Comfort Of The Sword

Christ cannot comfort you with His words until He first discomforts you with His words.  The teaching of Christ must first offend you and rile you, raise you up out of the comfort you have built for yourself-- a worldly comfort based on human reason and understanding.  A fleshly comfort that appeals to your sensibility and own sense of right and wrong.  "I believe in Jesus, I am not a sinner like that other person."  Yet we lie, we covet, we compromise. We worship and serve created things, rather than the Creator:  science, sexuality, social custom.  God does not measure righteousness by comparing us to other people, He measures righteousness by comparing us to Himself.  God is the standard of measurement, not us, not the church, but Christ alone.

We tend to think that Christ came to bring us comfort, but that is not so. Christ came to bring us discomfort.  Christ said "I come with a sword" because He first wounds us with His truth before He heals us with it.  His sword pierces through the darkness that surrounds our hearts to get at what's inside, then it cuts, it divides, it shears things off .  When we first approach God for salvation, we come in repentance as a beggar, there is no other way.  We must first be wounded by our sin before we can have a proper desire to be delivered from it.  Repentant, wounded, and humble-- that is why the in first three beatitudes Jesus says "Blessed are the poor in spirit...blessed are those who mourn...blessed are the meek..." (Matt 5:3-5).  Jesus is teaching us the correct disposition to enter into right relationship with God. 

Many people in the church seek a new word from God, a fresh perspective of the Gospel, but God's word and perspective are the same as they have always been.  Humanity is sinful and separated from God by their sin and He has provided the way to salvation through Jesus Christ. Many in the church say they want to glorify Christ, but I wonder, do they really?  Because to glorify Christ means to stand in light of all He is in comparison to all that we are not.  To glorify Christ is to shine the light of His truth which exposes all those things about us that we would rather keep hidden in the dark.  To glorify Christ is to bow down in humility before His image-- the image we desire to attain, yet still have so far to go.  To glorify Christ is to come before His cross and ask Him to examine us, to ask Him to show us all the ways in which we are not glorifying Him. 

Glorifying Christ comes at the expense of our own glory.  There can be only one, and it is not you, or your pastor, or your spouse, or your denomination, or your theology, or your ministry service.  There can be only Christ and the light of His glory that reveals all truth, even the truth we cannot see about our own heart.  And when His glory exposes such horrific truths, it causes us discomfort.  That is the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ:  "After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. 'The time has come,' He said. 'The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!'" (Mark 1:14,15).  When Jesus spoke these words, He was speaking to His own people.  Jesus' audience was those who claimed to be the people of God and He told them to repent and believe the good news of God.

What is the good news?  The good news is that Christ came with a sword.  It is His sword that both wounds us and delivers us.  His sword cuts sin's tether to our heart and divides us away from this world to make us fit for His kingdom.  His sword circumcises our heart by shearing away the lumps of flesh that bind our understanding.  His sword riles us up out of our sinful stupor, it offends us, and in so doing, it exposes all the things hidden in our heart that need to be cut away.  However the word of Christ offends you, is the very thing that separates you from Him.  Let Christ's words wound you with the truth so that you can then experience the sweet, healing comfort of them.

Do not think that I came to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. (Matt 10:34)

That servant who knows his master's will but does not get ready or follow his instructions will be beaten with many blows. But the one who unknowingly does things worthy of punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and from him who has been entrusted with much, even more will be demanded. I have come to ignite a fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled! (Luke 12:47-49)

This is what the Lord Almighty says:

"Do not listen to what the prophets are prophesying to you;

they fill you with false hopes.

They speak from their own minds,

not from the mouth of the Lord.

They keep saying to those who despise me,

'The Lord says: You will have peace.'

And to all who follow the stubbornness of their hearts

they say, 'No harm will come to you.'

But which of them has stood in the council of the Lord

to see or to hear His word?

Who has listened and heard His word?....

But if they had stood in my council,

they would have proclaimed my words to my people

and would have turned them from their evil ways

and from their evil deeds....

Let the prophet who has a dream tell his dream,

but let the one who has my word speak it faithfully.

For what has straw to do with grain?" declares the Lord.

"Is not my word like fire," declares the Lord,

"and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?" (Jer 23:16-29)