Jeremiah 23:16-29; Hebrews 11:17-31, 12:1-3; Luke 12:49-56
Sometimes we can take a look around at the things that are taking place and know what’s coming next. It’s as though the events are road signs telling us what’s directly ahead of us. But there are other times when the signs are there but we don’t see them for what they are. Jesus took people to task for that. He pointed out that, while they could determine the weather based on the signs around them, they didn’t see what was about to happen in their lives spiritually even though He had laid it all out in front of them. “Why do you not know how to interpret the present time?” He asked them. He could ask the same question of us.Like the people of Jesus’ time, we tend to miss what Jesus is making clear when it doesn’t line up with our expectations. In their case, they were glossing over the “baptism” that He was speaking about undergoing and looking for Him to bring peace to the earth (or at least to Israel by restoring the nation to its former glory). His response rattled them: “Do you think that I have come to give peace to the earth?” He challenged. “No, I tell you, but rather division.” While we have come to expect the topic of Jesus to divide people, we’re more inclined to think of that division as an unintended consequence of sharing the Gospel in a fallen world than Jesus’ purpose for coming into the world. But Jesus said plainly that He had come to bring division. While we may not like or understand this division, He tells us that it is a sign for us — and calls to understand what it means.
Within and outside of the church we’re divided politically, culturally, racially, economically, and spiritually. These divisions often keep us from recognizing a far more dangerous division: dividing truth from God’s Word. Many signs point to this problem. If we miss these signs we end up reacting to all sorts of issues that spring up when truth is divided from God’s Word and we lose sight of the meaning, power, and purpose of the baptism that Jesus was baptized with and the fire that He has kindled on the earth. Without that baptism and fire we have nothing to bring to our dying world to heal the worst division of all: people divided from their Creator and Redeemer. Jesus has healed that division for us as a sign of His grace and mercy. From that sign we know what comes next: our own baptisms of fire while we deal with the brokenness of our fallen world and then the peace that Jesus has made — not for a time on earth, but with our Father in heaven for eternity.
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