I Wish You Were Already Ablaze

Luke 12:49-56

So, the challenge today is to wrap up Jesus’ teachings from the 12th chapter of Luke, a series of lessons which haven’t necessarily been easy to preach on. And now, to wrap things up we’ve got Jesus bringing fire and division, and there’s a storm brewing on the horizon. Sometimes my first reaction to reading the lectionary texts is the classic John McEnroe, throw my hands up and shout, “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

Maybe it makes it a little bit easier that the Harts are out at their family reunion for this week’s text about dividing a family against itself…but not that much easier.

A couple of days ago my brother and I, and one of our friends, decided to go out for an early evening round of disc golf. We texted back and forth about the ominous looking clouds.“I dunno,” wrote our friend, “I’m looking at the radar and there’s a huge patch of red coming our way.” “Nah, it’s going to miss us,” I replied. So we played. As we played, the clouds got darker. “Nah, it’s gonna move through south of us.” Then we started seeing flashes of lightning. “Yeah, but we can’t hear the thunder.” Then we started hearing the thunder. “Yeah, but it’s not raining yet.” Then it started raining. “Yeah, but it’s not raining that hard.”

Four holes. That’s how many we got in before it cut loose and we ran back to our cars, unable to avoid the storm that we didn’t want to believe would affect us. We didn’t want to believe the signs. We chose to trust our guts and our own desires, rather than forecasts, radars, facts, and empirical evidence. Turns out that believing that things are going to go the way you want them to doesn’t necessarily make it so. Ignoring the evidence of a storm doesn’t make the storm go away. Believing that we’ll be okay, doesn’t make it so. In fact, I think Jesus would say that such belief is an abuse of faith. Faith is not a tool for asserting belief in our will, in what we want to happen, in what we think is true. Jesus teaches that faith is a tool for believing in God’s will, seeing what God wants to happen, and coming to know what God says it true.

“You know how to interpret the signs,” Jesus says to the crowds, “but when the facts and signs point to something undesirable, you choose to ignore them! You hypocrites!”

Casting fire on the earth. That sounds pretty undesirable. Of course, the fire isn’t literal. This is not arson we’re talking about, but judgement, purification, and the coming of the Holy Spirit, which, if you recall the scene from Pentecost, descends in tongues of flame to set the church ablaze. Jesus wants our hearts on fire for God and for God’s kingdom.

But God’s kingdom and the movement of God in the world is going to change things up a bit, in ways that might seem undesirable. God’s kingdom is going to bring a storm, of sorts, and those of us ignoring the signs, still out playing when it gets here, are going to be soaked. This judgment might feel unfair, but who chose to ignore the signs?

Jesus is warning us, “You can’t keep ignoring the signs to go on living in and loving the earthly kingdom and the forms of power it perpetuates. You can’t keep lusting after wealth and storing up possessions thinking that you’re going to be okay.” Jesus knows that the kingdom of God and the change it brings is going to be frightening for those unwilling to let go of power in the earthly kingdom. But just because you’re afraid doesn’t mean you should avoid interpreting the signs accurately.

We know from elsewhere in Scripture that Jesus was afraid. He knew what was going to happen to him. Jesus knew the baptism with which he was to be baptized and the cup from which he was to drink. In Luke 22:42 we find Jesus praying on the Mount of Olives before his arrest, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me.” He was afraid, “yet not my will but yours be done.” Jesus was afraid, and yet he did not use his faith to believe that something else might be true, he did not ignore God’s will.

Luke consistently writes about the ministry of Jesus disrupting the status quo, causing the rise of the poor and the fall of the wealthy, lifting valleys, lowering mountains, smoothing out bumps and rough patches, the movement of God spreading like a wildfire. Jesus knows that fear of this fire will challenge the faithful in divisive ways, even pulling families apart. But how I wish you were already on fire for God’s kingdom!”

The rich ruler who was saddened by Jesus’ teaching to sell all he owned and follow him, had faith in the status quo, he trusted wealth and possessions to keep him safe, but he was not on fire for the kingdom.

Jesus can tell that many in his audience, like this man, aren’t on fire for the kingdom, yet, and he’s distressed by the sadness and pain he knows they will experience when fortune, and family, and false faith are disrupted by his passion and the sending of the Holy Spirit. “How I wish you were already on fire for the kingdom.”

In last week’s lesson, Jesus told the crowds, “do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” But in order to give you the kingdom, you’ve got to let go of this world, this life, it’s wealth and possessions, and give it all to God.

John’s Gospel calls Jesus the crisis of the world: “Now is the judgment of this world,” it reads, “now the ruler of this world will be driven out.” The Greek word for judgment is krisis.

Krisis doesn’t so much mean “emergency as it does a moment or occasion of truth and decision about life” (Craddock, Luke, 166).

“Oh, how I wish you were ablaze for the kingdom!” Jesus says.

“Choose the kingdom. I know it’s scary. But, choose the kingdom. I’m scared, too. What stress I’m under, but your will be done, Father, your kingdom come.”

What signs have been scaring us? What have we been avoiding? What cries for justice have we been deaf to? What storms are on the radar that we’d rather not believe will affect us? So that we can keep playing our game as the lightning clashes and the raindrops fall…

Set your heart ablaze for the kingdom of God. Love God and love your neighbor.

Pay attention to the breaking heart of God, the floodwaters of love, the great gusts of grace, the downpour of justice, the torrents of truth. The prophets of old saw these same signs. They knew that one was coming who was going to bring judgment. A messiah who, according to Isaiah, is like a refiner’s fire. A savior through whom God’s love for the poor and outcast would unleash a flood of justice, that Amos said would roll like waters, and righteousness that would rush like an ever-flowing stream.

These prophets cried to God’s people, too: “Turn your hearts and minds to God! Choose God’s kingdom!”

Do we really want that? Do we trust God so powerfully that our hearts are set ablaze for the will of God? What would our church look like if we were ablaze for God? What would we do? Who would we love? Where would we go? How would we serve?

“Do not fear, little flock, it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

Is it our good pleasure to receive it?

It is Jesus’ good pleasure to set our hearts on fire for the kingdom of God.

“Oh how I wish you were already ablaze!”