Back to the Lighthouse
What Divisive Truth Demands of You
Part 7 of 7 in the series: The Truth That Divides
We’re back on the bridge of the ship.
The convoy is still moving — same heading, same speed, same formation. It still looks peaceful. No one is arguing on the radio. No one is breaking ranks. It feels like unity.
But the lighthouse hasn’t moved.
At some point, every Christian has to decide what to call that situation. You can stay with the herd and call it unity, or you can alter course toward the light and call it obedience. One path keeps everyone comfortable until the keel shreds on unseen rock. The other slices the water alone for a while, in the dark — but it actually saves the ship.
Everything in this series has been one long answer to the question: What happens when someone really steers by the lighthouse?
In Nazareth, Jesus reads Isaiah, then applies it honestly, and His hometown tries to throw Him off a cliff. In Jerusalem, He turns over tables and words, and the most religious men in the city call Him demon-possessed, blasphemer, and law-breaker. In the council chamber, Caiaphas calculates that it is “better that one man die” than that their fragile order be disturbed. On the roads from Damascus to Ephesus, Paul preaches Christ and idol economies riot. Throughout Israel’s history, prophets tear down altars, confront kings, and wind up in cisterns, prisons, and unmarked graves. In every age since, converts leave the herd and discover that the herd does not clap.
None of these people sought division for its own sake. Jesus did not wake up in Nazareth hoping to get mobbed. Paul did not aim for riots as a ministry goal. Elijah did not relish running from Jezebel. They chose God; division came as the wake behind a hull that refused to aim at the rocks.
The Only Sword He Carries
Jesus told us plainly what He came with:
“I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” (Matt 10:34–36)
As we unpacked in earlier posts, that sword is not steel. It is the Word that divides reality as God names it: light from darkness, wheat from chaff, sheep from goats. That Word, spoken clearly into any age, will always do two things at once:
Cut away illusions, idols, and counterfeit peace.
Free those who are willing to be cut.
“You will know the truth,” He said, “and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32). Freedom always begins with a turn — with a change of heading — away from what felt safe and toward what God says is true.
What This Requires of Us
If that is the pattern — Jesus, Paul, prophets, converts — then what does it demand of us? Not in theory. In practice. In your actual life.
1. Expect the Split
If you follow Jesus, you will feel the blade He warned about. Some friends will step back. Some colleagues will call you divisive. Some pastors will tell you not to “rock the boat.” Some authorities will pressure you to keep the convoy’s speed and heading.
This is not a sign you are doing Christianity wrong. It is often a sign you are finally doing it at all.
2. Refuse Counterfeit Peace
“Strive for peace with everyone” (Heb 12:14). “If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all” (Rom 12:18). Those commands still stand. We do not look for a fight.
But neither do we buy peace by lying. When peace requires “forgetting” the unborn, the child’s body, the created difference of male and female, the poor crushed by policy, the persecuted church — then peace has become idolatry.
Never unite with darkness (2 Cor 6:14–18). Never call good what God calls evil (Isa 5:20).
3. Speak Plainly, Not Cruelly
The sword we carry is the Word, not our own temper.
“Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt.” (Col 4:6)
“The Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone… correcting opponents with gentleness.” (2 Tim 2:24–25)
Truth already has sharp edges. Your tone doesn’t need to add barbs. We don’t have to mimic the world’s sarcasm and contempt. We can combine clarity and calm — and still refuse to budge on what God says.
4. Build New Belonging
Conversion and obedience fracture old circles. That’s simply reality. God does not leave you alone, though. He gives you a new household:
“They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” (Acts 2:42)
The local church is a plausibility structure for truth — a place where the things the world calls “crazy” or “hateful” (like repentance, chastity, sacrificial giving, public confession of Christ) are simply normal obedience. Converts need this new family — because the old one may step away (1 Pet 4:3–4; 1 Cor 7:12–16).
5. Engage Public Life Without Idolatry
The sword in our mouths does not mean we abandon the tools in our hands.
Jesus says, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Mark 12:17). Paul urges, “First of all… prayers… for kings and all who are in high positions” (1 Tim 2:1–2). Micah sums up our public duty: “Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God” (Mic 6:8).
In a constitutional system, voting, speaking, organizing, running for office, contesting unjust laws — these are simply modern ways of loving your neighbor and stewarding your Eden. That is not “culture war.” That is applied discipleship.
And when the state commands what God forbids, or forbids what God commands, the apostolic answer is still:
“We must obey God rather than men.” (Acts 5:29)
We do not obey that verse with violence; we obey it with courage and willingness to suffer.
The Choice
So at the end we are back where we started.
Stay in formation and bless whatever the convoy calls “unity” — or — alter course to the lighthouse, even if the herd jeers, and call it obedience.
This entire series has been written to say one thing: the cost of that turn is not proof that you failed. It is proof that the sword from His mouth is still sharp.
The church’s task is not to blunt the blade in the name of “unity,” but to wield it faithfully — in preaching, in discipleship, and yes, in public life — accepting the social costs as the normal price of following a crucified and risen Lord.
Unity that ignores or blurs the gospel is not unity; it is treason. Peace without righteousness is drywall over rot. Love that refuses to confront destructive lies about God, about man, about children, about justice — is not love at all.
And condolences that pivot into a leash — “We grieve, but don’t be like him” — are not pastoral care. They are the council’s logic in church clothes: better that one man’s example die, so the rest of us can keep our comfortable formation.
A Word to the Young Christians Reading This
This series began because of what was written to you — over your heads, about a man who was killed for doing what you’re being told not to do.
You were told his public courage was “culture war.” You were told his way of linking Scripture to law, family, and national life was dangerous. You were shown loaded images and emotional pivots designed to make you associate boldness with villainy.
Don’t buy it.
Read the prophets. Read Acts. Read what happened to every man and woman in Scripture who dared to say what God said — out loud, in public, with consequences.
Then decide for yourself whether the problem is the lighthouse or the convoy’s heading.
Jesus went first. Paul followed. The prophets bled. The Fathers taught the same thing under Roman swords. A man named Charlie tried, in his own fallible way, to walk that same road — and died for it.
Before you let anyone rebuke that courage as “culture war,” ask whether they are rebuking the very thing Scripture calls faithfulness.
The lighthouse has not moved. The only question is whether you will steer by it.
This concludes The Truth That Divides — a seven-part series on why Christian truth divides, why that division is good, and why the church must never trade the Captain’s chart for the convoy’s mood.
“Speak the truth in love.” (Eph 4:15)
“Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but expose them.” (Eph 5:11)
“As far as it depends on you, live at peace with all.” (Rom 12:18)
Soli Deo Gloria.
