Peace? [Luke 12:49-56 - Proper 15C]

The Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

Luke 12:49-56

Peace?

On the night Jesus was born, there were shepherds, in the fields, keeping watch over their flocks.  And beyond those fields, more fields, empty space, the quiet stillness of a resting world.  The whole scene existing in a time before electric lights and frantic traffic and billowing smokestacks forever changed our understanding of time and space and sky.  Above them, those lonely laborers, there was only the glittering, velvety blackness.  Until, there against that familiar backdrop, the impossible: a multitude of angelic beings, so many that space became crowded.  More than sight, they were also sound.  Into that silent night, the angels began reciting their ancient songs, songs that originated beyond the world of mortals, in the hidden mystery that is God’s heavenly presence. 

Sadly, we know very little of those sacred songs that filled that night sky.  Nothing of the otherworldly melodies or harmonies were recorded; there are no hints at song structure or tempo.  We cannot even be sure how many verses comprised those songs, although if the angels were Episcopalian they undoubtedly sang them all.  One lyric, just one sentence, is all that the Gospel of Luke, the only one of the four Gospels to tell this particular part of the Jesus story, preserves.  What the shepherds transmitted, what impressed them the most, was the angels’ word of peace: Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace, goodwill among all people.  Peace.  Peace because Jesus was born. The angels vacated Heaven, filled our sky, to announce the coming of the one called the Prince of Peace.

This Prince of Peace, who, according to our Gospel reading today, did not come to bring peace, but rather division.  That doesn’t make a lot of sense, does it?  To make things even more complicated, today’s Gospel reading is found in the Gospel of Luke, the very same Gospel that gives us this beautiful story of shepherds and angels and prophetic songs of peace.  And the same Gospel in which Jesus ends his healings by gently saying to the newly mended “go in peace.”  This Gospel, this Gospel that is written by the same author who wrote the book of Acts in which St. Peter declares that God sent Jesus into this world to preach a particular message and that message was, you guessed it, peace.

And yet today, in our Gospel reading, Jesus defies that entire line of thinking with one rather pointed rhetorical question, “Do you think that I came to bring peace to the earth?”  Well, all indications, from the songs in the sky to the words on the sacred page, seem to point to Yes.  Except that Jesus himself immediately answers his own question and his answer is a resounding no.  And then, so that no one in the crowd misunderstands, he elaborates on his simple no, adding: “I have come to bring division!”  Apparently stated adamantly enough to warrant an exclamation point in our English translation.

And so we have these two visions of Jesus: one the Prince of Peace, one the Divider.  Frankly, I don’t know about you, but I much prefer the former.  I don’t think we need a divine Divider.  We, human beings, are pretty good at division without Jesus’ help.  We don’t need Jesus to divide father and son, mother and daughter, mother-in-law and daughter-in-law.  We have politicians and media outlets for that.  And they are doing a bang-up job.

In these divided times, I find a Gospel like this very troubling.  I prefer my Jesus to bring the good things, the things that we seem to need much more of: love, joy, mercy, grace, peace.  I like when Jesus prays for unity “that they all may be one.”  I like when Jesus says, “everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”  I like when Jesus says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled” and “Do not be afraid” and “My peace I give to you.”  I like when Jesus says, “I am with you always, to the end of the age.”  I do not like when Jesus says, “I have come to bring division!”  I do not want to see families or communities or nations torn apart – especially in the name of Jesus.

Early in Jesus’ ministry, in this same Gospel of Luke, Jesus makes his first public preaching appearance.  Now, here, in today’s Gospel, Jesus says, “I came to bring fire and division.”  But at the beginning of his ministry, Jesus said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because God has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.  God has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”  No mention of division there, just the good stuff we want Jesus to bring.  The sermon ended in a mob trying to throw Jesus off of a cliff.

And so maybe what this tells us is that peace and division are not mutually exclusive, but rather intimately and inevitably linked.  Perhaps Jesus came to bring peace knowing that that also meant causing division.  Peace is, after all, a threat: a threat to every empire founded on dominance, to every economy supported by war, to every culture that enshrines violence as a value.  The great and terrible irony is that the history of martyrdom runs red with the blood of peacemakers.  Because peace is a threat.  Peace causes division.

This was the destiny into which the Son of God, the Prince of Peace, Jesus, was born.  It was always there.  When Mary and Joseph took the infant Jesus to the Temple for the first time, the Prophet Simeon, in a story recorded only in the Gospel of Luke, held the baby and rejoiced, “Lord, you now have set your servant free, to go in peace as you have promised; for these eyes of mine have seen the Savior, whom you have prepared for all the world to see: a Light to enlighten the nations, and the glory of your people Israel.”

But then away from the crowd, Simeon added this ominous omen, spoken to the holy child’s mother: “This child is destined for the falling and the rising of many, and to be a sign that will be opposed so that the inner thoughts of many will be revealed.”  And then he added, “And a sword will pierce your own soul too.” 

On one dark night, peace came into this world, announced by angels, celebrated by the heavens.  And it promised to change our world, to cleanse us of the violence that stains our history and our hands.  To offer us a new way into a better future.  To transform the terrors that haunt us into the dream of God: a new reality in which there is no more pain and no more death.  But that dream faced considerable opposition.  And on one dark day, not many years later, that peace was killed on a cross.  And we were forced to face an unbearable, but undeniable, truth: there is violence rooted deep down in the heart of our species – a species more adept at mourning our dead than sheathing our swords. 

Violence is a reality with which we are far too familiar; it is a force on this planet that can seem unstoppable.  But we know it is not.  Because we are Easter people; and Easter morning tells us that God has the answer to our violence.  Violence surrounds us but peace is our destiny.  That is the future God is writing; that is the dream God is dreaming. 

And as we wait for that dream to come true, the divine Divider has work to do: divide, in this case, heart from violence.  So that there is, in us, enough space for the Prince of Peace to settle in and make his home.