithful people of that church, his life was turned around.
In Loren’s case, it wasn’t a revival preacher who issued an altar call. There was no gentle voice of God urging him to come to Jesus. It was, however, no less the presence of God — a theophany in fire. As Loren described it, “I was in Joliet for only three weeks when enough terrible things happened to me, at the hands of other inmates, that I said to myself, ‘I will never, ever, do anything that will get me into a place like this again.’” God was merciful and gave him the strength to straighten his life out.
Later, he married and had a family. He established himself as a responsible citizen and then was able to go on to find other employment beyond the walls of the church. Criminal justice critics will tell you it doesn’t happen nearly often enough. But with Loren, the fire that rained down on his life showed him his sin-filled choices, and then that fire began to purify him and make him a better man. Loren knew what Jesus meant when He said, “I came to bring fire to the earth.”
Fire symbolized the presence of God. God will sometimes use the “fires” of life to punish and purify. This understanding is what provides the background for this passage of scripture. But this isn’t the only point Jesus is making. This isn’t a simple observation about how God can work through difficult times to strengthen. In today’s gospel lesson, Jesus claims that the gospel, God’s word of truth, is so radically different from what the world teaches that the world will experience it as fire raining down from heaven. For those of us who follow Jesus’ teachings, He is warning us that when we stand up for God’s truth, we will be considered revolutionaries or at times schismatics. Jesus tells His followers, that when His message sinks into our hearts and minds, it can cause trouble in our families. It can cause trouble with our friends. And it’s a message that lots of people will find counter cultural.
The law, the commands and directives of God, those things in the Bible that trouble us and identify our sin, are words that many times will run head-long into the feel-good, self-centered, teachings of the world. The law of God tells us to deny ourselves, to shun evil, to worship God alone, and to love our neighbor enough to be concerned about their eternal soul. It’s a message that society sees as nonsense, even offensive.
Society today says, satisfy the self above all else: do what seems right in your own eyes: there is no God. Recall the way the book of Judges ends, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes (21:25). When we choose to follow God’s truth, we can, and likely will, get in trouble with society. Just ask a confessional chaplain in one of the military services, a teacher in one of our public schools, or one of our servants of the court system. Proclaiming God truth and following His commands and statutes can cause problems in the public sphere. This Gospel can also have a negative impact on our family relationships and our friendships.
When we take our faith seriously, we will love others so much that we’re willing to speak God’s truth in love. At stake is the eternal soul of all who stand against the gospel. And for some, in many parts of the world today, adhering to God’s truth and speaking out, can get them thrown in jail, or worse yet, killed. But the same can’t be said for us here in the US. For far too many, God’s truth and the radical nature of the gospel of Jesus Christ has been lost.
Too many today misunderstand Jesus as only the Prince of Peace. They forward that believers can seek personal healing and forgiveness. It means that their faith promises contentment and personal security in the here, and now, plus entry to heaven at the moment of death, no matter how they lived their lives. But this distorted Western Christian view, this view of God’s grace as cheap, also means they forward that almost any nice, kind, gentle person is a “Christian.” They have forgotten that the kingdom of God, that Jesus introduced, was quite radical, and demanding.
All of us know that Jesus was crucified. The Romans didn’t give Him an award for keeping Jewish citizens quiet and content. Most of His apostles met violent deaths at the hands of those who were outraged at the revolutionary changes they wanted to make both in society and in the lives of individuals. When Pliny was governor of a province in Asia Minor, he wrote a letter to the Roman emperor telling him that he didn’t know what these Christians believed exactly, but they were the most willful, obstinate, rebellious, disobedient people, he had ever encountered. Therefore, he had put some of them to death just on general principles.
Stanley Hauerwas, a seminary professor at Duke’s Divinity school, opens one of his classes by reading a letter from a parent to a government official. The parents complained that the family was paying for the very best education for their son. Then the young man got involved with a weird religious sect. The parents plead with the government to do something about this group that was ruining their son’s life. Dr. Hauerwas ends by explaining that the parents weren’t complaining about the Moonies, the Hare Krishnas, or some other group. The professor had assembled snippets from different letters written to the Roman government in the third century about a weird religious group called the Church of Jesus Christ. How that differs from the claims the church makes on people’s lives today!
Instead of high demands and radical changes, we think Christianity was instituted to make us feel good about ourselves. Rather than an institution encouraging personal change, the community today wants the church to be a well-maintained, a quiet presence that never threatens property values. Jesus said that He came to rain fire from heaven. But in the last couple of thousand years, we’ve managed to get the fire under control by reducing it to a message of prosperity. This is something we need to change. The world, no matter how much it resists, needs to hear God’s word of truth.
We need to accept the fact that our Christian faith calls us to speak the truth in love, rather than just tell people that God wants them to feel good about themselves. Some people need to feel the heat of God’s presence and be willing to share Biblical truth even though it will disrupt their family life — just as Jesus predicted. We need to be willing to accept the pushback we’re bound to get knowing that God’s truth can and will change lives. We need to believe that faith in Jesus Christ can change the world.
But for that change to happen, we too must be open to the fire God rains down from heaven. We must be open and willing to accept the fact that God in Jesus Christ will also strengthen and purify us. And we must be willing to speak the truth in love, even when it offends the sensibilities of others. When we truly love, as Jesus taught us to love, our concern is for our family’s, neighbor’s, and friend’s eternal future. We must be willing to share God’s truth no matter the personal cost. As hymn writer Adelaide Pollard puts it, “Have thine own way, Lord. Thou art the potter. I am the clay. Mold me and make me after thy will, while I am waiting, yielded and still.”
Amen