Grace and peace to you from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The text on which this morning's message is based comes from our Gospel lesson (Luke 12: 49-53) read earlier.

God's Word can be pretty perplexing at times. Sometimes it can even seem contradictory. In our text Jesus says: Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division. But wait a minute. Doesn't the Bible say that Jesus brings PEACE! Our Gospel writer Luke even said the angels sang at Jesus' birth in Luke 2 "Glory to God in the highest, and peace to his people on earth. To the people He healed Jesus said: Your faith has saved you; go in peace. After his resurrection, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them (his disciples), "Peace be with you. Jesus brings peace! Jesus brings division!? Jesus seems to be bringing contradiction. How can these statements be reconciled?

God's Word can seem pretty perplexing at times. Jesus said (in John 12: 47): For I did not come to judge the world, but to save it. Here in our text Jesus says: I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled. At first glance bringing fire down to earth sounds pretty judgmental. When we think back to fire in the Old Testament we generally think of judgment. Sodom and Gomorrah met up with the fire of God, the judgment of God. Because of their great evil the LORD rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire … out of heaven (Genesis 19: 24). As the LORD, Yahweh, came down to Mt. Sinai to give the 10 Commandments to His people, He descended upon it in fire; and its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain quaked violently (Exodus 19: 18). Psalm 21: 9 leaves no doubt about the connection between God's wrath and fire: In his wrath the LORD will swallow up (his enemies), and his fire will consume them. In Luke 9, Jesus' disciples wanted to call down this wrath of fire on the Samaritan villages that had rejected Jesus. But Jesus sternly corrected his disciples.

God's Word can seem pretty perplexing at times. The world would have you believe that there are many contradictions in the Bible. And if read in an unfriendly manner, a skeptical worldly manner, many places in the Bible could seem to be contradictory. If we read the Bible as modern American literature, expecting the details of time to be as exact as our quartz watches, then we will find details that by our standards today are error. But if read through the eyes of 800 B.C. Hebrews, or 65 A.D. Galileans, who expected truth but not minute details, then the so-called "errors" fall away. Different cultures emphasize details differently. For example, Jesus died about 3:00 in the afternoon on a Friday and rose again somewhere between midnight and 6:00 AM on Sunday. For us today, we might say he was dead for around 36 hours, about a day and a half. But the Bible says he was dead for three days. To us 3 days means 72 hours. But yet, Jesus was dead on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, in common every day language -- three days. To modern, worldly doubters, there would seem to be a contradiction. But it is only their misunderstanding of reading ancient, Near Eastern texts by modern American standards. They want to change the message, not let the message change them.

When read through the eyes of faith, Scripture becomes amazing. In my seminary training I was amazed nearly everyday to learn some new little detail about the intricate, poetic structure of these books and letters we call the Bible. My previous scientific training developed in me a skeptical quality, but during my seminary training I became more and more convinced that these Scriptures were fully God's inerrant Word. These Words do not simply contain God's message written in between the lines. They are God's Word for us. Paul says in 2 Timothy 3: 16 "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness." Scripture is literally "God-breathed", fully human and fully divine, just as our Savior is fully human and divine.

But we're still left with the tension, the apparent contradiction in Jesus' words. How can he say on one hand "I have come to bring fire on the earth" and on the other hand say (John 3: 17) For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. We catch the critical clue in the next verse of our Gospel text: I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is completed. Jesus did come so that God's wrath would be shown on earth, but that wrath would not first be directed at His human creation. Jesus came so that the force of God's wrath, the LORD's fire, could be directed squarely at Jesus Himself, on the cross. He became our burnt offering for sin. Jesus is on His way to Jerusalem to become our Savior, and He is feeling the pressure, the distress of our sin.

There is no contradiction in God's Word, but the tension is there. God has not described Himself in a neat, tidy little package. He is not a "small God." In His description of Himself He leaves us with some tension. He is a perfect and just God, who cannot have sin and evil stand unpunished before Him. But the tension is there; He is also and primarily a loving God, who wishes to be reconciled with those He created. Jesus Christ came so that that tension could be resolved. Because of His great love for us, He offered up himself as the sacrifice, as the payment for the wrath God has against sin and sinners. Because of His great love for you, the Son of God saved you through His baptism. He was baptized in water; He was baptized in blood on the cross so that we could be baptized through water into His death and resurrection.

There is no contradiction in God's Word, but there is a tension there. Jesus did come to bring peace, peace between God and us. But we should not imagine that this peace will always be perfectly peaceful here on earth.

Jesus' message of love and forgiveness shown through His sacrifice on the cross will often be rejected in this world. A divine Savior becoming fully human and suffering and dying is too much for the human heart to accept apart from the power of the Holy Spirit. We say in the Small Catechism's meaning of the Third Article of the Creed: I believe that I cannot believe by my own reason or strength in my Lord Jesus Christ or come to Him. But the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel… Did you hear the tension in that Catechism section: I believe that I cannot believe by my own reason or strength? Left to ourselves and our own natures, we who have entrusted our lives to Him can even begin to question the depth of Jesus' grace, especially when we encounter Words of tension like these in our text. That is why it is so important for all of us to be the mouthpieces of the Holy Spirit, constantly reminding each other of Jesus' love and grace, both here in worship and in our everyday lives.

Family members and friends who we love and pray for will too often push away our attempts to share Christ's love with them. Like the disciples, we may sometimes even misrepresent Him, wanting Him to use His Law, his power and anger against others who hurt or reject us. But He calls us to be gentle with others, to not just speak his message of love and forgiveness, but to show that message in how we live our lives. He does bring us His peace; let us show that peace to others.

But despite how well we speak and live that message, some in the world will reject it. I have Jewish Christian brothers and sisters in Christ I know who when they became Christians were totally rejected by their families, shunned as if they were no longer alive. I have spoken with many of you who have friends and relatives who reject or ignore your attempts to share God's grace and Good News with them.

That is sad, but according to our text not to be surprising. The Good News is that Jesus keeps calling, even to those who reject his message. Jesus keeps coming, calling out from the cross to reconcile others to himself, through Word, through Sacraments, through us, His mouthpieces. Jesus keeps coming, reconciling us to Himself through His cross. Other flawed but forgiven human beings shared His love and forgiveness and grace with us: Parents, pastors, Sunday School teachers, other Christian friends.   We responded to His call. Now it is our privilege, our honor to share that love with others, gently but persistently. Now it is our privilege, our honor to share that love with each other, gently, persistently strengthening each other in our walk in this world. The grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with us always. Amen.