Sermon: Sword before peace (June 25, 2023)

Pentecost 4A
June 25, 2023
Matthew 10:24-39
Romans 6:1b-11

INTRODUCTION:

Last week’s texts were difficult; this week’s aren’t any easier! Jeremiah will start us off by lamenting the difficulty of his call as a prophet. He is laughed at, mocked, and reproached all day long, he says, and whenever he wants to give up, saying, “Forget it, God! You’re on your own!” it feels like a fire is in his bones. He must do the Lord’s work. But all the while, he knows, God is with him “like a dread warrior,” so he knows the enemy will not win.

In Romans, Paul will simultaneously convict us and lift us up, telling us that just because we have God’s grace does not mean we get to “let sin abound.” His phrase, “By no means!” is an emphatic one (I imagine an inflection of, “Come on, what are you thinking??”). But finally, he will assure us that, though we are “dead to sin,” we are alive in Christ. 

Our Gospel reading is the real doozie. It is the continuation of last week’s speech to those Jesus is sending out, his disciples, with continued warnings about the violence and division that may happen as a result of this mission. “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword,” he says. The text comes off as sort of piecemeal, like an unrelated collection of sayings of Jesus that he wants to be sure to get out there… which almost makes the warnings even more jarring to take in. It’s like one bombshell after another.

So no, today’s texts are not easy, but they do also offer plenty of hope. As you listen today, listen for that hope. Hear the difficulty that comes with a genuine life of faith, but listen to the ways that God provides in that journey. Let’s listen.

[READ]

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

There are a lot of difficult words in this Gospel text, but the ones that trouble me the most are these: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” They are troubling for many reasons, but one of the big ones is that this seems so contrary to what Jesus says and who he says he is elsewhere in the Bible! Didn’t we hear Isaiah call him the Prince of Peace back on Christmas Eve? And the angel choir in Luke sang, “Peace on earth, good will to all”? Just a few chapters before this in Matthew, Jesus preached from a mount, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.” When Jesus is arrested in the garden before his crucifixion, one of his disciples draws a sword to defend him and Jesus says, “Put your sword away. For those who take the sword will die by the sword.” So, what gives, Jesus? Why change your tune here?

It’s quite likely that part of this has to do with context, that is, the context of Matthew’s audience. First of all, those first converts to Christianity may very well have faced severe religious persecution, often at the hands of family members (which accounts for all that stuff about families turning against each other). In 21st century America, in this land of religious freedom (at least on paper), Christians don’t face such extreme persecution, though other religions, such as Islam and Judaism, certainly face discrimination and violence. But for Matthew’s audience, Christian persecution was the norm, and his audience likely would have taken comfort in these words from Jesus, because he is letting them know they are not alone in feeling the way they do.

Second, I don’t take Jesus’ words about peace and the sword to be a forever statement. Rather, he is saying, “Peace won’t come right away. The way toward peace must first go through disruption and conflict.”

And this I find highly relevant today, because it is very consistent with my experience of finding peace in my relationships. How many of you have ever known that there is a difficult conversation you need to have – with a family member, a spouse, a co-worker, a child – and you are dreading it because it is so fraught, and you know they won’t take it well, so you just put it off as long as possible, perhaps never even getting to it? I’m talking about those big, “Something’s got to give, because I cannot take anymore the way things are going,” sorts of conversations. And when that happens, when you “keep the peace” by staying silent, do things get better? Not typically! They build and build until finally we are screaming hurtful things, or we take on self-medicating habits, or we develop physical ailments caused by the increased stress we are carrying… or sometimes, even worse. Soon enough, that “peace” we were hoping to maintain is exactly what is destroying our life – in some cases both our bodies and our souls.

And so Jesus urges us not to hold it in. “Nothing is covered that will not be uncovered, and nothing is secret that will not become known.” Maybe we can keep things hidden for a while from the people around us (though those things we harbor do have a tendency to find their way out somehow, even if sideways), but nothing is hidden from God, who knows our hearts through and through. When we can have those difficult conversations, in loving and logical ways, rather than highly emotional and hurtful ways, it may feel very much like conflict in the moment, like a sword that further divides us from one another. (That is often our fear, anyway, right? That bringing it up will only make it worse?) But ultimately it will bring lightness, and peace – if not with the person in question, then at least with God. No one was ever helped or healed by holding onto their pain or grudge; indeed that can only serve as a barrier both in our relationships with each other and our relationship with God. And so Jesus urges us not to sit on it forever, but to bring it into the open, where healing and restoration can happen.

I think Jesus does speak to our personal and intimate relationships in this text, but I also think he is speaking to a broader pursuit of justice. Remember we read just before this that he is sending the apostles out to proclaim that the kingdom of heaven is near, that an age is near in which justice rules and everyone has what they need, and everyone is in right relationship with God. He is asking them to proclaim this into a cultural context in which that is decidedly not the case, in which death-dealing forces threaten God’s people every day. At the time, that force was primarily the Roman Empire; today I’d argue that we have an assortment of different forces and various “-isms” and unjust structures that keep us from living in the ways of God’s kingdom. And when those “powers that be” are threatened, when the status quo is disrupted, you’d better believe there will be push-back. There will be a sword before there is peace!

Jesus anticipates this, names it, and normalizes it. We often take that last line of today’s reading, about “taking up your cross” and following Jesus as a spiritual one, as if to say, “Bear your suffering, and keep the faith.” But the cross, remember, was an instrument of the Empire, a means of torture to keep people in line. Seen that way, Jesus’ statement is quite a political one as well! In this context is means more like, “Don’t be intimidated by this oppressive force that would try to keep things just the way they are, this way that does not allow for kingdom living. They can and may give us the cross, but they cannot stop God’s kingdom from coming, and they cannot stop us from proclaiming it. And yes, they may kill your body, but they cannot kill your soul, for that belongs to God. So follow me, and keep right on proclaiming God’s kingdom of love and justice, know that this God of love cares for you and every single hair on your head.”

And on this point, I find both comfort and conviction in our reading from Romans. “Shall we keep on living in sin, so we can keep receiving God’s grace?” Paul asks. “Heck no!” When we know better, we do better. We were baptized into Christ’s death, he says, but that also means we were baptized into his life. In other words, we have all lived in sinful ways: we have held grudges and withheld forgiveness, we have said cruel things, we have sought our own comfort and priorities, we have tolerated and upheld unjust structures because they either didn’t negatively affect us, or they even benefited us. Those sins lead to death – death of the body and of the soul. But because we were also baptized into Christ’s resurrection, that sinfulness and death are not the end. We have been brought into newness of life. That new life isn’t always easier – it may require us to have those difficult conversations, or stand up against injustice. We may put ourselves at risk, or upset people we love, by doing this kingdom work. It may even feel like a sword at times. Yet we can trust that because we died with Christ, we also live with him, and that newness of life will, ultimately, lead to peace.

Let us pray… God of justice, we long for your peace right now, but we also know that sometimes the way to peace is difficult. Give us courage to pursue it, in our personal relationships and as a society, so that we can proclaim the nearness of your kingdom. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Full service can be viewed HERE.