Srmon-Sunday August 31 2008
Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Brothers and sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I, like I am sure many of you, have spent some time this past week watching the Democratic National Convention. And next week I will spend some time watching the Republican National Convention. I have noticed this week that politicians are pretty skilled at the fine art of exaggeration. Barack Obama’s campaign approach, as is common for the presidential candidate from the non-incumbent party, has been to emphasize the need for change. "Change we can believe in" has been his campaign slogan. And indeed there is some genuine need for change. But to listen to some of the speeches this week, one would think that America, as a nation was on the verge of collapse, and our only hope is Barack Obama, when the reality is in the grand scheme of things we are the richest country in the world. And of course this week the Republicans will do the same thing and they will present John McCain as the one who can save us.
And I am not belittling the issues that the conventions address. The issues they are addressing such as healthcare, social security, the war, the economy, national security etc are all of course very valid and essential. And indeed there were some very powerful and poignant examples of people struggling with these issues that were mentioned at the convention this past week. But overall I found a lot of the language and a lot of the hoopla and hype connected to the convention to be reflective of a culture mired in the very condition that our Lord Jesus sees in Peter when Peter dared to rebuke Jesus for telling Peter that He (Jesus) was going to have to undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and be killed and raised on the third day. This is to say that often, our culture, we, set our minds too much, and place too much value on and hope in human things and not nearly enough on divine things.
And it is that condition and that state that our Lord Jesus addresses when He says that those who want to save their life will lose it and those who lose their life for His sake will gain it and then poses the question of what it profits anyone to gain the whole world but forfeit their life. Imagine if the very disciples whom Jesus was speaking to could see the world that we live in today, with the greater access to food and necessities, health care, living accommodations, entertainment options etc. We live in luxury that would have been unimaginable to them. They would no doubt say that we have gained the whole world.
And yet because, like Peter, we are so focused on things of the world we want more. You see Peter’s objection is rooted in his limited and cultural understanding of Jesus. You’ll remember in last week’s Gospel lesson Peter showed that he and his fellow disciples had a much better understanding of who Jesus is than their contemporaries who confused Jesus for John the Baptist, Elijah and a prophet, when Peter boldly confessed his belief, on behalf of he and the rest of the disciples, that Jesus is the Messiah and the Son of the living God.
But in this week’s Gospel lesson we see Peter, not long at all after his bold confession of faith, already messing up again. We see that, in spite of the fact that he might have been far ahead of some of his contemporaries when it came to his understanding of who Jesus is, Peter still had a long way to go. He was trapped and bogged down by his human understanding of who Jesus is, which told him that the Messiah shouldn’t have to be killed.
Which of course it is true that Jesus didn’t have to be killed. He could have allowed us to mire in our sin and suffer the due punishment which we all deserve. But He didn’t. Instead He laid down His life for us; taking upon Himself our sin and shame and bearing the punishment we deserve. But notice this is not the level upon which Jesus responds to Peter’s rebuke. In other words, He does not respond by getting into a theological debate with Peter.
You see Jesus knows that at the heart of Peter’s rebuke lies not a concern over right doctrine, but rather that Peter fears that if suffering and death await Jesus then perhaps a similar fate awaits Peter. Peter gave up everything to follow Jesus, but to give up his life? But that is exactly what our Lord Jesus demands of us, to give up our lives for His sake.
Focused on human things, we look for solutions to our problems and challenges and fulfillment for our needs and desires in the creation and not the Creator. But the more tightly we cling to the creation and our earthly life the more we close ourselves off from the Creator such as we see from Jeremiah in the Old Testament lesson.
And so in our self-absorption and greed we also lose sight of the joy and sweetness of God’s Holy Word and His eternal promise. We focus so much on saving our temporary earthly lives and thus oppose Christ’s perspective of giving up our lives for His sake that we forget the great gift of eternal life that awaits us. But just as Jeremiah was called to turn back to God so our Lord calls us back to Him and turns us back to Him.
God’s Word tells us that the message of the cross is foolishness and a stumbling block for those who are perishing, and when we focus on human things, like Peter we show our inherent offense to Christ’s perspective and the message of the cross. But by our Lord Jesus’ reaction to Peter’s rebuke we see that He is offended by that which opposes the cross. In spite of how offensive it might have been to Peter, Jesus was speaking Gospel to Peter. Peter rebukes Jesus, and Jesus’ response reveals that this wasn’t just about Peter’s offense at the Gospel but about the devil’s attempts to cast doubt on Jesus and the Gospel when Jesus says to Peter "Get behind me Satan."
Jesus provides the life and forgiveness we need, but we set ourselves against Him and on a path which leads only to the grave that by ourselves we can’t get ourselves off of. We can’t, but our Father in heaven can and did when He sent His Son to lay down His life for us. And that is what He is revealing to the very disciples who oppose Him when He tells them that He must suffer and die and rise from the dead for them.
And just as Jeremiah was called back to faith, Peter was called back to the faith that he had just boldly confessed when our Lord Jesus demanded the removal of the very one who was diverting Peter away from that faith when He said "Get behind me Satan."
Jesus didn’t get into a theological debate with Peter because he knew that ultimately Peter was not so much diverting himself away from the truth but rather sin and the devil were and Jesus would not stand for it. As I said, Peter was focused on human things, and this just made him that much more susceptible to the lies of sin and the devil, as it does to us today.
But our Lord Jesus did not allow Peter and nor does He allow us to remain stumbling blocks. And so like He did for Peter when He called Peter behind Him as a follower of Jesus, so He does for us today through Word and sacrament, calling us to our rightful place behind our Lord Jesus as His followers.
In Jesus’ death and resurrection we are transformed from stumbling blocks to saints and we are given new life as His followers, so we no longer have to try to save our lives. Of course in 21st century North America generally this does not mean that we literally lay down our lives to follow Jesus. But He does call us to let go of those human things that our culture embraces and stay focused on Him.
But understand that He does not demand that we do this but rather He frees us to do this. In Jesus’ death and resurrection we are given new eternal life so we no longer need to focus on saving our temporary earthly life. We are free to lose our life for His sake by, as it says in the lesson from Romans, blessing those who persecute us, contributing to the needs of the saints, extending hospitality to strangers, living in harmony with one another, refusing to pay evil for evil, and just overall living out our Lord’s call to follow Him by loving and serving our neighbor in Word and deed; the very Word of our Lord that Jeremiah describes as precious and by which we serve our Lord’s mouth.
And in doing this, we find our very Lord making us whole, making us whom we were created and saved to be and preparing us for or place in His eternal kingdom. And that is a promise, unlike perhaps many of the promises you heard from the convention last week and the one to come this week, that you can always count on.
Amen
Brothers and sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I, like I am sure many of you, have spent some time this past week watching the Democratic National Convention. And next week I will spend some time watching the Republican National Convention. I have noticed this week that politicians are pretty skilled at the fine art of exaggeration. Barack Obama’s campaign approach, as is common for the presidential candidate from the non-incumbent party, has been to emphasize the need for change. "Change we can believe in" has been his campaign slogan. And indeed there is some genuine need for change. But to listen to some of the speeches this week, one would think that America, as a nation was on the verge of collapse, and our only hope is Barack Obama, when the reality is in the grand scheme of things we are the richest country in the world. And of course this week the Republicans will do the same thing and they will present John McCain as the one who can save us.
And I am not belittling the issues that the conventions address. The issues they are addressing such as healthcare, social security, the war, the economy, national security etc are all of course very valid and essential. And indeed there were some very powerful and poignant examples of people struggling with these issues that were mentioned at the convention this past week. But overall I found a lot of the language and a lot of the hoopla and hype connected to the convention to be reflective of a culture mired in the very condition that our Lord Jesus sees in Peter when Peter dared to rebuke Jesus for telling Peter that He (Jesus) was going to have to undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and be killed and raised on the third day. This is to say that often, our culture, we, set our minds too much, and place too much value on and hope in human things and not nearly enough on divine things.
And it is that condition and that state that our Lord Jesus addresses when He says that those who want to save their life will lose it and those who lose their life for His sake will gain it and then poses the question of what it profits anyone to gain the whole world but forfeit their life. Imagine if the very disciples whom Jesus was speaking to could see the world that we live in today, with the greater access to food and necessities, health care, living accommodations, entertainment options etc. We live in luxury that would have been unimaginable to them. They would no doubt say that we have gained the whole world.
And yet because, like Peter, we are so focused on things of the world we want more. You see Peter’s objection is rooted in his limited and cultural understanding of Jesus. You’ll remember in last week’s Gospel lesson Peter showed that he and his fellow disciples had a much better understanding of who Jesus is than their contemporaries who confused Jesus for John the Baptist, Elijah and a prophet, when Peter boldly confessed his belief, on behalf of he and the rest of the disciples, that Jesus is the Messiah and the Son of the living God.
But in this week’s Gospel lesson we see Peter, not long at all after his bold confession of faith, already messing up again. We see that, in spite of the fact that he might have been far ahead of some of his contemporaries when it came to his understanding of who Jesus is, Peter still had a long way to go. He was trapped and bogged down by his human understanding of who Jesus is, which told him that the Messiah shouldn’t have to be killed.
Which of course it is true that Jesus didn’t have to be killed. He could have allowed us to mire in our sin and suffer the due punishment which we all deserve. But He didn’t. Instead He laid down His life for us; taking upon Himself our sin and shame and bearing the punishment we deserve. But notice this is not the level upon which Jesus responds to Peter’s rebuke. In other words, He does not respond by getting into a theological debate with Peter.
You see Jesus knows that at the heart of Peter’s rebuke lies not a concern over right doctrine, but rather that Peter fears that if suffering and death await Jesus then perhaps a similar fate awaits Peter. Peter gave up everything to follow Jesus, but to give up his life? But that is exactly what our Lord Jesus demands of us, to give up our lives for His sake.
Focused on human things, we look for solutions to our problems and challenges and fulfillment for our needs and desires in the creation and not the Creator. But the more tightly we cling to the creation and our earthly life the more we close ourselves off from the Creator such as we see from Jeremiah in the Old Testament lesson.
And so in our self-absorption and greed we also lose sight of the joy and sweetness of God’s Holy Word and His eternal promise. We focus so much on saving our temporary earthly lives and thus oppose Christ’s perspective of giving up our lives for His sake that we forget the great gift of eternal life that awaits us. But just as Jeremiah was called to turn back to God so our Lord calls us back to Him and turns us back to Him.
God’s Word tells us that the message of the cross is foolishness and a stumbling block for those who are perishing, and when we focus on human things, like Peter we show our inherent offense to Christ’s perspective and the message of the cross. But by our Lord Jesus’ reaction to Peter’s rebuke we see that He is offended by that which opposes the cross. In spite of how offensive it might have been to Peter, Jesus was speaking Gospel to Peter. Peter rebukes Jesus, and Jesus’ response reveals that this wasn’t just about Peter’s offense at the Gospel but about the devil’s attempts to cast doubt on Jesus and the Gospel when Jesus says to Peter "Get behind me Satan."
Jesus provides the life and forgiveness we need, but we set ourselves against Him and on a path which leads only to the grave that by ourselves we can’t get ourselves off of. We can’t, but our Father in heaven can and did when He sent His Son to lay down His life for us. And that is what He is revealing to the very disciples who oppose Him when He tells them that He must suffer and die and rise from the dead for them.
And just as Jeremiah was called back to faith, Peter was called back to the faith that he had just boldly confessed when our Lord Jesus demanded the removal of the very one who was diverting Peter away from that faith when He said "Get behind me Satan."
Jesus didn’t get into a theological debate with Peter because he knew that ultimately Peter was not so much diverting himself away from the truth but rather sin and the devil were and Jesus would not stand for it. As I said, Peter was focused on human things, and this just made him that much more susceptible to the lies of sin and the devil, as it does to us today.
But our Lord Jesus did not allow Peter and nor does He allow us to remain stumbling blocks. And so like He did for Peter when He called Peter behind Him as a follower of Jesus, so He does for us today through Word and sacrament, calling us to our rightful place behind our Lord Jesus as His followers.
In Jesus’ death and resurrection we are transformed from stumbling blocks to saints and we are given new life as His followers, so we no longer have to try to save our lives. Of course in 21st century North America generally this does not mean that we literally lay down our lives to follow Jesus. But He does call us to let go of those human things that our culture embraces and stay focused on Him.
But understand that He does not demand that we do this but rather He frees us to do this. In Jesus’ death and resurrection we are given new eternal life so we no longer need to focus on saving our temporary earthly life. We are free to lose our life for His sake by, as it says in the lesson from Romans, blessing those who persecute us, contributing to the needs of the saints, extending hospitality to strangers, living in harmony with one another, refusing to pay evil for evil, and just overall living out our Lord’s call to follow Him by loving and serving our neighbor in Word and deed; the very Word of our Lord that Jeremiah describes as precious and by which we serve our Lord’s mouth.
And in doing this, we find our very Lord making us whole, making us whom we were created and saved to be and preparing us for or place in His eternal kingdom. And that is a promise, unlike perhaps many of the promises you heard from the convention last week and the one to come this week, that you can always count on.
Amen
posted by Steve at 10:10 PM
1 Comments:
What an utterly beautiful sermon. Seriously-the language you used here was poetic. And I loved the connection you made b/tw Peter and us today-that was a seamless connection.
I loved this:
"And so in our self-absorption and greed we also lose sight of the joy and sweetness of God’s Holy Word and His eternal promise. We focus so much on saving our temporary earthly lives and thus oppose Christ’s perspective of giving up our lives for His sake that we forget the great gift of eternal life that awaits us. But just as Jeremiah was called to turn back to God so our Lord calls us back to Him and turns us back to Him."
Beautiful
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