Did we hear Jesus correctly in the Gospel? Jesus tells the people, “Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.” I remember at Christmas, the angels singing, “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to people of good will!” Jesus’ birth was to bring peace to a humanity afflicted with illness, pestilence, hatred and violence. Yet today, Jesus is saying that it is not peace he is to establish on earth but division. How does this make any sense?
In our second reading, the author of the letter to the Hebrews writes that human division is a product of Sin. If we are to find peace of which the angels sang, our eyes must be constantly focused on Jesus, who is the leader and the perfecter of our faith. Division, calamity, and destruction that we experience in the world is the result of human eyes focused not on Jesus, but focused on ourselves.
My dad grew up in the mountains of western Pennsylvania and he was fond of telling a story about two women who grew up in those mountains. The women were unmarried, sisters, living together, and faithful members of their Baptist church. They read the Bible daily. However the two women also had a weakness for chewing tobacco. Sundays always found them in the front pew of their little church. One Sunday, there was a visiting minister who gave one of those fire and brimstone sermons on the evils afflicting humanity. He preached vehemently about the sin of dancing. The one sister remarked to the other, “Oh, he is a fine preacher.” “Amen to Jesus!” the other sister responded. Then the preacher took up the evils of alcohol. “Oh, he’s ablaze with the Holy Spirit!” said one sister to the other. “Give it to them sinners, Reverend!” the other sister shouted. Then, the preacher began to preach against the evils of tobacco. One of the sisters spat some tobacco juice on the floor and complained, “Well, now he’s just meddling.”
As this story illustrates, while we may think our eyes are fixed on Jesus, our eyes are often only fixed on ourselves. Even the most well-intentioned of us struggle to drag our eyes away from ourselves with all of our own prejudices, and our own preconceived ideas of righteousness. If our gaze is fixed only on ourselves, we only manifest and perpetuate the sin and evils that have afflicted humanity from the time of Adam and Eve.
In today’s gospel, Jesus acknowledges that the way of God is in direct contradiction to the ways of the world and thus there will be division. Jesus makes it clear that if we, as his disciples, fix our gaze on him, our lives will be lived in direct contradiction to that of the world. The world tells us that we are to destroy our enemies, “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” Jesus says in response to the world, “No, that is not the way of God. The law mandated by God is, “love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you.” The world tells us that we are to place ourselves first before others. Jesus says in response to the world, “No! We are to be as servants to one another. The last shall be first and the first shall be last.” The world tells us that we must preserve our lives at all cost. And, Jesus says in direct contradiction to the world, “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” In Matthew’s Gospel, we hear that when Peter pleads with Jesus not to go to Jerusalem and so avoid dying, Jesus turns on Peter saying, “Get behind me, Satan! You are an obstacle to me. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.” To think as God thinks and live as God intends us to live will place us in direct contradiction to those who think only as human beings do. There will be division.
May we take to heart the words of the second reading, today. Let us rid ourselves of every burden and sin that clings to us, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus who is the leader and the perfecter of our faith. In focusing our lives on Jesus, we will find the peace of which the angels sang on Christmas morn. For it is only in Jesus that we will find true joy and happiness.
