December 9th Sermon

Below is the sermon I preached today on the Matthew 3:1-12 lectionary text.

I want to tell you a story. The story may not reflect your experience. You may not identify with it personally, but I believe there are many folks for whom my experience is their reality. So it is my prayer that in hearing my story, that the Holy Spirit will guide you when you encounter a person who is struggling with a sense of condemnation or judgment.

You see it is today’s gospel reading, these types of prophetic passages in the New Testament proclaiming Christ’s second coming, which used to strike fear into my heart.

“Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” …….. “His winnowing fork is in his hand and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

Every week I would say the Apostles’ Creed and I’d wince when I said the words “and Jesus will come again to judge the living and the dead.”

Not MY gentle Jesus! Surely not the Jesus who has spoken words of encouragement in my ear, not the Jesus who has cradled me when I wept and surely not the Jesus who invited me to dance during one dreary piece of offertory music. …………..

One Sunday morning, a few years ago, I was complaining within myself “Was this piece of piano music ever going to end?” and Jesus said to me “Would you like to dance?” ……. and we waltz together up and down the aisle of the church and up and down the steps of the altar. I even let Jesus lead, something I’m not so happy to let my husband do! ………………

Dancing is a profoundly intimate experience……….. even between strangers ……….where we take cues from one another………….and then we become as one. Even in contemporary dance where it appears to be chaos on the stage, there is a choreography that unfolds because each person is following the lead of the one who directs.

I knew Jesus is Lord of all, saviour of the world, but I was afraid of what final judgment meant.

It was probably ten or twelve years ago and I was taking an undergraduate class called “Christianity” at the University of Regina. My professor, a Lutheran scholar, read an end-times passage from the New Testament and asked “Who here is scared by what this passage is saying?” A number of people put up their hand, including me. Then he asked, “Is there anyone who isn’t frightened by this passage?” A young woman, probably twenty-one, put up her hand. The professor asked her to explain ‘why’. She said, “I’ve been saved by the love of God and I do not need to fear Christ’s final judgment. These passages are comforting to me.” She said it so simply ….. so matter-of-factly ….. And my professor said, “Yes, they are comforting for me as well.”

It was as if little explosions were going off in my head. How could this kid know all this? …… How was it that I didn’t know this? …….. Could it really be possible to be comforted by these passages? I thought I HAD to “bear good fruit” in response to the love of God through Jesus that I had experienced…… Otherwise that unquenchable fire was my destiny. The thought of being separated from the love of God that I’d known here on earth was agonizing. If I couldn’t produce “good fruit/good works” then the promise of eternal life in the glorious presence of God would not be for me.

My ‘head’ knew the God of judgment but my ‘heart’ knew the God of love. Somehow for me they were two different gods.

This young woman’s response drove me to the bible. What I discovered was that I was judging myself more harshly than God was ….. I was demanding more of myself than God was …… I was …. “taking the lead”…….I was saving myself.

Now, I was not so egotistical to believe that I could save myself, but somehow it seemed like my repentance …. my radical ‘turning around’ ….. changing my ways …… was all about what I needed to do …… not about what Jesus had already done for me on the cross ….. and not about how Jesus was already working within me. I wanted to fix myself up for Jesus, but you see Jesus was already doing the fixing. I wanted to do good works so Jesus would be proud of me, so I could prove that I really did love Jesus …. not because I loved Jesus. I was and am a Christian … but I was a little mixed up.

Not for one moment am I blaming my pastors’ preaching. I just hadn’t grown enough to hear and understand the Lutheran teaching on how we are made right by God. We Lutherans have a gift to offer the world in terms of our doctrine of justification!

Now I know you don’t want to hear a whole bunch of fancy jargon that proves I’ve been going to university for years …. but theology is important …. because theology really means “how we see God acting.” What you think about God …….and how you live out your day-to-day Christian life……. might be two, very separate, things …. at least they were for me.

The Lutheran doctrine of justification – or how we are made ‘right’ or ‘righteous’ by God says, “We are justified by God’s grace alone.” “We are made right with God by God’s mercy alone.” By God’s love which we do not deserve.

There is nothing we can do to make ourselves “right enough” before God …..there is no work that can be done by us! …..We aren’t even able to have enough faith on our own …. “We are made righteous by God’s grace alone through faith alone in Jesus Christ.” And it’s not our efforts to be faithful that will save us … it is the faith that has been instilled into our hearts by Christ Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus beckons us to simply ‘come and receive’ for his mercy brings peace.

It is not the doing of good works, or the bearing of good fruit, that will make you righteous. Every day ….. every moment …. God offers us the gift of grace…. Accept the gift which the Christ child brings and be made righteous. …… It is the righteous person who performs good works and bears good fruit. We do good because it is a good thing to do.

I want you to think about your motivation ……….. Why do you do good deeds? Why do you love your neighbour? …… It is your motivation, ……not your behaviour that counts. …… Hear it again ………It is your motivation, ……not your behaviour that counts.

I’m not preaching at cross purposes to John the Baptist because this is exactly what he is saying today. …. He’s just a bit spicier in the way he’s saying it! ….. “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance.”

John is warning the Sadducees and Pharisees that if they perform good works and seek baptism only because they are seeking a reward from God ……………….. or equally hopeless, if they are scheming to avoid punishment from God ………….. then their motivation betrays the good actions they perform. …… Oh … maybe you and I won’t be able to tell the difference …. but God can.

If you think you MUST repent in order to deserve God’s forgiveness … then repentance becomes a work necessary for salvation …. and we are then…. NOT saved…. by God’s grace alone. Your motivation is wrong. We can never deserve a gift. For if we deserve a gift, then it is no longer a gift but rather something owed to us. We experience grace and mercy with Jesus’ announcement that our sins are forgiven. Jesus comes to us before we are even ready …. because Jesus has been with us always. The Holy Spirit stirs us and reveals the fullness of what Christ has done. What love is this!

Jesus will come to judge the living and the dead. Rejoice! Rejoice! We can read judgment passages with loving confidence because the Scriptures tell us in 1John 4:16-19

16 So we have known and believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. 17 Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. 18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. 19 We love because he first loved us.

Anthropologists have observed that societies that have no religious structures still have orderly communities. We often think of the Old Testament and its books of Law as being the foundation of the Judean society. As the Judeans drifted away from their personal relationship with Yahweh, they clung to their own righteousness in following the Law. The coming of Jesus reveals that God’s relationship to his people is NOT legal. John 1:14-17 says, “17 The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”

Yet, how wonderful it is that the cornerstone of the Law, the Ten Commandments, can be a fantastic resource to teach us what fruits worthy of repentance could be: prayer, thanksgiving, the confession of the gospel, the teaching of the gospel, obedience to parents and the authorities, faithfulness to one’s calling, peaceable conduct, generosity to the needy, wholesomeness, decency, and truthfulness.

All of humanity will be judged, and we hear the voice of John the Baptist and the Old Testament prophets calling us to “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” In this season of Advent we are waiting with Mary for the birth of a child who will change this world. The Messiah is coming into the world.

We are also awaiting the final Advent when Jesus will come once and for all. The freely given gift of grace is offered to all. As righteous people of God who know that our sins are forgiven. We are called to perform the good work of loving our neighbours – near and far, known and unknown. We do good things because it is a good thing to do … not for any merit we might earn before the throne of God.

And it is a good thing to share the gift of Christian love on Christmas Day and every day. Help remove stumbling blocks – listen carefully and gently guide whenever someone suggests they are not good enough. Let God be the judge of our unworthiness and reassure each person that God’s grace has already been extended.

Trust in Jesus’ mercy and grace. Encourage the lost and the over-zealous, so that all God’s children may be judged blameless on that final day because they have heard the voice of Immanuel – God with us.

Remember how at the beginning I suggested that I acted as though there were two gods. There is only one God … Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Trinity themselves are engaged in the greatest dance of all.

Do you know of the old-time dance called the ‘Butterfly’? We have it out West. It’s a dance that requires three people to swing each other around, reaching out to grasp the partner and swirl them in and out to the other partner. Three distinct people – one relationship – working in harmony and filled with joy. Maybe our bond with God is a little bit like the ‘Butterfly’ – God …..the individual (you / me)…..and neighbours (the rest of the world).

I invite you to close your eyes and imagine this picture ……. You are engaged in God’s dance ….. You are moving slowly ………..in and out of lives ….. nearby,….. in Owen Sound, ………. in Ghana and Burkina Faso …… you have been touched by God’s grace …………….. and then you touch another person’s life …….. ………….and another person unknown to you ..is touched by the grace of God …….…. and they touch you. ………….. You sense your neighbour is drawing away because of a fear of judgment or self-condemnation … God is reaching out to grasp to grasp them as you are swiftly reaching for them as well. ………

God needs us to be part of the ‘Butterfly’. Imagine that sometimes the dance is a waltz or a polka, ………… (Where are you? …..Resting in God’s peace or dancing?) ……imagine too, that a lot of the times it’s a ballet or a jazz line. ……. It is in the giving and receiving of Christ’s love that the way is prepared.

Gracious God …. We bow before you and thank you for first loving us. In your creative wisdom you have fashioned us to be a community. We trust in your unfailing love as we cry out “Come Lord Jesus, Come”. Bless us in our ministry, strengthen us when we are weak, correct us when we falter, provide us with words with which to comfort …. so that on that appointed day …….. which is only known to you …….. Lord …that we will hear you call us by name and by your grace we shall recognize your voice and we’ll be home. In the name of the Christ child we pray. Amen