This chunk of Hebrews is one of those "stump the pastor" sections that, if not dealt with carefully, can cause some serious issues. For example, in 6:2, a number of good things to think about are blasted and in 6:4 there's a claim that it is impossible to return to faith once you fall away. So, what's the deal in these verses? While I can't find anyone who agrees with me, here are my thoughts.

First, we need to look at what was said both before and after this section. Both sides deal with Melchizedek and the priesthood of Christ. With this in mind, we see in verse 11 that the author, who's just introduced the topic of Christ's priesthood, wants to say a whole lot more about it, but the people aren't inclined to listen to what he has to say, rather, they want to move on to what they perceive to be more important issues.

I rarely send forwards and would almost never post one on this site, but this story from a fifth grade teacher at Zion Lutheran School in Dennison, Iowa reveals just how difficult the Gospel is to hear and fits right in with comments I often hear, "That can't be right, it's too easy."

In religion the fifth graders are learning about Martin Luther, so during our lesson on Luther's despair to attain perfection, I gave the students an analogy: What if the requirements to graduate high school changed so that from Kindergarten through 12th grade, you could never miss one single point on any homework assignment or any test, you couldn't miss a single day of school, you could never be late or get a tardy, you couldn't have any detentions, you could never get caught talking out of turn or in the hallways...etc. "Would anybody graduate?" No! We talked about how Martin Luther felt the same inadequacy, and then I came back to the analogy...and here's where things went awry.

"What if the high school principal announced that in spite of all the impossible requirements, there actually was one person who had met them all. This student had aced every assignment and test, he had never missed school, and he had never misbehaved. And to any student who wanted, the school would count his record as theirs. How many of you would take it?" Now, I was really proud of my great analogy, but as the words left my lips, only like three hands went up! Playing it cool, I asked, "Why would those of you who don't have your hands up say no?" And their general consensus was, "because it's cheating!" "What if that was the only way to graduate?" I pressed. "It's still not right!" they said, or "It would be better to stay in high school forever than cheat", or "I'd rather do the work myself than take credit for what isn't mine." So I reworked my words and the analogy until most of them came around to see what I was getting at, except for Lexie who still held that she would not accept it.

What about the Gospel do you find hard to believe? What are other ways we could share the beautiful news of Christ's work for us?

The book of Jonah opens with a three verse introduction that sets the stage for the entire book by introducing the two major characters and the three major places of the book.

Two of the three main places are obvious, Nineveh and Tarshish. In the days of Jonah, Nineveh was a far cry from the powerful city it was in the centuries before and after Jonah. In Jonah's day it was an independent city state that was experiencing economic hardship. In modern day terms, we could compare Nineveh to a city like Detroit, making it's evil something along the lines of immoral behavior, crime, or neglecting the poor.

Tarshish, on the other hand, is most likely the New Testament city of Tarsus, the hometown of the Apostle Paul. It was a city in modern day Turkey that in near a range of mountains known to be rich in natural resources including lumber and mineral deposits. Because it was part of an important trade route, Tarshish was a place financial security which makes it the opposite of Nineveh.

The third city isn't mentioned in Jonah, but it is revealed in 2 Kings 14:23-29, where we learn that Jonah is a prophet in Samaria during the reign of Jeroboam II. What's odd is that Jeroboam is described as a king who does wicked in the site of the Lord which, typically, would mean that he would be an enemy of God's prophet. Since we don't see this relationship with Jonah, we have to wonder if Jonah might have been a prophet in the king's pocket who was called by God to be a true prophet in another land ... much like the Apostle Paul in the New Testament.

In addition to the three main places, these verses also introduce us to the two main characters of the story, Jonah and Yahweh (aka God). When we read these three verses in light of the overall Biblical narrative, we can see the two primary characteristics of Yahweh, his justice and his gracious.

Yahweh's justice can be seen in his desire to send Jonah to speak against the sin of Nineveh. This might strike our culture, which typically tries to link a Judeo-Christian morality to a Judeo-Christian faith, as odd, in that Nineveh, a Gentile city, is being accountable to a divine law that had never been given to them.

This invites us to pause for a moment and think about the difference between revealed and natural law. Revealed law is what we see happening at Mt. Sinai in Exodus 20 where God comes to Israel and gives them the 10 Commandments. However, those commandments were only given directly to the Jewish people. Natural law however is what the Apostle Paul addresses in Romans 1:18-32 where, all people are held accountable to God's Law because it's naturally observable and obvious. Therefore, those who aren't Jewish, like the people of Nineveh, are also held accountable to the 10 Commandments because they are a wonderful summary of natural law. For more on this we recommend the book, What We Can't Not Know: A Guide.

However, in addition to Yahweh's justice, we also can be confident, because of his nature, that he is gracious and is sending Jonah to Nineveh to prompt repentance so the people will be forgiven. Later Jonah will reveal that it is because of God's grace that he didn't want to go to Nineveh ... he didn't want them to repent and he didn't want God to forgive them.

This attitude on Jonah's part reveals his character. As a prophet who has been called by God we can assume that Jonah is a man of faith, however, he doesn't understand or like God's mission in the world. At this level, we can see attitude of Jonah that parallel many Christians today who are content to guard the Gospel, keep the good news of Jesus to themselves, and not be willing to go to those outside the Church with God's gracious message to all nations.

There are two more lessons that we pick up from Jonah. The first deals with the presence of Yahweh. As Jonah boards the boat to Tarshish, we're told that he's trying to run from the presence of Yahweh. Given that he believes in a God who is the Creator of all things, it would be foolish to think that he was trying to hide from God. Rather, if we look through the Old Testament, we can always see that the presence of God is connected to physical things like a burning bush, a pillar of cloud or fire, the tabernacle, or the temple. It was through these incarnational places that God would do his work of forgiving.

In the New Testament, Jesus becomes this incarnational presence of Yahweh and passes it on to the Church in the Word, both written and spoken, Baptism, and the Lord's Supper. When people today avoid God's Word, the sacraments, and Christian community, they are, like Jonah, seeking to escape the presence of Yahweh that will often make them experience an uncomfortable reshaping of their lives.

This links us to the final lesson from Jonah 1:1-3 in that, while the Word of God will convict us and change us, there's another Word spoken to us, a Word of forgiveness. Oddly enough, we often are like Jonah in that we reject this Word.

Throughout the Old Testament God speaks and things happen, being it creation coming into existence or a prophet going to work. However, with Jonah, God speaks and Jonah doesn't act accordingly. We see this happening in our live today when God speaks forgiveness into our lives, be it through the telling of the Gospel, the waters of Baptism, or the body and blood of the Lord's Supper, and we continue to allow our past (and now forgiven failures) to define us.

God longs to speak grace into all our lives. In the opening of Jonah, God's prophet seeks to block this grace, but, as the story unfolds, we'll see that even this unwilling prophet can't handcuff the love of God for humanity.

What's going on in Luke 12? First Jesus speaks a word of law that penetrates deep into our hearts and then, just a few short verses later, he declares that he didn't come to bring peace, but division (12:49-53).

Who is this Jesus who's accusatory? Since when did Jesus come to tear families apart and cast a judgmental fire upon the earth? This doesn't sound like the Jesus I know at all.

Rather, when I think of Jesus, I always picture the man who spends his time with tax collectors and sinners. He's a guy who hung out with the dregs of society and brought acceptance to the outcasts. Jesus is a guy who went about healing diseases and proclaiming a message of love and forgiveness. That's the Jesus that I think of in the Gospels.

Moreover, this is the Jesus I discover in the rest of the pages of the New Testament where the central theme is Jesus dying for the forgiveness of sin ... a forgiveness that makes us right with God ... a forgiveness that breaks down barriers and unites people. This isn't a Jesus who divides.

If that wasn't enough, I find the same loving Jesus promised in the pages of the Old Testament. There the Father who sent Jesus into the world describes himself as "slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love." Over and over this love is proven as he come to the nation of Israel, forgives their sin, and lifts them out of an oppressive situation. That isn't a God who divides.

So which Jesus is the real Jesus? Did Jesus come to bring love and peace, or did Jesus come to bring division?

The answer is yes ... they are both the real Jesus. To add to it, it's the same event in Jesus' life that brings both peace and division. While Christians stand at the foot of the cross and empty tomb and find themselves at peace with one another and with God, they stand there and also find themselves divided with the rest of the world.

I saw a clear example of this a number of years back when I heard the story of an art professor at my undergrad school. She'd grown up in an Orthodox Jewish home. By the time she reached her college years she was ready to experience everything the world had to offer, including cheeseburgers. So she left her Jewish roots to explore the world, a move that, by and large, her family accepted.

However, after a number of years she took a position teaching art at the University of Nebraska. While here a student introduced her to the New Testament and, after reading it in its entirety, she called her parents to ask why they had never told her about the Jewish Messiah named Jesus. At the news of her conversion to Christianity many of her family members cut off contact with her and they even held a funeral for her. The same Jesus who had brought her peace had also brought division to her family.

I've seen other example of this in my life, be it husbands and wives who have different faiths, or parents fighting with children who want to play sports on Sunday morning. The very same Jesus who brings peace to so many, also brings division.

And yet, what is truly amazing, is the ability of Jesus to bring peace into places where he once brought division.

When I was working in California I knew a woman who'd been a Christian for years but, for one reason or another, had married a non-believer. Over time, these differing values put an incredible strain on their marriage but, rather than give up, she decided to persist and be the best wife she could possibly be. To use Paul's analogy from Ephesians 5, she wanted to live in relation to her husband as the church does to Christ ... even if he wasn't anything like Jesus to her.

Over time, the Spirit used her modeling the relationship between God and his people to soften his heart towards both the Church and Jesus until, finally, one day, he asked her if he could go to church with her. That morning, the very same Jesus who had divided them for so long, brought peace into their marriage.

Yes, Jesus came to bring peace. Yes, Jesus came to bring division. It all depends on how you view his cross.

There are some passages in the Bible I really don't like and Luke 12:13-21 is one of them. In part I know it's because of some odd memories that are associates with it. The first time I preached on this text I was in Seminary and I remember getting up to preach and seeing two of my Greek professors in the congregation. To make it worse, they weren't seated next to each other so I was always looking at one of them which made the whole experience rather intimidating.

To add to it, the way I structure my sermon that day involved comparing the rich fool to my grandfather. I noted that externally, they looked rather similar and kept asking what prevented my grandfather from being a fool. Given that my grandpa has since died, this passage brings back memories and stirs up sadness at the thought of loss.

My Lutheran sensibilities are also attacked by this passage because there isn't any good news in it. I've been trained to think in terms of Law and Gospel so when I come across a passage like this one, where there is no Gospel, something deep within begins to uncomfortably twist and churn.

But my greatest opposition to these verses from God's Word is that the Law that's right there on the surface, a word of judgment against consumerism and materialism, speaks directly to me, after all, I love stuff and constantly find myself looking for more. Be it my love of the latest technology or the longing for a porch or balcony so I have a place to barbecue, I, like the rich fool in Jesus' parable, want stuff.

I'm sure I'm not alone in this, in fact, I'm guessing that these verses get right into the face of most Americans. After all, we, as a nation, make up just over 4% of the world's population but consume more resources than anybody else. We actually have so much stuff here that many of our poor are financially better off than billions of other people throughout the world.

So, given how direct this word of Law from Jesus speaks to you and I, I thought I'd go somewhat practical in my blog and offer three tips on how to heed Jesus' words and "be on your guard against all covetousness."

Two of these lessons come directly from the life of the rich fool, the first becoming clear when we look at who he spoke with while deciding what he was going to do. The first person singular pronoun 'I' appears six times in the six verse parable. To our American ears this might not seem unusual, but in the culture of the day, this would have been unheard of and considered shameful as decisions were to be made in community. This didn't happen in a cult sense where decisions were made for you, rather, others served as a sounding board and could offer a different perspective. It's the same concept that you find in our culture blog of the week, The Elemental Community.

With this in mind, how do you be on your guard and remain faithful over foolish? Ask yourself how you go about making your decisions ... is it an entirely individual endeavor or do you bounce your ideas off of others (of course, who those others are also makes a huge difference)?

The second lesson we learn from the fool's life comes in how he viewed the crops. Jesus opens the parable pointing out that it was the ground that produced the exceptional crop that added the already rich man's abundance and instantly he refers to the produce as his. In his mind, they are something that is earned and the one who provided the soil, the rain, the sun, and the seeds isn't part of the equation.

This is radically different from a Biblical perspective which declares that all things belong to God and we are the stewards or caretakers of them. This would mean the roof on over our head, the clothes on our backs, the food in our stomachs, and even the money in our bank accounts ultimately belong to God and he has given them to us to use for the common good.

Regular rituals, be it prayers before meals, writing out a check for a weekly offering, or thanking God for life itself as you wake up each morning can help keep this second point in mind, as can major event rituals such as the blessing of a new home.

Of course, when you're constantly trying to bounce ideas off of others and hoping you can discern what is right or continually reminding yourself that everything you have is from God and he's called you to use it properly, it becomes easy to find yourself bogged down in debates over what would be faithful and what would be foolish which of course, in and of itself, is also foolish. It's into this paralyzing dilemma where Martin Luther's words to Philipp Melanchthon come to the rescue ... "sin boldly".

Luther's point was that we can't avoid sin in this life so, rather than find ourselves disabled in our attempts to always do right, we should move forward in life as best as we can, doing what we believe to be the best thing, and trust that when we fail, Christ's grace is always sufficient and that we are forgiven.

So, how do you life a life that's faithful rather than foolish? Hear the voice of your Christian community, recognize where your blessings come from, and sin boldly but trust in Christ more boldly.