Kindling Fire

In this weekend's Gospel reading, Jesus says,

"I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed! Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided: father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law."

The Rev. James Ligget has said of this passage,

No gentle Jesus, meek and mild, no easy yokes or light burdens, no kind words about love and forgiveness. This is the other side of the Gospel, the other side of the faith; the side that we don’t embrace quite so willingly. But there it is and it is very much a part of the whole Christian message.

And we need to hear it. We simply cannot ignore or overlook the reality that God offers us a vision of what human life can be, and what it should be. We pretty much know what that vision is. It has to do with shaping ourselves as people by living faithfully with God at the absolute center of our lives....

And when Jesus talks about fire, and about his baptism, and about division and conflict, he is talking about what it looks like and what it feels like to struggle to live this way—to be faithful to the vision.

The full text of his sermon is online here: Selected Sermon.

Note:
Our Pool Party is today from 12 noon to 3 p.m. at Honey Creek with a cookout, the pool and sea kayaking.