Sermon May 20 2007 "The Weak, Strong, Commitment to Community” (part 3 of 3) aka "cleaning up the mess from not communicating clearly two Sundays ago"

(speak a bit about failing to communicate what I thought to be the heart of Paul’s message to the Roman church because I repeated myself and mixed the whole process up, but I found a story of a guy who’s had a pretty big impact on my life that I think illustrates the kind of thinking Paul is calling the Romans to do)

My friend Greg and I have been talking quite a bit about what it means to follow Jesus. Greg would not consider himself as someone who takes Jesus seriously, but he admits to having questions. I didn’t have a formula for him to understand how a Christian conversion works, but I told him that many years ago, when I was a child, I had heard about Jesus and found the idea of Him compelling, then much later while reading the Gospels, came to believe that I wanted to follow Him. This changed things in my life, I said, because it involved giving up everything and choosing to go into a relationship with Him.

Greg told my that he had seen a pamphlet with four or five ideas on it, ideas such as man was a sinner, sin separated man from God, and Christ died to remove that separation. He asked me if this was what I believed, and I told him, essentially, that it was. “Those would be the facts of the story,” I told him, “but that isn’t the story.”

“Those are the ideas, but it isn’t the whole picture,” Greg stated then.

“Yes,” I told him.

Earlier that same year I had a conversation with my friend Omar, who is a student at a local college. For his humanities class, Omar was assigned to read the majority of the Bible. He asked to meet with me for coffee, and when we sat down he put a Bible on the table as well as a pamphlet containing the same five or six ideas that Greg had mentioned. He opened the pamphlet, read the ideas, and asked if these concepts were important to the central message of Christianity. I told Omar that they were critical; that, basically, this was the gospel of Jesus, the backbone of Christain faith. Omar then opened his Bible and asked, “If these ideas are so important, why aren’t they in this book?”

“But the Scripture references are right here.” I said curiously, showing Omar that the verses were printed next to each idea.

“I see that,” he said. “But in the Bible they aren’t concise like they are in this pamphlet. They are spread all over the book.”

“But this pamphlet sums up the ideas,” I told him.

“Right,” Omar continued.”but it seems like, if these ideas are that critical, God would have taken the time to make bullet points out of them. Instead, He put some of them there and some of them here. And half the time, when Jesus is talking, He is speaking entirely in parables. It is hard to believe that whatever it is He is talking about can be summed up this simply.”

Omar’s point is well-taken. And while the ideas presented in these pamphlets are certainly true, it struck me how simply we had begun to explain the ideas, not only how simply, but how nonrelationally, how propositionally. I don’t mean any of this to fault the pamphlets at all. Tracts like the ones Omar and Greg encountered have been powerful tools in helping people understand the beauty of the message of Jesus. Millions, perhaps,have come to know Jesus through these efficient presentations of the gospel. But I did begin to wonder if there were better ways of explaining it than these pamphlets. The greater trouble with these reduced ideas is that modern evangelical culture is so accustomed to this summation that it is difficult for us to see the gospel as anything other than a list of true statements with which a person must agree.

It makes me wonder if, because of this reduced version of the claims of Christ, we believe the gospel is easy to understand, a simple mental exercise, not in the least bit mysterious. And if you think about it, a person has a more difficult time explaining romantic love, for instance, or beauty, or the Trinity, than the gospel of Jesus. The apostle John opened his gospel by presenting the idea that God is the Word and Jesus is the Word and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Not exactly bullet points for easy consumption. Perhaps our reduction of these ideas has caused us to miss something.

(Talk about how, when gospel becomes simplified and “easy-to-digest” and driven by principles, we lose the central call to be in healthy relationship with God (which is much more complex than several Biblical verses) and the call to live in healthy relationships with others around us)

When that happens, we get lazy and start slotting things into black and white, wrong and right, here or there…and that deeply affects the way that we read the Bible. Specifically, when we see Paul speaking to the early church about how to live, we apply our categories of black and white to his instructions, and very quickly, if we’re being honest, we find our approach is deeply flawed;

We read Paul say one should not eat food sacrificed to idols, “about eating the food offered to idols: we know that an idol stands for something that does not really exist; we know that there is only the one God.” Well, we might assume, using our way of thinking, clearly eating food sacrificed to idols is ok because there’s only one God.

But then later in the same letter, Paul says “what is sacrificed on pagan altars is offered

to demons, not to God. And I do not want you to be partners with demons. You cannot

drink from the Lord's cup and also from the cup of demons; you cannot eat at the Lord's

table and also at the table of demons. .” So, in using our way of thinking, clearly eating

food sacrificed to idols is not ok because we don’t want to eat something that has been

sacrificed to demons. (we’ve got a problem here now)

We read prohibitions against drunkenness and we say, “well, that means don’t drink.”

But do we apply the same thinking, then to prohibitions against adultery, and conclude, “well, that means all sexual expression is bad?”

Gluttony is a Biblical sin. Eating so much that your body suffers and your quality of life drops. Do we apply the same logic in approaching this problem? If gluttony is wrong, do we quit eating?

We read prohibition against babbling in tongues during worship without interpretation, does that mean we quit talking?

Do we see the flaws in that approach?

Everything in moderation is not the answer (cause some things are flat out unhealthy in general); you’d be hard-pressed to suggest that heroin or marijuana or gossiping are good for you even in small doses.

Ultimately, God has called us out of our self-centered lives into a relationship with Him, and because it is a serious relationship, there won’t always be black and white answers. And God has called us out of our individualism into relationship with other human beings, and those won’t always be black and white.

Some things are simple, but because some things are does not mean all things are.

But Paul doesn’t dwell on this subject, and quickly moves on, saying “the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men.” Romans 14:15-18

And so Paul moves on in chapter 15 in two careful twin sections (1-6 and 7-13) to describe Jesus, the Messiah, as the example both for the community’s life together (like Jesus, they are not to please themselves but to be committed to building up their neighbors) and for their mission in the world (like Jesus, they are to bring hope to the Gentiles). (repeat)

Both 1-6 and 7-13 have three main parts to their approach

1) an appeal to the community to act in a particular way

2) the identification of Jesus as the pattern for the recommended behavior

3) a prayer that God will empower the community to live as Jesus set the example to do

1-6 directed to the internal life together of the community

Summarizes the discussion in Romans 14 of the primary responsibility of the powerful to accept the weaknesses of the powerless as their burden (this time christologically defined)

The appeal to the death of Christ on behalf of the same powerless ones (14:15) is dramatically recalled by the quotation of Psalm 69:9 in verse 3

- by showing the Roman Christians, particularly the “strong” to see the willingness of the Messiah to take on the additional burden of insults that he didn’t deserve, Paul gave them a model for their own attitudes towards those with whom they disagree

- Paul is claiming not only that the death of Jesus the Messiah on the cross fulfills Scripture, but also that the Jesus who died for others is an example for Christian obedience.

- For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.

- this has HUGE implications!

o (so when Scripture speaks of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 52 and 53, it’s not just talking about what Jesus will eventually do on behalf of the entire world, but is also illustrating what every faithful Servant of God should do

o this illuminates deeply Jesus’ call before his crucifixion that “whoever would follow after me must pick up their cross daily,”

§ so the significance of Jesus for his followers is not just as Savior, but also as Supreme Example in life

Therefore, if we want to know how to treat our fellow believers, we look to Jesus. If we want to know what righteousness looks like, we look to Jesus. If we want to know how to treat our enemies, we look to Jesus. Even down to the nitty-gritty of seeking a proper balance of work and relaxation; serving others and taking time out to seek God and renew, we look to Jesus. (that is, on a practical level, what it means for us to say Jesus is Lord)

Focus on: “Everything written in the Scriptures was written to teach us, in order that we might have hope through the patience and encouragement which the Scriptures give us.

shows the immense importance of the word of God first by the fact that he writes as an apostle of Christ, creating Scripture for us, and in his writing Scripture he quotes the Old Testament Scriptures that are already written. Take Romans 12:19 as just one example. In calling us to love again, he says, “Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.’” “As it is written”! Then he quotes Scripture (Deuteronomy 32:35). And what he quotes is a promise: God will settle your accounts! God is just, and God will sweep no evil under the rug of the universe. All accounts will be settled. That is Scripture. That is something we learn when we read the Bible.

Paul closes this section of his conclusion to the letter with a prayer- that the God of hope will unite the community of Christians at Rome, powerful and powerless together, in conformity to the pattern of the Messiah and therefore as a sign of the fact that God is breaking down the walls that we build up between people groups to reconcile all of humanity.

And what is its effect? It lifts the burden of vengeance. We don’t need to carry this. God will. He promises that no wrong against us will be overlooked. It will be avenged on the cross, if our abuser repents and believes. Or it will be avenged in hell. You don’t need to carry the load of being God. You can hope in him. You can count on future justice. And in that hope you can rejoice and endure and love--even those who abuse you

(So seeking a Biblical worldview and a God-centered reality does not result in finding “Biblical principles” to apply to our modern lives, but becoming a people who trust the living and just and powerful God of the Universe with all of our lives!)

He is asking us some central, central questions; What difference does it make in your life, practically speaking, that Jesus Christ was crucified? (which carries secondary questions: does your daily life look different than a non-believer? If not, what can you change?) What difference does it make to your church; how you think, treat, and interact with one another? (do you treat one another in the church like folks do in job environments and out in society, or are you committed to a different way of being?)

Father talking to son at breakfast about needing to make a decision about whether he was going to do his very best in school, and said to his son,

“Son, this decision is not just a choice, it is a commitment. Do you know what that means?”

“I think so, Dad,” said the son. “It means sticking with something no matter what.”

The dad pointed to the young man’s breakfast plate. “It is the difference,” he said, “between ham and eggs. The chicken is involved. The pig is committed.”

Recognizing the difference between “involvement” (faith at fringes, so these questions don’t matter) and “commitment” (faith at center, so these questions matter deeply).