The Sword, the Cross, and True Peace

Jesus is called the Prince of Peace—so why does He say, "I have not come to bring peace, but a sword"?

In this sermon on Matthew 10:34–42, we wrestle with one of Christ's most difficult sayings. Jesus prepares His disciples for the painful reality that the gospel often divides families, exposes our disordered loves, and confronts us with the impossible demands of God's law. Yet those hard words are not the end of the story.

The same Christ whose word cuts also heals. The sword of the law ultimately falls upon Him at the cross so that sinners might receive the peace with God they could never earn for themselves. Drawing on the witness of St. Perpetua and St. Felicity, this sermon explores Christian courage, rightly ordered affections, and the hope that enables believers to remain steadfast even when faith is costly.

In this sermon:

• Why the gospel sometimes brings division rather than earthly peace
• The difference between worldly peace and the peace of Christ
• How the law exposes our deepest need
• Augustine on rightly ordered loves
• The witness of the early martyrs
• Why the cross transforms Jesus' hardest sayings into good news

"The sword Christ came to bring was ultimately turned upon Himself, so that those who come to Him might know the peace that passes all understanding."

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

I will not I will not disappear to his hose that soul shall never to say I'll never know never no never forsake Father this day we pray especially that you would attend your word by your spirit that you would give us ears to hear rightly that you would give us minds to discern and understand that you would give us hearts of faith to rest in and trust and believe your goodness and your promises made to us in your son Jesus Christ. And we pray these things in his name and for his sake. Amen. Please be seated. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out. Throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. Again, I tell you, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God. Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide, and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many, for the gate is narrow, and the way is hard, that leads to life. And those who find it are few. So Jesus said to them, Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Those are just some of my favorite of Jesus' really hard sayings. Those words which, when they spring forth from our Lord's lips, they jar us. It's easy to kind of muddle along through life, muddle through our Bible reading plans, muddle along through most of a congregational worship service, as those familiar words of peace and of rest as they wash over us, as we recount them in scripture and prayer and in song. But every once in a while we find ourselves jarred awake by do not think that I have come to bring peace, but a sword. And if that weren't hard enough, I've come to set father against son, daughter against mother, daughter-in-law against mother-in-law. What is it that we're supposed to do with what we just read? Every once in a while, I'm struck when we do these gospel readings. You know, it's it's it's bracketed by these statements. The gospel of the Lord, praise to you, Lord Christ. Really? As Jesus sends his disciples out to proclaim the arrival of the kingdom of God, to point the people to the promises of God that a savior would indeed come. And not just that a savior would come, but that as the disciples are going to proclaim, a savior has come. He has arrived. He prepares these disciples for what they will face. Their expectations for the Messiah and for his kingdom are all about triumph and thrones and feasting. And all of those expectations were about to be dashed by the reality of heralding the kingdom of God in a sinful world that is indeed at war, open rebellion against that very kingdom. At least for the moment, those hopes and dreams will be dashed. Jesus says that instead they're going to face hostility, opposition, division, even at that most essential and fundamental of levels, at the level of their family, because the gospel divides. Many of you know that intimately. We read of fathers set against sons and daughters and daughters-in-law against their mothers, and it all hits a little too close to home. You see, for so many who hear that gospel, that Christ has come to save sinners, and Christ indeed delights to save sinners. For many who hear that gospel, they respond believing that good news. For many of them, it will mean a rift, a fissure within their very own household, between those most intimate of relationships. As Jesus says, a person's enemy will be those that they've grown up with. Those who nursed them and cared for them and their infancy. In our society, that can look like chilly relationships or children cutting off their Christian parents. That works both ways, by the way. And that is true pain. It is true suffering. I don't want to minimize that at all. But I just want to kind of step back and look at it a little more broadly. Oftentimes for Jews, that means having a funeral for that black sheep who has gone astray and considering them dead. And of course, in the Muslim world, the gospel, when it comes like a sword, bringing division, it very often does come like a sword. And it means death at the hands of father and mother, sister and brother. When the kingdom of God comes near, it is for many the peace and the life that their restless hearts have been longing for, and for others, is an offense and a sword. I think some of our struggle with this passage is that we so often have a paltry understanding of what peace is. We think of peace as some noble geopolitical aspiration, which is true. It would be a better world if we weren't constantly shooting missiles at one another and we weren't constantly at war with one another. That is true, but that's not the peace that Jesus is talking about and that the gospel brings. It's not even that peace around a family meal where we're just nervously praying that no one starts to re-air all the dirty laundry or no one brings up a political conversation so that our quiet family meal doesn't descend into some type of verbal fireworks show or jousting. The peace that Christ brought as he was heralded as the Prince of Peace, that's what Isaiah calls him down the tunnel of time. That's what the angels were singing about peace on earth, goodwill to men. That peace, the peace of God which passes all understanding, is an existential peace. And it's not simply your existential peace, your inner peace, or my peace, though that is a foretaste. But the peace that Christ has come to bring is cosmic peace. It is rest. It is a return to the tranquility and the delight of Eden, where fellowship is full and perfect, where all possible joys are known, where the work of our hands is not a toil but a delight where we can once again walk with the Lord in the cool of the day. This is the peace that the Prince of Peace has come to bring. And you and I should not be satisfied with any lesser substitute. This peace is the peace that the world hates. Because this is not a peace that we can manufacture by our striving and by our effort. It's not the peace that we get as a reward for all our diligence and all our good work, for all our faithful observance of all the religious rituals, for all of our praying, for all of our Bible reading plans. No, this peace is simply a gift. It's a gift. And so the world hates it. It is a gift that our passage has told us is the reward of the righteous man. Well, that of course leads us to another problem, doesn't it? Who is righteous? Who is worthy of this peace that Christ brings? Echoing the psalmist, St. Paul tells us what we all know deep down inside in Romans chapter 3, to answer that question, who is worthy? There is none who is righteous. There is no one who understands. There is no one who seeks after God. But good sermons are oftentimes front-loaded with a bit of bad news. But that's because the law is bad news for you and me. When Christ comes bearing a sword, he comes with that sword of the law, showing us just how far we fall short of God's righteousness and his holiness. How utterly hopeless and helpless we are according to our own ability and our own reckoning. So maybe you're like me and you're looking at these words from our Lord Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, and you're thinking, I don't like this passage. It's okay. The word of God is strong enough to stand up against your momentary dislike of any given passage. The Father is not offended. Don't worry about that. It's okay to come to Scripture and say, I don't like this, but I want you to bear with me for just a few moments, as hopefully we turn from law and condemnation to the promise of the gospel and the gloriously good news of the resurrected Christ. We kind of started into this last week with verse 32 of chapter 10. That's on page 765 of your Pew Bible. If you want to follow along with me, of course, in your own copy of the scriptures. We read in verse 32 of chapter 10, everyone who acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge before my father who is in heaven. But whoever denies me before men, I will also deny before my father who is in heaven. Friends, if that is a standard, if that's a bar that we have to somehow clamor over without knocking it down, I don't know about you, but I'm in I'm in pretty deep trouble. As I look back over the course of my life, even as I look back, not on the over the course of my entire life, but just over the course of the past week, how diligent and how faithful have I been in acknowledging Christ before men. Tell you friends, I've left a little to be desired in that category. Everyone who acknowledges me. Verse 37. Everyone who is worthy of me, whoever loves father or mother more than me. That one's tough. But I might be able to screw up just enough willpower. A couple moments of every day to love Jesus and of my own power more than I love my precious mother and father. Whoever loves son or daughter more than me. That's a far taller order, especially over the last few weeks, as our eldest has been across the sea in Europe. Friends, the weight of the law's expectations, that's what Jesus is laying out here. The weight of the law's expectations is crushing. Especially in light of the law-bearer and the law keeper, Jesus Christ. When he comes near with his perfect obedience to the law, with his holiness and righteousness, our utter and ability is undeniable. And we are left exposed. St. Paul talks about this in Hebrews. Well, the word of God, he says it is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword. And what does it do? It pierces and it divides. But there is, I think, hope in this passage. What Jesus is calling us to is not to greater exertion in loving our parents or our children less. What Jesus is not calling us to necessarily, though maybe, is to constant days out on street corners preaching the gospel. Again, he may be calling you to that, and that would be wonderful. There's nothing wrong with that, but that's not necessarily what he's calling all of us to when he says, whoever denies me and whoever acknowledges me. I think what Jesus is calling us to is to rightly ordered loves and affections.

unknown 15:08

St.

SPEAKER_00 15:08

Augustine is really helpful with this and talks about this in the City of God and, of course, a number of other places, but without diving too deep, this is what the gospel does. It takes our disordered loves and it places them in the right order. So when we love God supremely, then and only then can we actually love our mother and father, our sister and brother, our dear and precious children and our neighbors. Then only can we love them rightly and well. Because it's only in loving God supremely that we actually know what love is. That's also, I would suggest to you, the remedy for your battle against sin. Your battle against sin is not won by beating yourself up with the law that has already condemned you. Your battle against sin is won by loving God supremely and above all things. By living into the new birth, the promise that you have died with Christ in baptism, as we read in Romans, and that you have been raised with Christ in his resurrection, and you are a new creation. So when Jesus comes, he comes bearing, bringing the law to bear on you and me. It seems so incredibly harsh, but friends, it is a mercy because it's only in rightly perceiving our desperate condition that we can then turn in gratitude and love to all that Christ has done for us. Every March 7th, it rolls around on the church calendar. If you follow the church calendar, you will have noticed it. There's a day where we commemorate Saints Perpetua and Felicity. I don't know if you know much of their story, but I'll recount it for you in brief. Perpetua was a well-educated, wealthy, honest Roman noble woman who had come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Her father was a Roman pagan and he feared for her safety. This is in the late 100s and the early 200s. And so he often asked her, pleaded with her through tears that she would give up this Christian thing, this little trail that she had begun to walk down. One day her father confronted her again and perpetually she pointed to a vase in their home and asked, maybe in South Georgia that's called a vase, I don't know. But pointed to it and asked her if he could call it anything other than what it was. Of course not, was his reply. Perpetua then said, just like this vase cannot be called anything other than what it is, so I cannot be called anything other than what I am. A Christian. Despite her father's persistence, she remained steadfast in her faith, and one day the authorities came knocking on their door. And as they came asking for her, she didn't bat an eye. She and Felicity, her friend and her slave, they were taken captive and brought one last time after a course of ill treatment and torture in Roman prisons, brought one last time before the Roman governor. And this is what she recounts in her passion, which I encourage you to find and to read through, the passion of Saint Perpetua and Saint Felicity. She says, My father appeared with my son. Just a few months old. And he drew me down from the steps, saying, Have pity on your child, Perpetua. The governor himself joined in this appeal. Spare your father's gray hairs, spare your infant son, offer sacrifice for the welfare of the emperors. I will not, she replied. The governor asked her, Do you still say you are Christian? I am a Christian. Well, that sealed her fate. The day of their victory dawned, the passion goes on, and as she and Felicity and the others went from the prison into the amphitheater, they went joyful, with brilliant countenances, trembling, not with fear, but with joy. On their way, Perpetua and the other Christians, they sang hymns, they called out to the people, they met along the way that they would repent of their sins and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Because of her obstinacy, the Romans chose an especially vicious punishment for Perpetua and Felicity. They would be subjected to a mad heifer. The heifer was a symbol to the Romans of fertility and motherhood, as both of them were young mothers. They stepped into the arena, the gates were closed behind, their faces, though, were serene. And as that heifer trampled them and beat them about, the women remained uncowed. Her garment torn, Perpetua picked it up to cover herself so that she might protect her modesty. Eventually, Felicity succumbed to her wounds from the heifer, but Perpetua lived on, and so a young gladiator was sent to kill her. Saying that the young man hesitated, the sword trembling in his hand, Perpetua took his wrist and guided the blade to her own throat. Perpetual felicity, so many other martyrs in the first few centuries of the church, martyrs in our own century, indeed, they come to us as symbols of courage and strength, but a courage and strength. That is not their own. A courage and strength given to them by Christ, and a hope and a promise that they have that because he conquered death, they too by him have conquered death, and that for them death was now just the entrance into eternal life. Jesus comes with hard sayings. So that we would not be grasping, clinging desperately to the lives that we have built here of our own mettle and our own ingenuity, but instead that we would let go and we would rest in his pierced hands, knowing that there is no better place, no place more secure than we could ever be. I have one final excuse me. Sorry about that. I have one uh one final hard word for you today. Technology. John chapter 14. Jesus says, I am the way and the truth. And the life. That, of course, is not the hard word of Jesus. We all love that part. I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. That hard saying, no one comes to the Father except through me, it is transformed when we realize that the sword that Christ came bearing, I came not to bring peace, but a sword. That sword which would divide families, setting a daughter against her beloved father's pleading tears and his gray hairs, that sword that Christ wielded in his hand, he did not turn it towards us and our destruction, but he turned it towards himself and his own. As Christ climbed Calvary's cross and the sword of the law cut him down, it was the beginning of the fulfillment of what uh preceded our Isaiah 2 passage, that swords would be turned into plowshares, so that the word of God would cut us down in our pride and then plow furrows in our lives so that the gospel seed could be planted and it could grow up bearing good fruit for our joy and our satisfaction in Him. So those words, no one comes to the Father but by me, they are true, just as true because of the cross, is that anyone who comes by me, Jesus says, anyone who comes by me will see and know and be known and loved perfectly forever by the Father. It was not that Roman sword that was first thrust into perpetuous life, but the sword of Christ. Before Caesar's blade cut her down, Christ, by the judgment of the law and the grace and the hope of the gospel, had divided a new mother and a beloved daughter from her infant son and her grieving father. And it was not lack of love for either of them that led her into that arena that day, but it was a far greater love which had captivated her, the love of Christ, the rock of ages who had himself been cleft for her. Because Christ conquered death, she and Felicity knew that they too would one day walk out of their graves as well, and with that confidence they sang hymns of joy, knowing the peace of God and the promises of God that neither Rome nor death could destroy. Let's pray. Father, this day we we thank you for your saints and how they testify to us of your goodness and mercy and your faithfulness in dire and sorrowful and painful circumstances. And we thank you, Lord, that they testify to us that though we are unworthy, you are that worthy righteous man who has won life by your perfect obedience to the law and has set us free from the condemnation of the law, so that we might live in and with you. So we pray today by your spirit you would come and you would take our loves, our affections, and you would set them in order, so that in loving you in all things and above all things we may better love our spouse and our family and our neighbors, and all of that to your glory and our joy and satisfaction in you. We pray these things, Jesus, in your name and for your sin. Amen. I invite you to stand as you're able as we confess our faith together in the words of the Nightstein Creed.