The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
One of the grim spiritual facts is that from the moment of a child’s Baptism, of being grafted into the family of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the devil, the world, and the old sinful nature go about their business of trying to separate a child of God from the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and from one’s church, the holy family of Jesus Christ. And as the child grows, these three enemies use every means necessary, every means at their disposal, to accomplish the task of dividing a Christian family.
Today’s Gospel is the last section of Jesus’ sermon on Christian discipleship, on what it means to live the Christian life and how a Christian is supposed to live the life. It’s a reality check into the hardest kind of life one can lead in this world, that is, a Christian life of fidelity, of catechesis, and of speaking the truth in love to family, friends, and strangers alike. This is also the first time, not by coincidence, in the Gospel of Matthew that Jesus uses the word “cross.” After telling the disciples that their families are going to be divided on account of Him, He tells them, “Whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.” He ties the cross to the very first battle that must be fought all the time in the life of a Christian: the battle that takes place within one’s own family.
Here in the same part of the sermon where Jesus talks about the division that’s going to be created at the speaking of His Word, He makes sure that the hearers understand that it’s not simply going to be those who are spoken to who will suffer anguish under the law and Word of God. He makes it clear to the speaker of God’s Word that there’s a price to pay for speaking, and it’s a price that He expects us to pay. It’s simply part and parcel of the Christian life. Preachers and speakers of God’s Word will also suffer hardship brought on by the very work God has sent them to do in the world.
Shortly after commanding us to confess and speak the truth about the Christian faith and about Jesus, that was last week’s Gospel lesson and sermon, “Everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven,” Jesus tells us that the speaking will bring division between those who believe the Word and those who do not. But it’s not all bad news. In the sermon, Jesus also closes with a reminder: it’s not all going to be hardship and sacrifice. They will not be alone in this struggle against unbelief. They will not be a low light in this dark world. He will be with them, and their treatment is His treatment also: “Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me.”
Still, we are confronted with the most unsettling of all of Jesus’ sayings: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” You don’t hear that quoted very much, either inside or outside of church. Those people who have only the shallowest understanding of who Jesus is and what He’s done, and the most shallow understanding of any Christian doctrine at all, they want to hear about a different kind of Jesus, not the one presented to us in all the Gospels. They want to know about the Jesus that says “peace and goodwill toward men.” They want to know about the Jesus that doesn’t bring the sword, but rather brings kindness and gentleness and full acceptance, no matter what. They don’t want to hear about a law and gospel that cuts and hurts and offends by way of the law. They don’t want to hear a gospel that rescues from sin and death and the power of the devil. They want to hear about a Jesus that simply tolerates anything and everybody, as if He’s not connected to faith or repentance whatsoever. They want a Jesus who will tell them that no matter what the lifestyle, it’s all going to be just fine because Jesus is good with it.
Now it’s true, Jesus is the Prince of Peace, the God-man who came to reconcile sinners to His heavenly Father, and to do it by His obedience, by His suffering and death on the cross, and by His resurrection. He says it straight out: He has brought the most powerful sword into the whole world and into this battle, and has entrusted us with it. Hebrews 4:12 tells us it is the sharpest of all swords; it’s the sword of His Word. “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” We’re told not to judge; we don’t. The Word does. We just use the Word, and it does what it’s supposed to do. It’s supposed to condemn sinners in their sin, call them to repentance, and apply the gospel: the person, the work, the life, the death, the resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ.
The very same Word of God that brings peace between God and sinner also brings and reveals the division between one member of the family and another. The Word brings division between those who believe and confess and who seek to do what is right, those who live in faith and repentance, and those who are opposed to the very same. We don’t hear much about Jesus the divider. Everybody simply wants Jesus to unite. They want to hear about the Jesus of peace, of unconditional love as they understand the phrase. They want a Jesus that doesn’t care about what they believe or how they live. They want a Jesus that has nothing to do with a call to repent. They want to hear about a Jesus that, quite frankly, doesn’t exist.
The real Jesus, though, is all about peace: peace between God and sinner, the peace that surpasses all understanding, the peace that is mentioned in every single epistle in the New Testament. He’s all about sending peacemakers into the world to proclaim this. “Blessed are the peacemakers,” that is, the preachers of the gospel, “for they shall be called sons of God.” The angels proclaim peace at Jesus’ birth. As He sent out His disciples on their first missionary journey, He told them to speak peace to houses that receive them. He’s hailed as the Prince of Peace in Isaiah 9. In John 14:27, Jesus teaches that the peace that He gives is different than the peace that the world gives: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you.” Saint Paul urged his followers in Romans 12:18, “If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” Don’t go looking for a fight. If the Word of God is not at stake and a salvation issue is not at stake, then tolerate; be peaceful toward your neighbor.
Yet the Bible is filled with families that were divided by the sword of God’s Word. Adam and Eve were no longer united in perfect harmony with their Creator, God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, nor with each other, as soon as they took the forbidden fruit. Then there’s the Cain and Abel mess, hardly a unified family. Then there’s Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Hagar, and Ishmael; the Word of God divided them. Lot and his sons-in-law. Joseph and his brothers. Naomi and Orpah. David and Absalom. And the examples could go on and on of families in the Old Testament that were divided because the Word of God came, by the law and by the gospel, and God carved out from the sinful world His holy nation. That’s what He does: God carves out His faithful from the unfaithful, and the unfaithful rail against God and His children.
Jesus even experienced His own family trouble. His family tried to stop Him from preaching and teaching in Mark 3:21. When His family heard about what Jesus was preaching, they went out to seize Him, for they were saying, “He is out of his mind.” The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed by Beelzebul.” His own family became publicly embarrassed at what He was saying, and thus they went to take custody, grab Him by the arm, and try to pull Him away from the crowd. Judas betrayed Him. The heavenly Father forsook Him on the cross. That’s a division of the family. Peter denied Him, and the disciples all ran away.
As traditional family-values type people, our first instinct is to keep the family together at all costs. Sometimes that means we make deals over religion, church talk, and moral issues. To that natural instinct, Jesus says in the text this morning, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” Tough words, especially for modern parents and grandparents, where family dynamics can look a lot like making your way through a minefield, trying to avoid an explosion.
“Family first” is a common phrase among the morally oriented: the most important thing in life. It’s not uncommon these days to hear people boast in that fashion. This combination of family first and Christ second is simply another form of works-righteousness, based on a notion about what you owe and don’t owe to a family. But any works-righteousness, especially this one centered on the family, destroys Christian faith, and it tears Christian congregations and Christian families apart. Families are gifts from God, that is true. But one family comes about by way of nature, and the other one comes about by the work of God: a spiritual family, by the work of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
In Matthew 12:48-50, Jesus tells us which of His families is the most important. They wanted to take Him out and remove Him, His own blood family, and His reply is, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” And stretching out His hand toward His disciples, He said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” That means you. You are His holy family, made so in the waters of Holy Baptism and in the ministry of the Word and sacrament of the church.
Jesus also said, “Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me,” indicating that this family tie is so close, so unbreakable, that how the world and people treat you, they are in fact treating Jesus and His heavenly Father as they treat you.
Think what would be lost if faithful proclaimers of Christ’s Word, if pastors and missionaries and confessors, ordinary laymen like you, chose instead to make peace with the unbelieving world by promising not to speak the Word of God. Those who encounter this kind of messenger have absolutely no chance whatsoever, no chance to receive the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation, no chance at all to be grafted into the family of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, no chance at all for eternal life, and no chance at all for eternal peace. But when pastors and missionaries and confessors of every kind deliver Jesus’ blood-bought message of peace, then Jesus Himself can be welcomed, and the Father of mercy is pleased to impart to them His peace, the peace that surpasses all understanding.
Putting our blood relatives first and God second is a sin, pure and simple, a violation of the First Commandment. But for Christ, Jesus loving and obeying His heavenly Father, dying for us so that we would be adopted, grafted into the holy family, made brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ and sons and daughters of the heavenly Father, was a perfect fulfillment of the First Commandment. There was no division between the Father and the Son, except in the moment on the cross. Salvation is found only in the work and the relationship between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. There is no salvation in your love for blood relatives. We’re saved by Christ and His blood.
When we consider all the things in the world that compete for our love, our attention, and our loyalty, the natural family comes in second, only superseded by our divine family: our relationship to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, and our relationship to one another, to fellow saints in the church. The first duty we have to our natural family is to speak, to teach and speak God’s Word. Jesus was doing this even at age 12, in the temple: “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”
Of all the divisions that came with the person and work of Jesus Christ, the greatest division within the family came on Good Friday, and it came so that you would never be divided again from your heavenly Father. In order to reconcile you to God, the Holy Trinity in some mysterious fashion suffered a split, a division, a separation, between He who knew no sin but became sin for us, and the Holy One of Israel, God the Father. His complete obedience to the First Commandment showed that He was more worthy than any other, the spotless Lamb, so that you would always be a member of His family. You were baptized into His death, and you were raised in His resurrection. You’ve been made brothers and sisters of God Himself, sons and daughters of the holy Father. In this holy family, the church, Christ has placed you even above Himself; He died for you. You have been named and claimed by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in Baptism. For you who take up your cross now and follow Him, there will be divisions, there will be heartbreaks, there will be pain over family. But Jesus is with you and for you, and never forsakes you. Why? Because you’re His brothers and His sisters, and you’re family. Amen.
May the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.