20C22.    Jeremiah 38:4-6, 8-10.  This is that classic battle between the forces of good and evil.  Jeremiah, as spokesperson or prophet for God, was speaking against those who were not following the will of God and so they tried to put Jeremiah to death.  Jeremiah was rescued as God intervened for him through a royal court official.

Luke 12: 49-53.  “Jesus said to his disciples: ‘I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!  There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!  Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.’”  Jesus, “the Messiah, the Son of God” (John 20:31b) was sent into this world to conquer the world (John 16:33c) and to protect those who belong to God (John 17:12) from those who belonged to the world and who hated those who belonged to God. (John 15:19) The symbolism of baptism that Jesus speaks of is one in which the adult person who is being baptized submerges into the water as a sign of his dying to all that is not of God to rise out of the water to live a new life in all that is of the Lord.  So baptism here symbolizes the death and resurrection that Jesus would go through to condemn Satan and conquer the forces of this world. (John 16:11 & 33c)

Hebrews 12:1-4.  The image of ‘running the race’ is one pushing ourselves to the limit to put out our very best as the way of living our faith.  It is natural ‘to go with the flow’ and just live life as an everyday routine.   Instead Jesus is calling on us to be on fire with the love of the Lord, to be the salt that makes the flavor our faith come alive and to be the light that brings to light the glory of Lord who is life for us.  Life is a “struggle against sin” because the devil, the world and our own bodies make sin look delicious.  “For the sake of the joy” that lies before us in heaven and the joy of walking now in the Lord, let us endure the many crosses that this world can put in our path.

Psalm 40.   “Lord, come to my aid!”   “You are my help and my deliverer; O my God, hold not back!”