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Sermon for Trinity 4
Romans 8:18-23 + Luke 6:36-42
“Like father, like son,” they say. And I’ve found, it’s true in many ways. A son naturally inherits certain traits and abilities from his father. More than that, certain behaviors or ways of thinking, or talking, tend to rub off almost unintentionally from father to son. And beyond that, a son who admires his father will often choose, intentionally, to become more and more like his father.
The same is true for the Christian. How did you become a Christian? You were “born again” of water and Spirit, through Baptism, through the word of truth, the word about Jesus, the Son of God, who was sent by God the Father in order to give every believer the right to become a child of God, the right to call God your Father. As Paul says in Galatians 3, “You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ.”
Well, if that’s true, if you have been born of God, then the saying “like Father, like son” will also apply to you in a spiritual way. Every Christian is remade in the image of God from the moment he is born again, with a New Man who naturally inherits certain traits from his Father. But the Christian must, at the same time, as he grows and matures, strive to become more and more like his heavenly Father, being molded into the image of Christ, who is, by nature, the very image of the Father.
The primary trait of God that is, and that must be passed on to all His children is highlighted for us in today’s Gospel, where Jesus says to His disciples, Therefore be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful.
Mercy. Compassion for the one who is miserable or in need. To be merciful is to be moved to compassion by someone’s neediness or misery. And that describes our heavenly Father perfectly. Even before He created the world, He foresaw man’s misery, all the misery of mankind, which has all been caused by Adam and Eve’s fall into sin, and by the natural corruption of the soul that has passed down to all their descendants, making us hostile to God by nature, making us self-centered and unbelieving. Our sinful nature, and our sinful choices, and our sinful actions are the cause of human misery—not necessarily the direct cause of every hardship, but the overall cause. God foresaw the misery, just as He foresaw the corrupt character of our souls, and all the rebellious and loveless thoughts and actions that we would be guilty of. Not only that, He foresaw the eternal punishment that awaited us all for rebelling against our Creator. And instead of throwing up His hands and saying, “Why bother? Why bother creating these creatures who will rebel against Me? And if I create them, why bother redeeming them from the misery they deserve?”—instead of that, God was moved to compassion by our misery, even though it was our own fault, and, in His mercy, He planned out our salvation, which centers in His beloved Son being born as a man and dying for the sins of mankind, that all might believe in Him and be rescued from all our misery. That’s mercy, which is one of the defining characteristics of our Father in heaven, and of our Savior Jesus Christ.
If you have come to know God rightly, then you know His mercy. And if you have truly been brought to believe in that merciful God, then you have been on the receiving end of His mercy, and you have already been transformed by it, so that you have inherited a new character, a new attitude of mercy, like that of your Father. You have been made new as merciful people, who are moved to compassion toward those who are suffering, or in need, whether their suffering is their own fault, or not.
But the Christian also, at the same time, carries around an old attitude, an old character of mercilessness, that looks on the misery of your neighbor and says with smugness, “Why should I care? They’re getting exactly what they deserve!”
It’s because of that old, sinful nature that dwells in all Christians, even as it reigns completely in all non-believers, that Jesus has to remind and encourage His disciples to be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful.
And so He does. Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.
You know that our godless, wretched society has latched onto that “Do not judge” command and tried to use it against you whenever you bring up certain sins that people are committing, as if those who hate God had the right to lecture the children of God, as if God forbade His children from recognizing anything as sinful, or from pointing out anyone’s sins to them. There are many ways to answer such unserious people, but sometimes the best answer is just to double down and say, “Oh, I absolutely judge you and condemn you. I have no choice but to agree with God’s word, which reveals your actions as sinful. But it’s God’s judgment you’ll have to deal with on the Last Day if you do not repent.”
It’s not all judging and condemning that Jesus tells His disciples not to engage in. It’s malicious, merciless judging and condemning that He forbids, beginning in the heart, and then extending to the lips. It’s criticizing your fellow Christian, when there’s no need to criticize, especially without taking into account how your words may do more harm than good. It’s taking his words and actions in the unkindest possible way. It’s sticking your nose in where it doesn’t belong. It’s assuming sinful motives or actions, or jumping to conclusions about something he or she said or did. It’s harboring hatred and malice in your heart toward your neighbor, and especially toward your fellow Christian. And it can also happen when you think someone else is sinfully judging and condemning you; you might turn around and sinfully judge and condemn them right back, because you assume that they were judging you first! But this is not how your Father in heaven behaves. And, therefore, such merciless judging and condemning is out of character for a child of God the Father. And yet, it’s all too common for our sinful nature to engage in it.
Forgive, and you will be forgiven. He doesn’t mean, forgive the impenitent. He does mean, have a heart of mercy toward the one who has sinned against you, and always be ready and willing to forgive, without requiring that atonement be made, because you were forgiven freely, without having to pay for your sins. So when your brother or sister comes to you in repentance, you must do as your Father has done for you, or else you will forfeit the forgiveness that you were freely given.
Give, and it will be given to you—a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over, will be placed into your lap. For with the same measure you use, it will be measured back to you. He doesn’t mean, give anything and everything that anyone might ever ask of you. He does mean, have a heart of mercy toward the one who is asking you, and always be ready and willing to give generously, if it’s within your power, if it will actually benefit the one who asks, just as your Father does for you. If you’re generous toward your neighbor, God will be generous with you. But if you’re stingy and close your heart to your brother in need, you have to expect that God will be stingy toward you also.
To illustrate how all this comes back to imitating our merciful God and Father, Jesus tells a little parable. “Can the blind lead the blind? Will they not both fall into a ditch? A disciple is not above his teacher. But everyone who is thoroughly trained will be like his teacher. And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but fail to notice the beam in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove the speck in your eye,’ when you yourself fail to see the beam in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”
In other words, no matter how much you may think is wrong with someone else, no matter how much you may want to help, you’re useless to him, until you get help for yourself first—the help of addressing your own sins, the help of learning mercy from Jesus’ own example, the help of dealing with your own blind spots, your own heart that is not merciful by nature, but merciless, and self-absorbed, and self-aggrandizing. Your new nature as a reborn Christian is like your merciful Father in heaven, but your old nature is the opposite and so constantly needs to be confronted, and dealt with, and, in fact, put to death, daily, so that your new nature, born from God’s mercy, might arise, daily, to approach your brother in mercy, the mercy you know that you yourself have received from God, and then deal with your neighbor from a position of mercy, not from a position of superiority. Then you will be able to see clearly. Then you will be of use to those around you, the more you appreciate God’s mercy toward you, the more you reflect the mercy of God in the world.
Like Father, like son, when it comes to mercy. So it is already for every Christian, and so it must be as we grow into the image of our merciful Father in heaven, who is merciful and kind not only to the righteous, but also, as Jesus says, to the unthankful and the evil. May God the Holy Spirit grant us grace, that we may become ever more like God the Father, who, in His mercy, has forgiven us all our sins and has made us into His very own sons and daughters, through faith in Christ Jesus. Amen.
