The love of money leads to terrible things

Posted on September 26, 2010 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for Pentecost 18(c)

Amos 8:4-7  +  Luke 16:1-13  +  1 Timothy 6:6-16

God has something to say to you today about money.  Does that bother you at all?  Money talk in church?  It’s one of those personal areas that we don’t usually like anyone else to have an opinion about – even God.  But he does have an opinion about it. More than that, he has a teaching about it, and also a warning.  How true the words of the Apostle Paul to Timothy are:  People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

God doesn’t care about money. He cares about you and doesn’t want you to be ruined by money.  And so we turn to God’s prophet Amos this morning to sound God’s warning for us.  Amos shows us through Israel’s example that The Love of Money Leads to Terrible Things.

First, a little background on the Book of Amos.  Amos was a shepherd and a fig farmer from the Southern Kingdom of Judah.  But the Lord called him to take a break from shepherding and farming – to take a break from making money – and to go up to the Northern Kingdom of Israel around the year 750 BC in order to deliver a message to Israel – to warn them that they would be punished and permanently exiled from their homeland for all the many ways they had rejected the Lord as their God. One of those ways was their attitude toward money, and that sinful attitude led to terrible things.

It led, first of all, to a heart that hated God. Hear this, you who trample the needy and do away with the poor of the land, saying, “When will the New Moon be over that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat?”  You get the relationship between the New Moon and selling grain?  Every New Moon – once a month, no matter what day it fell on, God’s law ordered Israel to close down their businesses and do no work, but instead come together for worship.  The same thing was true for every Saturday – every Sabbath day.  No work allowed.  Which meant, no making money allowed.

You’d think the people would have appreciated a day of rest and worship of this good God who provided them with all they needed.  But what God provided was never enough for them.  Their love for money led them to hate this God who forced them to rest and worship him once a week and on every New Moon.  They couldn’t wait for those days of worship to be done so that they could get on to their heart’s true desire: making more money.

Jesus said it himself: “No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.”  Sure enough!  The Israelites’ love for money meant hatred of God.

From there, it was a small step to more terrible things.  Their love of money led to the abuse of their neighbor.  And here, Amos lists a whole host of unethical business practices. 1) Skimping the measure; 2) Boosting the price 3) Cheating with dishonest scales; 4) Buying the poor and the needy – making almost slave labor out of them; 5) Selling the sweepings with the wheat – so that the chaff that had been beaten off the wheat and the dust on the ground would be swept up and added to the weight of the purchase.  Anything goes in business practice, thought the Israelites – including the abuse of your neighbor.  Business is business, right?

“Wrong!” says the Lord.  God never commanded anyone to love his money, or even to make a profit.  But God has commanded, in the two greatest commandments, that a man must love God with all his heart, soul, mind and strength, and must love his neighbor as himself.  Money is to be used for one purpose and one purpose alone: to serve the Lord as the Lord commands, which includes serving one’s neighbor.  Money is never to be served, because money is never to become your god.

Now, not all business owners are dishonest like the Israelites were.  Not all who are rich oppress the poor or take advantage of them.  But some do.  And God sees.  Sometimes it’s actual dishonesty or cheating.  Sometimes, it’s just called regular business practice in our capitalistic society, in which boosting the price far above what something is worth is standard practice.  Someone will argue, “It’s worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it.”  Well, that’s what the Israelites were saying, too, but God calls it “trampling the needy.”

And when Amos talks about buying the poor with silver, I couldn’t help but think of the way some business owners contract illegal immigrants so that they don’t have to pay such high wages.  So what if the government says it’s illegal?  So what if the workers get abused or mistreated or not paid the full amount?  It’s business!  It’s about making money!

Of course, it goes both ways.  Why do some cross the border illegally in the first place?  To make money!  Not just to survive – believe me, I know.  In many cases, it’s to get richer, because the poor wages paid to them here in this country are worth a fortune in their country. So what if the government – and therefore, God – says it’s illegal?  It’s business! It’s about making money! God will just have to understand.

See how the love of money leads to terrible things?  God doesn’t matter.  Your neighbor doesn’t matter.  Money is what matters. Now, not many of you are business owners here.  But you can all fall into this kind of greed in which your money becomes more important that your neighbor’s welfare, more important than God’s Word.

I wonder if you’ve ever thought to yourself what the Israelites thought – when will this church service be over so that I can get on to the things that are really important to me – like making money, or spending money, or enjoying the things that my money has bought?  Or think about what career decisions or retirement decisions you’ve made.  Where has God’s Word factored in? Or is serving the Lord an afterthought – something to be determined after you have all the money and material benefits you think are so important?

Notice, I’m not talking mainly about the money that you place in the offering plate.  I’m talking about your heart and what occupies it.  Because the love of money is nothing else than the love of self – self before God, self before your neighbor.  We’re all guilty of that.  The question is – won’t you repent of that and turn from it? Admit that your heart is a selfish place – at best, torn between serving God and serving money. At worst – content to serve money and keep God in the background.

Repent, because the love of money leads to terrible things.  Can you think of anything more terrible than what God said to the people of Israel through Amos? The Lord has sworn by the Pride of Jacob: “I will never forget anything they have done.” That should send chills up your spine.  Because if the Lord never forgets anything you have done, then you are lost forever, and on the day of reckoning, you will have all your sins recounted, one by one, and your heart will be laid bare for all to see – your devotion to self, your devotion to money, your lack of devotion to God and his Word, the ways you’ve taken advantage of your neighbor. And there will be only condemnation.

But in his mercy, God has stepped into history before that day – that day of reckoning – and called you to repent of your idolatries and believe in his Son, Jesus Christ.  He is God’s forgetting place.  The truth is, God wants to forget everything you have done, and so he sent His Son to do everything right for you, and to pay for your idolatries with his blood shed on the cross, blood that cancels the law’s accusations against you, His death that cancels the need for you to die eternally.  His blood is the blood of a New Covenant in which you are right with God, not by using money correctly, but by faith in his name.  God states the terms of that New Covenant in the prophet Jeremiah, “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”  God has sworn never to forget your sins – unless you are found in Christ.  He alone is God’s forgetting place – where God has chosen to forget – and forgive – everything you have done and to remember everything that Christ has done for you.

You were covered with Christ in baptism.  And if you have wandered into the love of money since then, repent and return to God’s promise in your baptism.  Repent and believe the gospel you’re hearing now. Repent and receive the blood of the New Covenant here at the Sacrament of the Altar.

God’s forgiveness in Christ leads to a proper view of money – not as something to be acquired and certainly not as something to be served, but as a gift of God to be used only for the purposes he himself outlines in his Word.  If God has won your heart through the sacrifice of His Son, then your wallet has been won for him, too.

Yes, offerings to the church are part of that as God directs you to support the one whom he has placed before you to preach the Gospel.  Your offerings are also used to provide this place where people can be taught about God – through Bible classes, but also through the beauty of God’s house and through the loving care God’s people take to maintain God’s house. Your offerings are also used to support the spread of God’s Word in our church body, our synod, to prepare pastors and teachers for ministry, to support missionaries throughout the world.

But you serve God with your money in other ways, too, above and beyond your offerings.  When you pay your taxes. When you provide for your family and for your extended family in their financial needs. When you care about your neighbor right here among our membership and offer the shirt off your back, if necessary, to help a brother or sister in need.  And then you go out into the community or into the world as individual Christians and as you have been blessed with more than enough, you still have something to share with your neighbor, and you may even have something left to spend on your own enjoyment.

And when it comes time to think about your job or your income or your retirement – you have God’s direction to serve Him there, too, not yourself, not your own personal comfort or cravings – to serve God and to serve your neighbor with your whole life, heart included.

The love of money leads to terrible things, but the love of God for you in Christ Jesus leads to wonderful things – a proper use of God’s gift of money, but much more than that. The love of God for you in Christ Jesus grants you the forgiveness of your sins, eternal life and salvation before you spend a dime. Amen.

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Like Moses, Like Jesus – The Sinner Has an Advocate

Posted on September 20, 2010 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for Pentecost 17(c)

Exodus 32:7-14  +  Luke 15:1-10  +  1 Timothy 1:12-17

Once again, the scene is set for us in today’s Gospel.  The tax collectors – aka those who practiced legalized extortion – and other professional “sinners” were all gathering around to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law complained, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”  They were surprised and offended that someone who claimed to be sent from God could have such compassion on people who obviously didn’t deserve it.

The irony of it is that the Law that the teachers of the law were supposed to teach was the Torah – the first five books of the Bible, the books written by Moses.  If only those “teachers of the law” had paid closer attention to the Law, then they wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised to see Jesus welcoming those sinners and even standing up for them.  Nor would they have been offended by it.  Instead, they would have rejoiced over it – as you should, too – because Jesus was acting just like their hero, Moses, did, standing up for miserable, rotten sinners.

Let’s go back to that First Lesson we heard today from the Second Book of Moses, Exodus 32, and see the similarities – Like Moses, Like Jesus – The Sinner Has an Advocate.

The sinners, in Exodus 32, were the entire nation of Israel.  It had only been about three months since God, through Moses, had miraculously parted the waters of the Red Sea and rescued them from slavery in Egypt.  It took them about two months to travel to the foot of Mt. Sinai, where our text takes place.

They got to Mt. Sinai, and then God gave them the fright of their lives.  Thunder and lightning, fire and billowing smoke, earthquakes, blaring trumpets, and then – the voice of God thundering the Ten Commandments to them, beginning with: “I am the Lord – Yahweh – your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me.  You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.  You shall not bow down to them or worship them.”

The people trembled with fear. They pleaded with Moses to go up and talk to God for them, because they couldn’t handle it. So he did. He got the rest of the laws from God, brought them down, read them to the people and all the leaders of Israel responded.  “We will keep these commandments.  We will obey.”  Then Moses was called back up to the mountain with God so that God could give him the tablets of stone with the laws of God engraved by the finger of God.

Forty days Moses was up there on the mountain, six weeks or so.  And the people grew impatient.  They told Aaron, Moses’ brother, “Make some gods for us who will go before us, because we don’t know what’s happened to this Moses guy.”  So Aaron foolishly crafts a golden idol in the image of a calf and sets it before the people to worship, and they all bow down to it and sacrifice to it and get up and dance around it. So much for the First Commandment! So much for their pledged obedience!

That’s where our text begins.  God tells Moses to go down and see just how corrupt these people have become with their idolatry. Then God tells Moses, “I have seen these people, and they are a stiff-necked people. Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.”

If Moses had been like the Pharisees and teachers of the law in the Gospel, he would have taken God up on his offer, wouldn’t he?  To be done with “those miserable sinners,” to allow God to consume them in his wrath while rewarding him for his faithfulness.

That’s what the Pharisees and teachers of the law wanted – to be congratulated by Jesus for their goodness, to be rid of “those miserable sinners,” to be rewarded by God.  They wanted Jesus to abandon the lost.

But that’s not what Jesus did.  It’s not what Moses did, either.  But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God. “O Lord,” he said, “why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people. Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever.’ ”

See how differently Moses answered from how the Pharisees and teachers of the law answered!  He pleads with the Lord. He pleads for the wicked, rebellious, foolish people who had already grumbled against him and against God so many times. 

But notice, too, the basis for his plea.  He doesn’t say, “Oh, Lord, they’re really not so bad.  All they did was make a statue and bow down to it.  They don’t deserve to be consumed by your wrath.”  Nope.  Not a bit of that.  Moses agrees that they deserve to be consumed and that God would be just to do it.  But he doesn’t plead for justice.  He pleads for mercy.

And again, on what basis?  Why should God have mercy on these people and spare them from the complete destruction he had threatened?  Why?  Moses cites one reason and one reason alone: for the sake of God’s own reputation. 

First, “You brought them out of Egypt (not I, Lord), with great power and a mighty hand.  You did this great thing for them.  Why should your salvation go to waste?”

Second, “Yes, Lord, you would be just to consume them, but don’t give the Egyptians the satisfaction.  Don’t let them blaspheme your holy name and get the wrong idea about who you are.  They won’t understand that it was really the people’s fault.  They’ll just see it and accuse you of being capricious.  Don’t let your reputation be trashed on account of these wicked people.”

And third, “Remember your oath, your promise made to your faithful servants in the past, to Abraham, Isaac and Israel.  You promised them that their descendants would inherit the land!  You promised! You promised!  Remember your promise! Relent!”

And Moses was heard by the Lord. His prayer for his people was acceptable in God’s sight. God relented.  He “changed his mind,” insofar as you can say that about the LORD who doesn’t change.  He relented and didn’t bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.

Now, we might get the impression that what God really wanted to do was to destroy Israel, and that it was Moses’ compassion that changed God’s mind.  But God is only moved by our prayers if he wants to be moved.  It was God who wanted all along to have compassion on his people. He just wanted Moses to be their advocate.

What God wanted was for those who had rebelled against him to know the extent of his wrath over their sin and the deadly consequences that were in store for them.  What he wanted was for his chosen leader – Moses – to stand up for his people, to be an advocate for them, to show compassion for them, to hold up God’s honor and God’s own promises as the reason why he should not destroy them.  What he wanted was for Moses to become a picture of Moses’ replacement, THE Chosen Leader who would truly lead God’s people to the promised land.  What he wanted was for his people to hear about Moses pleading for them, and to know that that’s what the Christ would do, too.

How do we know that’s what God wanted all along?  Because that’s what we see in Jesus.  Jesus is the exact representation of the Father’s Being.  Jesus reveals the heart of God to us. Like Moses, like Jesus – the sinner has an advocate.

Now Jesus didn’t deny the sinfulness of the tax collectors and sinners who were coming to him, nor did he excuse it, or tell them it was OK to continue in it, or leave their sins unpunished.  Instead, he came to be punished for their sins.  Israel’s Chosen Leader asked to be consumed by God’s wrath instead of them, so that they could go free, so that they could enter the promised land of the Father’s grace and of heavenly glory.

And it would be effective.  God’s wrath against the sinner would subside – actually, it would be poured out, but on Israel’s Representative, Israel’s Substitute, Israel’s Sacrifice – the Son of God, the Christ. The Law of Moses has been fulfilled by Christ.  There is an advocate for sinners who stands at the right hand of God and says “Remember! Remember your promise that everyone who believes in me will not perish but have eternal life!  Remember how you sent Me to be their Substitute, how you poured out your wrath on me on the cross! You promised to save them through faith in me. You promised! You promised!” And God remembers, and relents.

And so the will of God for sinners is not that they be consumed by his wrath.  Peter reveals God’s will for sinners:  He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.  That’s God’s will, that’s what God wants, for sinners to see the error of their ways and turn to him for mercy – mercy that they can count on in Christ Jesus.  Jesus says that there is rejoicing in heaven when a sinner repents and looks to Christ for forgiveness.

There is no rejoicing in heaven whatsoever over those who see no need to repent.  There is no rejoicing in heaven when self-righteous people wish for themselves to be saved but wish for other sinners to get what’s coming to them.

I may have told you the story of a church I know where the treasurer stole $100,000 and gambled it away.  And then, as far as some members were concerned, the worst thing possible happened.  He repented, and promised to pay it all back.  But, you see, they became Pharisees – Pharisees who got angry when the church forgave his sin, Pharisees who didn’t want the likes of him anywhere near them ever again.  There is no joy in heaven over such people. But there is joy in heaven over the thief who humbles himself and repents of his wickedness and turns to Christ for forgiveness.

We need to watch ourselves – how we speak, how we act – that we never give people the impression that sinners are unwelcome among us.    What is unwelcome among us is pride and arrogance.  What is unwelcome among us is a refusal to call sin sin, and a refusal to repent of it.  Our church should be a place where no one is ever ashamed to come, unless they come in pride.  Everyone should know that this place – Emmanuel Lutheran Church is for sinners only – sinners who look to Christ Jesus for help. 

Let us take on the attitude of the Apostle Paul who confessed himself to be the chief of sinners. Because if that’s how you see yourself, then you’ll never be able to look down on other sinners.  Let us be like Moses, like Jesus, and like our Father in heaven who wants everyone to come to repentance and be saved by faith in his Son. And let us point sinners to their Advocate, Christ Jesus.  The sinner who repents and trusts in him will never be put to shame. Amen.

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Is the gain still worth the loss?

Posted on September 12, 2010 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for Pentecost 16(c)

Philippians 3:4b-11  +  Luke 14:25-3  +  Genesis 12:1-8

Are the words of today’s Gospel still ringing in your ears?  “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple.”  It’s one of my favorite passages in the Bible.  You may think that’s weird.  But you see, it cuts through all the false images of Jesus that society has created – of a wishy washy, soft-spoken, always gentle Jesus who speaks only of love, who just wants people to do him the favor of letting him be a part of their lives, at least, a little part – a Jesus who just wants to fill up churches around the world with lots and lots of people, lots and lots of growth – no matter what they actually believe, no matter what the church actually teaches.

Today’s Gospel reveals a Jesus who doesn’t want large crowds following him with half a heart, but rather who wants disciples who have seen in him a treasure worth more than all the world’s wealth – disciples who realize: it’s expensive to follow Jesus; who realize that it’ll cost them everything, they’ll lose everything – and who want to follow anyway, because to gain Christ is worth more than the loss.

In Philippians 3, we see an example of a man who did count the cost of discipleship, and as far as he was concerned, the gain by far outweighed the loss.  His name was Paul, and at one time, all of you who were confirmed in the Lutheran Church said that you agreed with him, that to gain Christ was worth losing everything.  When you were asked, “Do you intend to continue steadfast in the teaching of Christ as you have learned it in the Lutheran Church and to endure all things, even death, rather than fall away from it?”, you answered, “I do.”  In this text from Philippians 3, and through the Gospel today in Luke 14, God confronts you with the probing question:  Is the gain still worth the loss?

First, consider what you must lose to gain Christ.  The Apostle Paul had much to lose.  Here are some things he had: 1) circumcised on the eighth day, 2) of the people of Israel, 3) of the tribe of Benjamin, 4) a Hebrew of Hebrews; 5) in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6) as for zeal, persecuting the church; 7) as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.  In other words, Paul had everything that a human being could possibly have in order to claim bragging rights before God.  He had the right family – Israel, chosen by God to be his people.  He had the right upbringing, the right reputation, the right behavior.  He was sincere in his beliefs and zealous in living according to them.  So meticulous had he been throughout his life that no one could point to a single law within Judaism that Paul had failed to keep.  His record was spotless. If anyone had reason to brag before God, it was Paul.

But in order to gain Christ, Paul had to lose it all. But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. All of those things that Paul used to boast about – he had to turn his back on them as useless when it came to God’s approval.  He couldn’t rely on any of it – not his Jewish heritage, not his circumcision, not his obedience to the law, not his sincerity, not his zeal.

But it wasn’t just those things Paul had to lose.  With them, he also lost the respect of his Jewish extended family.   He lost his position of honor and power in Judaism.  He lost his livelihood, his home, his stability. He lost all earthly comfort; he lost his health and his freedom on many occasions, and eventually he would have to lose his head – literally, because in order to have Christ, he couldn’t hang onto any of those things.

And neither can you.  Not father or mother.  Not wife or husband or children or friends or career or comfort or reputation or life. You can’t rely on any of those things. You can’t cling to any of those things.  You can’t live for any of those things.  And you can’t be devoted to sin. And you can’t hold onto your own righteousness, goodness or decency to wave before God and expect him to applaud or to smile or to give you his approval.  It all has to go.  You have to lose it all, renounce it all – at least from your heart, and maybe also from your life if any of it threatens to come between you and Christ.  That’s what it means to die to your self.

That’s the price – the high cost of discipleship.  Your self has to go. Every day.  That’s what it means to repent.  That’s what repentance looks like, to confess that it’s all worthless, to consider it all rubbish.  Who could do such a thing?  Who would be willing to pay such a high price?  I mean, to lose everything, to renounce everything, even your own self – what could be worth that?

Hear Paul’s answer again:  I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 

Paul realized that nothing he had could earn him God’s approval, and all his earthly comfort and possessions – even his family would be gone in a heartbeat.  Then what?  Without God’s approval, he had only God’s eternal condemnation to look forward to, because for as righteous as he might have been in comparison to other people, in comparison to God, he was still a poor sinner who didn’t deserve God’s love or God’s approval.  Paul realized that he was, by nature, just like everyone else: dead in trespasses and sins; an enemy of God; an object of God’s well-deserved wrath.

But in Christ Jesus everything changed.  In Christ God revealed his compassion toward undeserving sinners.  In Christ God revealed just how far his love for sinners goes – that he would give up his own beloved Son to save those who were so desperately clinging to this world.  He would lose his Son to gain his enemies.  Apart from Christ there is no forgiveness.  Apart from Christ there is no happy ever after, no righteousness before God.  But in Christ there is complete forgiveness for everything and a gracious Father in heaven.  In Christ there is an innocent verdict in God’s courtroom and that happy ever after that’s beyond our wildest dreams.  In Christ there is salvation from this corrupt, dying world, salvation from the devil’s schemes, salvation from your own demented self.  Those are the benefits of Christ.  That’s what you gain when you gain him.

And best of all, the benefits of Christ are not given to the one who works for them.  The benefits of Christ are given to faith, to the one who believes this good news.  Instead of relying on your own record of behavior to be considered righteous by a righteous God, instead of offering your righteousness to God, Paul says that true righteousness comes from God as a gift, and comes by faith in Christ Jesus.

And when you gain Christ by trusting in him, you not only gain his righteousness before God and a place in that eternal inheritance.  You gain a new perspective on this world – as a dying place, as a temporary place, as a place that we patiently live in for a little while longer, but no longer as a place we live for.  You gain a new worldview – you no longer view God’s commandments as unreasonable burdens you have to bear, but as an altogether reasonable guide to behavior that just makes sense for children of God. 

When you gain Christ, you gain a completely different take on suffering, too. Listen to how Paul puts it, I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.  The cross, for as bitter as it feels, is not the Christian’s enemy, but rather, the Christian’s friend.  You get to be like Jesus when you bear the cross in his name!  And if you’re like him in suffering, you’ll also be like him in glory. The power of Christ’s resurrection enables you to endure under the cross, to hate your own worldly life, even to rejoice in the face of suffering and death, because you know how this story ends.  It ends with life for you who believe in him.  It ends with Jesus who died and rose again and promises that you will rise from the dead, too, one day, if you are found trusting in him when the time of your death comes.

So to be found in Christ, to be found clinging to him by faith – that was THE life-goal of the Apostle Paul.  That is the goal of every true Christian.  If you find that other goals have become more important in your heart, if you find that Christ is little more than a Sunday morning tradition, if that, then it’s time to confront that question:  Is the gain still worth the loss?  Or have you foolishly chosen to renounce Christ in order to gain back some of the earthly things you once considered to be loss?  You can’t cling to both.  Christ is an all or nothing Savior.  Renounce everything else, and get all of him, with all his benefits.  Cling to anything else, and get none of him.

Is he worth it?  Is his kingdom enough?  Is what you gain in Christ still worth the loss of everything else?  The Lord Jesus was confronted with the same question by his Father, but in reverse.  Are they worth it?  Is having them in your kingdom enough?  Is what you gain in those sinful human beings still worth the loss of your dignity, the loss of your glory, the loss of your life?  Without hesitation, Christ answered with a resounding, “Yes! The gain is always worth the loss.”  Christ’s answer is what inspired the answer of the Apostle Paul.  Let that answer inspire your answer, too.  Amen.

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The Humble Service of the Hebrews

Posted on September 5, 2010 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for Pentecost 15(c)

Hebrews 13:1-8  +  Luke 14:1,7-14  +  Proverbs 25:6,7

Our text today is from the letter to the Hebrews, chapter 13.  It’s the last chapter of this deeply theological letter, in which the author – whichever apostle it was, we’re not sure – details for the Hebrew Christians how Jesus Christ is superior to everything and everyone.  As the eternal Son of God, the radiance of his glory, he is superior to the whole creation – superior to angels and to men.  As the high priest of a new covenant between God and man, Christ is superior to Moses, the law-giver.  As a perfect sacrifice for sins, Christ is superior to all the works of man and all the animal sacrifices of the Old Testament put together.  And by God’s grace, through faith in Christ, everything that’s his – is now ours.

So what does someone do who has everything that Christ has?  What does someone do who has been given all things and raised above all things?  Well, of course!  He lowers himself beneath all things and renders humble service to all people.

The verses of our text in Hebrews 13 seem to be a bunch of random commands and encouragements by the apostle. They actually cover all Ten Commandments pretty well.  And they seem to have little to do with today’s Gospel of Jesus in the house of that Pharisee on a Sabbath day.  But the key to understanding all these commands at the end of the letter to the Hebrews is in our relationship to Christ Jesus and our place in his kingdom.  We almost need to add in the verses right before our text: Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship – or, “serve” – God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our “God is a consuming fire.” It all ties together around thankful, reverent, humble service – THE HUMBLE SERVICE OF THE HEBREWS.

It was anything but humble service that Jesus encountered in today’s Gospel, when he stepped into that Pharisee’s house on that Sabbath day.  You remember what you heard a few moments ago?  What did Jesus observe there among those Hebrews? He looked on as all the invited guests, as soon as they walked in the door, made a beeline for the seats of honor.  There was nothing humble about their behavior.  What Jesus also observed there was that the host wasn’t throwing this party to be hospitable and generous to the guests.  He had invited those who were most likely to invite him back to their parties. There was nothing humble about his behavior.

Jesus condemned that self-seeking behavior in those Hebrews, their selfishness, their arrogance, their attitude of superiority.  He condemns it wherever he finds it. “Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled.”  As Peter says, “God opposes the proud.”  He sees that pride in every sin, because in every sin, we exalt ourselves above God’s law and fail to serve him humbly.   It’s not all right to seek your honor or your pleasure at the expense of others.  It’s not all right to get angry at the people around you because they did something foolish that made your life harder, or because they told you the truth you needed to hear, even though you didn’t want to hear it.  It’s not all right to be so self-absorbed that you barely give your brothers and sisters in Christ a second thought throughout the week, much less a helping hand or a sincere prayer for their wellbeing.

Don’t cling to behavior like that and attitudes like that.  Our God is a consuming fire, and what that fire consumes is the sinner who dares to make himself more important than others.

Which brings us back to the superiority of Christ.  The only one in the universe who truly is more important than any creature in the universe – made himself nothing, taking on the form of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and made himself obedient to death, even death on a cross.  The Book of Hebrews pictures Christ as the perfect Hebrew – perfect because he humbled himself to live a human life under God’s law, made perfect through suffering, perfect because he so perfectly represents who God is – by nature superior to all, but by choice the humble servant of all.

And through the humble service of that perfect Hebrew – our God who is a consuming fire has been reconciled with sinners. Humble yourself by repenting of your self-centeredness – by repenting of all your sin. And look to Christ, the humble servant.  He is the high priest who presented his perfect sacrifice before the Father and holds it up before his eyes.  Because of that sacrifice of Christ, the perfect Hebrew, God has promised forgiveness of sins to the one who trusts in Christ. He has promised to exalt the one who humbles himself in repentance and faith in the goodness of Christ.

Faith in Christ brings you into Christ and makes a Hebrew out of you.  Baptism seals the deal and makes you God’s child, and as God’s child you are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, the kingdom of the saints, the kingdom of the Hebrews. 

Because of Christ’s merits, you have a gracious Father in heaven. Even so, our relationship with him is never to become “buddy, buddy.”  Our God remains a consuming fire, who does not terrify those who are in Christ Jesus, but who still deserves our reverence and awe and commands a healthy respect.

It’s only fitting, now, that you become like the Son of God in how you view the world, in how you view your brothers and sisters in Christ, in how you offer your whole self in thankful, reverent, humble service to God.

If you would do this, if you would serve God in reverence and awe and humility, what things would you do? What does a life of humble service look like?

Well, here we are, finally getting to our text in Hebrews 13.  We couldn’t start with it, because it’s one of those texts that assumes that those who are comfortable in their sins have already been afflicted by God’s law, and that those who are afflicted in their conscience have already been comforted by his Gospel in Christ Jesus. Now how does that gospel teach us to spend the remainder of our days on earth until we fully receive that kingdom God has promised?

Keep on loving each other as brothers. Literally, “Let philadephia – brotherly love – remain!”  We’re talking about fellow church members here.  In Christ, no one is better or worse than another, no one superior or inferior to another.  We have a special relationship with one another, not as brothers and sisters by DNA, but as brothers and sisters by faith in Christ, by Christ’s Hebrew DNA.  We are not separated by race or color or gender or age.  It’s time to get rid of all notions of superiority or inferiority, of being standoffish, or rude or mean.  Instead, love one another – care about one another – warts and all.

And show it in tangible ways.  The letter to the Hebrews gives some examples.  Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it (probably referring there to when Old Testament Lot took those angels into his home in the city of Sodom). Christian hospitality is one way to show that brotherly love. You may show it in your home.  We ought to show it here in God’s house, too. Remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering. It’s talking here specifically about fellow Christians who are imprisoned for being Christians, or those who are mistreated unjustly, unfairly.  If you don’t know a brother or sister in Christ who is imprisoned – since we don’t have as much of that kind of persecution as they did back in the first century – think about other ways in which your brothers or sisters in Christ may be suffering under the cross. Remember them in your prayers.  Offer them your support, your humble service.

How does a Hebrew live in humble service to God and his brothers?  Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.  You see, God’s commandments, like the Sixth Commandment – you shall not commit adultery – still serve as a guide for God’s people on earth.  Living a moral life, a chaste life, is still part of a life of humble service to God – humble, because our sinful self would like nothing more than to set aside God’s rules about sex and marriage and make up its own rules and do what it wants and seek its own pleasure.  Not married yet?  So what!  You can’t be expected to wait for marriage to hook up with someone.  Married but frustrated?  So what! Look for love somewhere else.  Oh, married life is hard?  Well, then. Get a divorce!  No, no, no. Don’t let self get its way.  Remember your God and his commandments, and give him thanks for curbing your sinful nature with these reminders of his judgment on the adulterer and the sexually immoral.

Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.” So we say with confidence, “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?”  It can be a hard thing to keep your life free from the love of money, because it seems so necessary, and it can provide so much comfort and enjoyment and security in life.  That’s why it’s so important to keep a heavenly perspective on things.  Money doesn’t provide for you.  God does, and he’s promised to give you all you need.  Money can’t save you from disaster or from sin or from death.  God can.  Money doesn’t love you.  But God does. Christ is the proof! So don’t love money. Love God. Don’t trust in money. Trust in God.  Don’t make your life about making money.  Make your life about humble service to God.

Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.  Who are these leaders?  A few verses later it will encourage God’s people to obey their current spiritual leaders.  But here, it’s talking about those who preached and taught God’s Word before and are now dead.  It would include pastors who led you in God’s Word when you were little.  It would include apostles and prophets and martyrs and those we refer to as saints – not because they’re closer to God than we are, but because they led lives that serve as examples for us to imitate their faith.  In humble service to God who provided for us spiritual leaders like that, true Christian role models like that, we don’t consider ourselves to be better than sliced bread.  We don’t pretend that the Church never existed before we entered it.  We don’t discard the wisdom of our spiritual leaders from the past. We remember it.  We honor them as God’s gifts to us. We read their writings, we sing their hymns – Augustine, John Chrysostom, Luther, Melanchthon, Chemnitz, Gerhard, Walther, Hoenecke.  We keep the Western Rite in our divine service – the liturgy, because it’s a treasury filled with God’s Word, handed down to us by our leaders, who spoke the word of God to us.

And what has always been at the heart of that Word? Jesus Christ – the same yesterday and today and forever.  Jesus Christ, who has always existed as the Son of God, who lives now, even though he died, and who will outlast this universe.  Jesus Christ, the Hebrew of Hebrews, whose humble life of service means the forgiveness of our sins, who is our righteousness before the Father, and who will come again to bring us into his heavenly kingdom.  At the end of the day when you look back and see all the ways you did the sins you didn’t want to do and didn’t do all the good you did want to do, all the ways your service was less than humble – there is Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever.  There’s the same body and blood, the same water, the same Word.  With the same old forgiveness and mercy, which is new every morning.  The humble service of THE Hebrew continues forever.  Let his faithful, humble service inspire the humble service of these Hebrews.  Amen.

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Your business is to head for the door

Posted on August 29, 2010 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for Pentecost 14(c)

Luke 13:22-30  +  Isaiah 66:18-24  +  Hebrews 12:18-24

It’s the age-old question that we have before us today in the Gospel of Luke. “Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?”  It’s a question people ask out of arrogance, sometimes, hoping that only a few good people – like me – are allowed into heaven.  It’s a question people ask sometimes out of fear, for themselves or for others.  Will only a few make it?  What about them?  What about me?  Who’s gonna be there in heaven?  What are a person’s chances?  How many?  How few?  Wouldn’t you like to know?

The truth is, it’s none of your business.  That’s God’s business!  The Lord knows those who are his.  It’s man’s fallen, human nature to try to play God and crunch the numbers.  And it’s man’s fallen, human nature to second-guess God’s reasons for saving some or for condemning others.  But you don’t get to play God and peer into heaven to how many are there.  And you don’t get to judge his judgment.  It’s God’s business how many or how few are finally rescued from Satan’s kingdom and brought into the kingdom of the Son he loves.  It’s God’s business to know it.  It’s God’s business to accomplish it.  Your business – is to head for the door.

“Make every effort,” Jesus said to the crowd, “to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.”  You see, Jesus doesn’t answer the question whether few or many will be saved. What he does say is that many won’t be.  And you don’t want to be among those many who are left outside.  Jesus doesn’t want you to be among them, either.  So, Jesus tells the people listening to him (both then and now), “You – make every effort.” Literally, “struggle, strive, compete to enter through the narrow door.”

So, what? Is he saying, “Work very hard at keeping God’s commandments in order to enter”?  Well, no.  If you started out life neutral or even good, then you could make every effort to stick with it, to keep honoring God’s name and God’s Word and serving your neighbor and steering clear of sin and selfish behavior and hateful thoughts.  But you didn’t start out life neutral or good.  You started out life in Satan’s kingdom, trapped, enslaved to sin and destined for eternal condemnation outside of God’s kingdom, God’s house.  That’s why you needed “to be saved” in the first place. 

There is only one door that leads out of Satan’s kingdom and into God’s kingdom.  It’s a very narrow door, and that door is Christ Jesus himself.  “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life,” Jesus says.  “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved. Whoever does not believe will be condemned.”  Whoever believes.  Christ died for all, not a few, and wants all to be saved, not just a few.  But he wants all to be saved through faith in him. Anyone who tries to be saved by any other way than believing in the Son of God, or by any other name, will be shut out of God’s kingdom forever.

Of course, we’re so lost by nature that no one would even be able to believe in Christ and walk through that door to salvation.  And so God sends his Holy Spirit through this gospel – whenever you hear it – to create and strengthen faith.

So, if salvation is by faith alone in Christ, and faith doesn’t come from our effort or struggle, but as God’s gift through his Word, then why does Jesus tell the crowd before him to make every effort, to struggle, strive and compete to enter through him?  And when do we enter through this door into God’s kingdom?  Now, through faith in Jesus? Or when we die or when he comes again?  Great questions!  Let’s dig a little deeper.

Entering through the narrow door that is Christ does involve a struggle, because it requires dying – dying to sin, dying to self, dying through repentance and rising to new life as the promise of the forgiveness of sins in Christ Jesus sparks faith in your heart.   That death to sin and rising to new life first occurred at your baptism, when the door to heaven swung open to you and you were received into God’s family as his forgiven child, clothed as you were in Christ, the true and only Son of God.  You entered through the narrow door.  If you had died at that moment, you would have awoken in the paradise of God.

But instead, you took another breath here on this earth.  And then another. And then another.  And one day passed, and then another, then months and then years and now here you are.  And, you see, we are not Calvinists here or Baptists who believe that once you’re saved, you’re always saved, that once you’ve entered through the narrow door, you’re good to go for the rest of your earthly life.  Conversion, you might say, is an event, but faith is not.  Faith is a constant looking to Christ and relying on his promises.  Faith keeps its focus on the narrow door and heads straight for it. 

But you have enemies here, as long as you’re drawing breath on earth, who will do everything in their power to sidetrack you from that narrow door, to pull you off the road, to drag you out of the house. Your enemies want you to be on the outside with them when the door closes shut on the day of your death.  The devil, the world and your sinful nature are those enemies.  And they will hit you with temptations and distractions and troubles and worries and worldly attractions – anything to get your focus off the narrow door that is Christ and his cross.

And so the Bible uses this picture of God’s house in two different ways.  In a sense, you who trust in Christ Jesus have already entered the Kingdom of Christ through the door that is Christ and his cross.  But in the sense that you haven’t arrived at your final judgment yet, because you haven’t died yet and Christ hasn’t returned yet, and you could still foolishly allow these enemies of your faith to gain the upper hand, the Bible also pictures the Christian life as a constant heading for the narrow door that is Christ, a daily and continuous living in repentance, a constant need for faith to be fed through Word and Sacrament, a lifelong struggle against sin and against Satan, a lifelong seeking to be found in Christ, so that, when the door is closed, you are, once and for all, safe – saved – on the inside, and not still searching for the door on the outside.

So serious is this business of salvation that Jesus begins to speak to the crowd before him as if it were already too late for them, and the door had already been shut.  You will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’ “But he will answer, ‘I don’t know you or where you come from.’

Most of the Jews in Jesus’ day were unwilling to die through repentance and were unwilling to look to Christ as the door to salvation.  And yet, they were fully expecting to be let into heaven.  There you’ll stand knocking, Jesus tells them.  “Oops, Lord, you made a mistake.  Yeah, you closed the door on us, but we’re Jews, Abraham’s children?  We are the few, the proud, the saved, remember?  Your chosen people?  Not like those sinful Gentiles over there! Just go ahead and, um, open the door.”  And Christ, the doorkeeper will tell them, “I don’t know you, I don’t recognize you at all.”  “What do you mean you don’t know us?  You lived among us. You taught among us.  We ate and drank with you.  Sure, you know us!”   “No, no I don’t.  Now get outta here, you evildoers!”

When God says, I don’t know you or where you came from, he doesn’t say it out of ignorance.  He says it out of choice.  He says it to those who refused to know him through the Person of Christ, who tried to know him in some other way, as some other God than the one who revealed himself in Holy Scripture and who gave his One and Only Son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  He says it to those who sat back and relaxed, figuring they were home free since they were lifelong Jews or lifelong Christians. But faith in Christ and church membership aren’t the same thing.  Being familiar with Christianity is not the same thing as a heart that relies on Christ for everything.

For those who fail to head for the narrow door in time, “There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out.”  Imagine the sadness and the rage of those who thought they were God’s best friends simply because of their heritage or their church membership, but who find out on the day of their death that, yes, it was all true – all the stories about Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, all the words of the prophets – but I didn’t pay attention to what they said.  I knew who they were, but I didn’t repent and trust in the Christ they all pointed to, and now it’s too late.

People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God.  This one must have really hurt Jesus’ Jewish audience that day.  Here, they thought they were the few – the saved – because they were Abraham’s children.  Instead, they’ll have to stand on the outside looking in as Gentiles – people from every nation, tribe, language and people – take their seats at the never-ending heavenly feast.  Because salvation has never been about nationality.  It has always and only been about faith in Christ, whose gospel would be largely rejected by the Jews, but would go out to the four corners of the earth and convince people from all over the world to head for the narrow door that is Christ, as you heard Isaiah prophesy today as well.

So see!  While Jesus doesn’t reveal percentages of people who will be saved, or talk about how many or how few they will be, he does assure us that there will be plenty of people in heaven, people from everywhere.  People whom we looked at and said, “Naw, they couldn’t possibly be saved” – some of them will be first, Jesus says.  And some people whom we looked at and said, “Yes, there is an obvious saint who will be in heaven” – some of them will be last, Jesus says – in other words, they won’t be there at all.

So identifying who is saved or who is not saved, or figuring out how many or how few will be in heaven – that’s not your business.  Your business is to head for the door, now, before it’s too late.  Your business is to arrange your life around the door, to continue in the Word of Christ and stay close to the Sacraments of Christ, to be constant in prayer that God keep you on the straight and narrow way and defend you from every enemy that would steer you off course.  No one coasts into the Kingdom of heaven on autopilot.  No one stumbles upon that narrow door by accident.  No one gets taken along for the ride into faith.  Only those who take their sins seriously will take their salvation seriously.  Rest in Christ’s salvation, but don’t sit back and relax.  Make your life about heading for the door that is Christ, and know for certain that, not a few, but all will be saved who look to Christ alone for salvation.  Amen.

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