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Introduction
Whether we care to admit it or not, and whether we like it or not, the truth is that
our country is at war. The young men and women of America’s armed services are in
the field even as I am speaking this morning. And it’s not only that our country is
engaged in war in Iraq or in Afghanistan—it’s that many other countries of the world are
engaged in various wars.
According to the most recent statistics, there are currently eight major wars under
way, which means that there are eight military conflicts inflicting 1,000 battlefield deaths
per year. Along with this are as many as two dozen lesser conflicts with varying
degrees of intensity.1
There are also conflicts in India, Israel, Nepal, Russia, Sri Lanka to name a few
more.
War is an unquestionable reality in our world that wreaks havoc on men and
women and boys and girls all over the globe.
1 http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/index.html
Think about it for a moment. If nobody likes war, why do we human beings
continue to fight them? “As a last resort,” you say? Well, that might be true for some
countries, but not all. War as a last resort does not account for every war that is
currently taking place; nor does it account for those that have taken place in the past.
War can be a very efficient way of consolidating power. The success in history of
various totalitarian regimes makes this clear.
So on the one hand, we’re told that nobody wants to go to war, that nobody likes
war, but loves peace. And on the other hand, we have this inescapable reality called
war, which has happened ever since the fall of man into sin. So which is it, do we love
peace or do we love war? Well, I would suggest both. On the one hand, we love war
(it’s in our nature to bicker and quarrel and fight and kill), and on the other hand, we
know that it’s not the ideal—it’s never the ideal.
And the reason it’s never the ideal is that God did not make us to be at odds with
one another; he made us for peace and harmony. Our sin has turned that peace upside
down. We experience war within ourselves, war with other people, and war among
nations. And in every case we are both perpetrator and victim.
This is how it has been since the fall of man into sin.
But God did not want us to remain in this miserable condition. He wanted to
rescue us from the condition into which we plunged. Oh, it’s true that we brought it on
ourselves, that our condition is our fault; that we would get what we deserved if God
were to do nothing except punish us for our disobedience to his commands and our
defiance of his authority. But this is what makes God’s love so amazing—even though
we made our bed, we don’t have to sleep in it.
So since our fall into sin, the Lord promised to send someone to rescue us from
our sin, and in particular, from the war that penetrates and surrounds us. From the time
of our fall into sin, God has promised to bring peace to his people.
Promises of Peace
Though we could multiply examples of the promise of peace, I want begin this
morning by showing you some of the key passages in the Old Testament prophets that
the Lord used to prepare his people for a time of unparalleled peace and prosperity, a
time that by God’s timetable was coordinated with and found its fulfillment in the person
and ministry of Jesus Christ. Turn with me to your Bible and let’s read these texts cf.
Isaiah 9:6-7; 55:10-12; Nahum 1:15; Zechariah 8:4-5; 9:9-10.
6
For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will
rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. 7 There will be no end to the increase of His
government or of peace, On the throne of David and over his kingdom, To establish it
and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal
of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this (Isaiah 9:6-7).
10
"For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, And do not return
there without watering the earth And making it bear and sprout, And furnishing seed to
the sower and bread to the eater; 11 So will My word be which goes forth from My
mouth; It will not return to Me empty, Without accomplishing what I desire, And without
succeeding in the matter for which I sent it. 12 "For you will go out with joy And be led
forth with peace; The mountains and the hills will break forth into shouts of joy before
you, And all the trees of the field will clap their hands (Isaiah 55:10-12).
15
Behold, on the mountains the feet of him who brings good news, Who
announces peace! Celebrate your feasts, O Judah; Pay your vows. For never again will
the wicked one pass through you; He is cut off completely (Nahum 1:15).
4
"Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Old men and old women will again sit in the
streets of Jerusalem, each man with his staff in his hand because of age. 5 'And the
streets of the city will be filled with boys and girls playing in its streets' (Zechariah 8:4-5).
9
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of
Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation,
Humble, and mounted on a donkey, Even on a colt, the foal of a donkey. 10 I will cut off
the chariot from Ephraim; And the horse from Jerusalem; And the bow of war will be cut
off. And He will speak peace to the nations; And His dominion will be from sea to sea,
And from the River to the ends of the earth (Zechariah 9:9-10).
And the promises for peace for Israel’s future do not end with the prophets of the
Old Testament; they continue even as we read the New Testament. Turn with me in
your Bibles to Luke 1:76-79; 2:8-14.
76
"And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; For you will go on
BEFORE THE LORD TO PREPARE HIS WAYS; 77 To give to His people the knowledge
of salvation by the forgiveness of their sins, 78 Because of the tender mercy of our God,
with which the Sunrise from on high will visit us, 79 TO SHINE UPON THOSE WHO SIT
IN DARKNESS AND THE SHADOW OF DEATH, to guide our feet into the way of
peace" (Luke 1:76-79).
8
In the same region there were some shepherds staying out in the fields and
keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 And an angel of the Lord suddenly stood
before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them; and they were terribly
frightened. 10 But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you good
news of great joy which will be for all the people; 11 for today in the city of David there
has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 12 "This will be a sign for you:
you will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger." 13 And suddenly there
appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, 14
"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased"
(Luke 2:8-14).
Since the time of the fall of man into sin, God’s people waited for a time of peace
and prosperity, a time when God would make all wars to cease. According to
Zacharias’ prophecy and the proclamation and praise of the angelic heavenly host, that
time had come upon God’s people.
So then, what have we seen so far? First, God promised in the Old Testament
that in the future he would bring peace through his anointed one, the Christ, the
Messiah. And second, God declared through Zacharias and the multitude of the
heavenly host that this Jesus was the one who would bring in that promised peace.
Jesus was the one who would bring peace among men—finally.
So then, what’s the bottom line? Jesus says that he brings not peace but rather
division—not harmony, but discord. How does this work? Are Jesus’s words simply at
odds with Zacharias’ and the heavenly hosts? Well, no. Actually there is no
contradiction; the two can be reconciled.
And we can begin to reconcile the two ideas in what Jesus intends to
communicate in verse 52: from now on five members in one household will be
divided, three against two and two against three. The phrase that I’ve just
emphasized (from now on) is a key to understanding what Jesus is getting at; namely,
that Jesus’ coming forever alters future relationships.
Put differently, no one can be neutral with respect to Jesus. Jesus is saying that
he is a polarizing figure. He’s not that good moral teacher that many people think he is.
Jesus’ coming means not peace but rather division because from the time of his
coming forward, people’s allegiances would be challenged.
Jesus is not a flavor of ice cream. I say I like chocolate. You say you like vanilla.
And we’re both happy. Your conviction about Jesus doesn’t work like that. It can (and
will) create heat in your relationships. When my wife was converted to Christianity, her
parents told her to abandon the faith, her fellowship, and her local church. When she
refused and planned to marry a Protestant (me), they took her pictures down. Paul tells
Timothy that if anyone wants to live godly in Christ Jesus, he will be persecuted.
So what Jesus is doing here is telling us that his coming is a call to allegiance.
Where is your allegiance? Is your allegiance to your family, to your way of life, to your
dreams and goals and aspirations in work, marriage, and home? Where does your
allegiance lie?
Jesus is not someone that you can flirt with, you have to make a commitment to
him; there is no mediating position, which is why in the parallel passage in Matthew,
Matthew concludes with this: “He who loves father or mother more than Me is not
worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.
And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me” (Matthew
10:37-38).
Now then, how does this reconcile with Jesus being the one who brings peace?
Well, it doesn’t exactly. We need more. Look ahead to Luke 19:41-44.
41
When He approached Jerusalem, He saw the city and wept over it, 42 saying,
"If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace! But now they
have been hidden from your eyes. 43 "For the days will come upon you when your
enemies will throw up a barricade against you, and surround you and hem you in on
every side, 44 and they will level you to the ground and your children within you, and they
will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not recognize the time of
your visitation" (Luke 19:41-44).
Verse 42 is very helpful…for at least two reasons. First, we see that Jesus is
interested in peace. So there is a sense in which Jesus did come to bring peace.
Second, we see that Israel’s blindness was that they did not understand the things
which make for peace.
The phrase the things which make for peace refers to what it is that will bring
the peace Israel has been waiting for. Now we know that Jesus is the one who brings
the peace of God. Zacharias prophesied that Jesus would guide his people’s feet into
the way of peace. And the host of heaven proclaimed peace among men at Jesus’
birth. So Jesus is the emissary of peace. But the way he brings it is surprising. He
brings it through division. He brings it through the division he creates by the call to
follow him. He brings peace through allegiance to him.
So Jesus does indeed bring God’s promised peace, he just brings his own
version of it—the true version of it, the best version of peace imaginable. Jesus’ peace
is not achieved through military power or conquest, but by a demonstration of the
sovereign power of God. And neither does Jesus’ peace mean the end of wars on the
earth. Oh, eventually and at the Second Coming, wars will become a thing of the past,
but in the meantime Jesus does bring peace—but in his own way.
The bottom line is that Jesus’ peace is found in our allegiance to him; ironically,
it’s found in the division that our allegiance to him creates.
1. Now then, why is it that God’s people would have a problem with this? Why
would his coming bring not peace but division?
2. Why wouldn’t the people simply accept their messiah and give their loyalty to
him?
3. Well, the answer is that his people are already loyal to something or
someone. In fact, we are all loyal to something or someone. In Romans 1,
Paul says that everyone worships; that is, everyone is loyal to a god. In our
sin, we have exchanged the glory of God for an image in the form of man
(gods in our image) or in the form of birds or four-footed animals or crawling
creatures (Romans 1:23).
Now if you are not a Christian this morning, you have never pledged your
allegiance to Jesus Christ. And by pledging allegiance I do not mean the way we all
pledged allegiance to the flag in school—by monotonous rote without any heart. If you
are not a Christian this morning, you have not pledged your allegiance to Christ in the
sense that you have not submitted your life to him in such a way that you have yielded
the driver’s seat to him. You are committed to something or someone else.
He must be first in order for you to experience the peace that he promises. Now
as we can see from this passage in Luke 12, the peace that he promises creates friction
in your life.
But since Jesus’ peace is other-worldly, it is a peace that surpasses your ability
even to explain it, that surpasses your ability intellectually to comprehend it. It is a
peace that allows you to transcend the difficulties of life with a sense of rest and joy
because your life (your life now and forever) is securely in the hands of the prince of
peace.
But more important than that is that the peace that Jesus gives is peace with
God. Did you know that you are at war with God? If you are not a Christian, you are at
war with God, even if you don’t feel like you are? How do I know this? Because of what
we’ve already seen! Peace as God defines it is understood exclusively in terms of your
relationship to Jesus, your allegiance to Jesus Christ. Without that allegiance, you are
at war with God, whether you know it or not.
Maybe you’re wondering how it could be that you could be at war with God and
not know that you’re at war with him. Hey…that’s a good question. You’d think that if
you were hostile toward someone, you’d feel hostility toward him or her—you’d have
some sense of it.
Well, the reason it’s hard to tell is that that no one’s motives and desires are
absolutely pure or absolutely impure. Whether you’re a believer or an unbeliever,
you’re a human being. And as a human being none of us appears black and white,
we’re all shades of gray. As we consciously examine our own hearts, we see a
confusing mixture of good and evil motives and desires. Christians fall short of the ideal
and non-Christians can exhibit some of the very virtues that characterize Christians.
But we are notoriously poor judges of what’s really going on in our own hearts.
We need something better than our ability to examine our own hearts; we need a third
party to open our eyes to the reality. And this is what the Lord has done in the
Scriptures. As the writer to the Hebrews has said, “For the word of God is living and
active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul
and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of
the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and
laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do” (Hebrews 4:12-13).
And what the Scriptures tell us is that the reality is that there is a fundamental
conflict that exists, a war that exists between God and his enemies.
Colossians 1:21 says that in our unbelieving condition we are hostile toward God.
Ephesians 2:3 says that as unbelievers we were by nature children of wrath (the objects
of God’s wrath). John’s first epistle says that humanity can be classified into two stark
and broad categories: the children of God and the children of the devil, children of light
and children of darkness, those with the Spirit of Christ and those with the spirit of
antichrist. And the book of Revelation, above all books in the Bible, allows us to take a
glimpse behind the curtain and see the reality of this fundamental conflict in all its
beastly ugliness.
According to God’s word, you are either his friend or his foe. You cannot be part
friend and part foe. According to Scripture, there is a polarization of allegiance in the
hearts of men. This is the reality of life at its most fundamental level.
And yet, just above the surface of this black-and-white fundamental reality there
are hearts that are adept at covering up our true loyalties. What we are able to do—and
do deftly—is to obscure the polarization with civility and moderation. In the words of
one writer, we have fashioned “an obscuring curtain of civilizing and moderating ploys
that conceal our deepest allegiances.”2
Now then, what are some civilizing and moderating ploys that we human beings
use to conceal our deepest allegiances? How about these?
2 Vern S Poythress, The Returning King: A Guide to the Book of Revelation (P & R, 2000), 130.
4. Living and letting live (saying “That’s okay for you. I’m glad that works
for you. It’s true for you but not true for me.”)
5. Sharing with others (tools, sugar)
6. Looking out for our neighbors (getting their mail, mowing their lawn
while they’re on vacation, waiting at the bus stop for their kids)
These are just some of the ways we try to trick ourselves into believing that we
aren’t at odds with our maker, the tactics we employ to make it seem like things aren’t
so bad.
I say that material things and our vision of ideal family life are enemies of Christ
not because giving things (and receiving things) are wrong, or because warm and
wonderful family relationships are wrong, but simply because our desires for them
threaten our allegiance to Christ. James 4:1 says the source of all our quarrels and
conflicts (the source of our lack of peace) is that our desires are at war in our hearts,
vying for supremacy.
We want to give the “right” gift to someone—that’s not bad. But we transfer our
allegiance from Christ to that desire when we are willing to be poor stewards of our
money in order to get it, or when we are willing to be anxious over their response or how
we will be perceived (will they think we’re cheap or that we don’t love them as much as
someone else).
Or I want to have the “perfect” Christmas Eve dinner. I want our Christmas to be
like that picture print by Currier and Ives—again, not bad, but this desire can capture
our allegiance when we become dour and cranky because we don’t have snow or when
we become short and irritable as we’re preparing the meal or when we become
embittered against the person who thought there was too much salt in the gravy.
I think you see what I mean. You can come up with your own examples. The
issue is that as soon as we take our eyes from Jesus Christ, as soon as we transferred
our loyalties, we have missed the meaning of Christmas.
Conclusion
1. In every circumstance of life, Jesus asks us to reaffirm our loyalty to him.
Every circumstance is an opportunity to live for Christ or for ourselves.
2. And you can do this. If you are in Christ, the war with God is over; you don’t
need to try to trick yourself into believing that all is well, because all is well.
You are no longer God’s enemy, the object of his hostility. Through Christ
you are his friend. And because you are his friend, though you will stumble
and give in to competing allegiances, you can always return to him.
Amen.