Isaiah 5:1-7
5:1 Let me sing for my beloved my love-song concerning his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines; he built a watchtower in the midst of it, and hewed out a wine vat in it; he expected it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes. And now, inhabitants of Jerusalem and people of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard.
What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it? When I expected it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes? And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and it shall be overgrown with briers and thorns; I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it. For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the people of Judah are his pleasant planting; he expected justice, but saw bloodshed; righteousness, but heard a cry!
Luke 12:49-56
12:49 “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.”
He also said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, you immediately say, ‘It is going to rain’; and so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, ‘There will be scorching heat’; and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?
The Word of God for the people of God.
Thanks be to God.
You may recall that last week I spoke of alarms, Of how those alarms can startle us out of our complacency and even cause us some level of fear. I spoke of how sometimes the alarms are imprecise but that it is up to us to listen so that we do not ignore those alarms when they are important. But, that – fear is not an excuse to not listen and fear should not be an excuse to keep on keeping on as though there was never an announcement or a message at all.
Today we hear more prophetic words. Prophets have a hard job. They have to show up at the most inopportune times, say things that no one wants to hear, and say it over and over in the face of almost certain apathy, hostility, and in some cases outright violence. Throughout the scriptures, the job of the prophets is to get the attention of the people – in whatever way they can. The words can often be off putting or just outright weird. The prophet Joel – who we usually hear from during lent uses language of destruction to grab the attention of the people in order to show the difference between where the people are and where they should be.
It might be worth thinking of their work this way, a prophet is a warning – they are an alarm sounding on a system that is having problems. They are not like an alarm clock which jolts you from sleep to attend to your day at a predetermined moment, rather they are more like a tornado warning, a fire alarm, or the siren on an ambulance. I once compared the words of the prophets to a siren you might have heard on the playground many years ago. You knew when you heard the siren that you needed to stop what you were doing, and to listen for what came next because whatever came next was really important. The prophets’ words and actions are like those sirens – their words and actions are meant to grab your attention – to break through the myriad of other worldly distractions that are competing for your attention and to make you focus on the problem at hand.
Sometimes the prophets speak in metaphors – for example in our Isaiah passage today, the prophet uses the image of a vineyard as a way of describing the relationship between God, the people of Israel and the house of Judah. There were hopes and dreams described in the first half of the passage – the vineyard owner had tended to the ground, cleared it of stones, made it hospitable and fertile, he planted the best vines, and built a watch tower so that the vines might be watched over and protected from threats that might destroy them. The owner tended to the vineyard – put into it hopes and dreams, expecting a good return. Instead, it seems that all he received was wild grapes.
You might think – well that’s not that bad, I mean he still got fruit, right? In this case, imagine planting grapes and getting pokeberries. So the vineyard owner plowed the whole thing under. Better luck next time. The prophet spoke to the people of that time in language they understood – if we retold this parable today, it might sound like this:
A builder bought plots of land, cleared them, and prepared them for new homes. They dug the foundations, bought the latest materials, and lots of supplies, and built beautiful houses. They made sure that the foundations had time to set, the supplies were properly cared for and the workers given time to build safely. After the houses were finished, the foundations cracked, the wooden floors warped, the paint on the walls peeled, and the pipes rusted through. So the builder knocked the houses down and began again.
All the hard work and care in the world were given and the result was a failure. That seems to be what the prophet is describing as the state of the relationship between God, the people of Israel and the house of Judah.
I have read many commentaries on the work of the prophets and I have heard people say they don’t like these parts of scripture – that they feel that the God portrayed in Isaiah is angry. The words Jesus uses today read much the same as those that Isaiah used. They can be read as disturbing and out of line with the mental pictures of gentle Jesus, meek and mild. But that image of Jesus as meek and mild isn’t the full picture. It’s not the full picture of any of us.
The prophetic words that Jesus is speaking here are full of passion – they are meant to grab your attention – like that warning siren on the playground all those years ago. They are meant to make us stop what we are doing – and pay attention. Because what comes next might just save our lives.
I guess the next question that presents is – Are those words spoken from a place of anger or of deep care? I believe that they come from a place of deep caring and love. I think of it like this – if it is me and I have to grab a child to stop them from burning their hand on the stove or running into the street after a ball – my words might very likely sound angry. I might look angry – because anger is a fear reaction. I don’t want to see the potential outcome of letting either of those dangerous actions play out. I might yell, harshly in some cases. My words are unlikely to be gentle or mild.
My words will be meant to grab attention – meant to make the intended recipient pay attention – that is to distract them and hopefully reorient them in a way that will not result in injury or allow a dangerous scenario to develop. Those words and actions come from a place of deep love and care and an intent to avoid something much worse.
Let’s dig a bit more. It might help us to understand Jesus’s word if we look at this passage in context – Jesus was having dinner with teachers of the law and members of the local religious establishment when he said to them – y’all are focused on the wrong things – you are so tied up in making sure that people see you in all your splendor that you are not living the law as we teach it. You are distracting the people – not helping them find their way. Those are hard words to hear, but ones that a prophet would be called to say. Having said that to the religious leaders and lawyers, he went outside following his meal. When he went out he found the gathered crowd and began to teach them using parables interspersed with assurances and exhortations to not fear because God is present with the people.
Our passage today comes toward the end of that moment in scripture. Just before our passage – Peter asked Jesus if the parables that he was teaching were for the disciples, or for everyone.
In return Jesus told them another parable and then turned to the gathered crowd and tells them “I came to cast fire upon the earth. How I wish that it was already ablaze! I have a baptism I must experience. How I am distressed until it’s completed! Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, I have come instead to bring division. From now on, a household of five will be divided—three against two and two against three. Father will square off against son and son against father; mother against daughter and daughter against mother; and mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.”
Disturbing words to catch their attention, to catch our attention – words like a siren that break in and grab at you. Jesus is telling everyone listening that things are changing. To those people hearing Jesus’ words in real time, or to those a few years later as they heard Luke’s gospel, to those people living in a time of imperial Roman persecution and oppression these words would have resonated. They would have recognized that there was and is a cost to following Christ. The Prince of Peace places them at odds with the Pax Romana—which divides them from family members who would prefer to “keep the peace” with the powers that be. The trick here is that “peace” has always meant more than getting along, or staying quiet so no one’s feelings are hurt. Is that really peace or just detente?
The prophets’ words might seem hurtful, but they come from a place of love, aimed at healing everyone – not just a select few. The problem here is that these words have been used to divide and to justify divisions. Fiery baptisms have been invoked to sanctify war and defend cruelty. Jesus’ description of family division has been co-opted to rationalize denominational schisms and excommunications that deny Christ’s labor of love. There is division that serves the gospel of peace, and there is division born of stubborn pride.
The issue we face is how to determine the difference.
The next few verses are intended to be useful for us – when Jesus says “When you see a cloud forming in the west, you immediately say, ‘It’s going to rain.’ And indeed it does. And when a south wind blows, you say, ‘A heat wave is coming.’ And it does. Hypocrites! You know how to interpret conditions on earth and in the sky. How is it that you don’t know how to interpret the present time? And why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right?
I am pretty sure we know this is not really a call to understand the weather outside but rather the weather that swirls around us. If we can see that the clouds on the horizon tell of a coming storm why do we disregard those events that tell us of coming societal storms. If we know that the wind blowing in tells of change that is coming, why do we deny the same change when the holy spirit blows through with winds of change for our church, state or nation?
We must ask the prophetic questions – have calls for unity become a synonym for complacency and avoidance? We must ask – are we being divisive when we stand up for the love of all of God’s children instead of just a select few? Does what we do serve building the kin-dom of God for all of God’s people, or just some of them? We must ask the prophetic question – are we avoiding the difficult work that is doing God’s work of Justice and love by ignoring that there are and have long been divisions among us?
Jesus’s call to do the work of building the kin-dom of God is a prophetic call. It is one that places us firmly with him on his journey to the cross, in solidarity with the oppressed, doing the work of feeding Jesus’s lambs and caring for Jesus’ sheep. The prophets’ words are intended to shake us from complacency – to jolt us into a state of readiness. They are intended to prepare us to love out loud in a multitude of ways. That love can look like – feeding our neighbors, preparing backpacks, or building houses. There are so many ways to answer the call to do God’s work of justice and love.
Cornell West said “never forget that justice is what love looks like in public” Friends, Jesus’ prophetic words call us to love one another in ways that might be surprising and startling. The kind of love that Jesus calls us to is the kind that may look like crucifixion, but ends in resurrection.
So let’s go out and do the work of loving out loud and Love all of God’s children in surprising and startling ways. Let’s go out and do the work of loving out loud in ways that break open hearts and minds and change the world.
Amen.
Matthew Messenger 