Luke 12:49-56 Commentary

As we continue in a time of great polarity and hostility, many of us know all too well the feeling of “father against son… and daughter against mother.” Does Jesus’s own frustration make us feel any better about the situation? Not really.

But his commitment to the struggle can bolster our own. Jesus’s teaching and ways, his very self, brought God’s purifying fire to earth, and his baptism was a symbolic representation of his calling as the Messiah God. Jesus’s time on earth was saturated with God’s redemptive purposes, lived out in his ministry, his demeanour, his passions, his prayers, everything. The “constraint” Jesus describes is this laser focus—everything was meant to show us how to seek and live the will of God for the world.

And Jesus’s frustration that it is not already so is palpable. The Prince of Peace (Luke 2.44) has to see so many of his subjects struggle against him, reject him, tear down what he builds. Yes, I can see why he’d be frustrated and wish that the final judgment was already here. Then, the new heaven and new earth would be established and all of this rebellion and infighting and struggle will be no more. Everything will be caught up in the complete and perfect fullness of God’s purpose.

But even here, God constrains God’s self, knowing that the Trinity has a plan for perfect completion that goes beyond what we humans can understand, and miraculously, involves us in the process—free will and all.

So what about the Prince of Peace confessing here that he did not come to bring peace? Jesus is actually confessing that this world will not see his ways as peace because they are diametrically opposed to how this world operates. In the case of opposition, peace feels like war—a war on a way of life, way of business, way of success, way of _____. You fill in the blank.

So when someone, say a family member like Jesus uses to illustrate his point here, “sees the light” and joins Team Jesus and begins to live differently, it will inevitably upset the family system and cause conflict. That conflict is a form of crisis—something we want to see resolved. Jesus’s peace will inevitably be the way that every crisis is resolved, but we humans will rebel against it until that final day. Those who choose to try to live the future reality will be frustrated and angry and suffer and need strength to persist because the pressure from even those closest to us to do the thing we know is right will be huge.

One of the ways that Jesus and the Spirit help us is by empowering us to interpret the times. And one of the reasons why people aren’t good at it is denial (they don’t want to be wrong). But another reason is just sheer ignorance and false religion, like when “Christian” values are unquestionably equated with a political party’s positions. And the reason this happens is because people don’t actually know the content of their faith. The Pew Research Forum’s study from 2019 proves this to be true: American Christians do not know more about the content of their faith than their non-Christian neighbours.

Knowledge is power. Knowledge is understanding. Knowledge allows us to act in appropriate and necessary ways. For instance, “What does the Lord require of you?” Scripture says, “To do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God.” (Micah 6.8) And Scripture says, Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And love your neighbour as yourself. (Mark 12.29-31)

Knowledge and acting on it will also cause division. Jesus proves that. Will we follow him into the frustration and pain that comes from challenging the status quo for the sake of the good news? Will we interpret conflict correctly—listening for the Spirit’s conviction of sin as well as God’s call to do what is right? Will we remember that just because we’ve made someone else uncomfortable may just as likely mean we’ve exposed their sin as it may point to the ones we’ve committed?

Will we be brave and reject false truths, even when they come from those we love most dearly? Will we be part of Jesus’s kingdom coming, or will we be part of the problem of not knowing the times we’re in?

Textual Point

I appreciate this reflection from Garret Keizer about the contradiction between Luke 2.14 and 12.51. What are we to do with the fact that Jesus’s birth is heralded as the Prince of Peace coming to earth and that he declares himself as bringing division instead of peace? For those who need to change, the coming of peace will often feel like war.

Illustration Idea

Also from an older The Christian Century reflection, Teresa Berger uses the words of activist Lisa Fithian to illustrate the way peace doesn’t feel like kumbaya but more like conflict and crisis. Here’s an excerpt:

Lisa Fithian seems to understand Jesus’ call to embody crisis. Fithian is a grassroots activist in the global peace-oriented movement for social justice. She has been arrested 30 times for intentionally creating crises, i.e., situations that force the powers that are—transnational corporations, the media, security forces, consumers—to cease doing business as usual, examine the inequities that they may be perpetuating, and change policies. In an interview [in 2003], Fithian explained: “When people ask me, ‘What do you do?’ I say I create crisis, because crisis is that edge where change is possible.” I wonder: Is this not what Jesus meant when he spoke of bringing fire to the earth? Did he not seek to bring crisis as “that edge where change is possible”? Was he not saying, as Lisa Fithian says, I have come to bring crisis because business as usual means injustice and death?