16th Sunday after Pentecost [Pr. 17] August 31, 2008 “Series A”
Grace be unto you and peace, from God our Father and from our Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Let us pray: Dear Heavenly Father, you sent your Son, Jesus the Christ, into our world in order that we might be redeemed from sin and death, and become heirs of your heavenly kingdom. Through the power of your Holy Spirit, help us to realize your enormous gift of grace and forgiveness that has been extended to us through Christ’s death and resurrection, and humble us to receive it with thanksgiving. This we ask, in Christ’s Holy name. Amen.
Pastor Bruce Burkness, whom many of you have come to know from his participation in our confirmation camp, his helping to cook chicken for our annual barbecue dinner, and preaching here that following Sunday, is one of my best friends. We have shared many hours at my camp, hunting, relaxing, and enjoying each other’s company. And many times during our visits, we have shared some interesting theological conversations. This morning, I would like to begin my message with an insight that I have thought about for several years, that Bruce had laid on my plate in one of our discussions.
Bruce said to me, “Ron, I really don’t think that God sent his Son into our world, in order to die on the cross for our sins. I think God sent his Son into our world in order to reveal God’s will for our life, to uplift us in the way that God would have us live in faithful relationship with him. I honestly believe that this was his primary purpose in the incarnation, and that because we could not come to embrace God’s incarnate Word for our lives, Jesus had to accept the cross for our redemption.
I have thought a lot about this conversation that I had with Bruce, even though, at the time, I first thought that he was wrong. We all know the passage from John that reads, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish, but may have eternal life.” And when we hear that passage from John’s Gospel, don’t we automatically think that God gave, or sent his Son to die on the cross, out of his love for us, for our forgiveness, that we might live with God in his eternal kingdom?
To be sure, Bruce believes with his whole heart, that Christ’s acceptance of the cross, his agonizing death that he suffered, was endured for our redemption. There is no other way, that we, as Christians, can explain the redeeming grace of God, which saves us from our sins and restores us to a right relationship with God. Jesus suffering death on the cross on our behalf, is the basis of the Christian faith.
But it is one thing for us to think that God sent his Son into our world so that he might die for our sins, as if it were predetermined that this would be the outcome. And it is another thought to think that God did not send his Son into our world to be executed on a Roman cross, but that, as a result of our sinfulness, and our inability to hear and respond to the living Word of God in our midst, caused him to be crucified.
When we think of the purpose of the incarnation as Bruce has envisioned, three thoughts come to mind. First, it clarifies our understanding of God as our Heavenly Father. On more than one occasion, I have engaged in a conversation with someone who just could not understand why God the Father, would send his Son into the world in order to be so brutally treated and put to death. One person verbalized to me that God must be sadistic being, not a loving Father.
In addition, Bruce pointed out to me that a person once verbalized to him that if God would send his own Son into the world with the intention that he would be so harshly treated, that God might also be to blame for the brutality that this person had to endure. But if it was not God’s intention at the time of the incarnation to have Jesus die on a cross, but rather to reveal his will for our lives, and to call us to a right relationship with God, then the responsibility for Christ’s death falls solely on us.
Is this not the message that Jesus proclaims in his Parable of the Wicked Tenants. Here, Jesus tells the story of a landowner, who had planted a vineyard, fenced it in, and built a winepress, all that was needed for a prosperous life. Then he leased his vineyard to tenants, and went to a distant land. When harvest time came, he sent his servants to collect his just due of the produce. But the tenants refused, beating and killing his servants. He sent other servants, but they did the same to them.
Finally, the owner sent his son to the tenants, saying, “Surely, they will respect my son.” Already, inherent in this story, is a forgiving nature on the part of the landowner, for not exacting punishment for the killing of his servants. But the tenants said to themselves, “This is the heir, let us kill him and get his inheritance.” In this parable, it was not the father’s intention to have his son killed, but his hope that his tenants would at last come to embrace, through his son, a right relationship with him.
This brings me to my second point, if we follow Bruce’s train of thought, and that is, that our human sinfulness is responsible for the crucifixion of Jesus the Christ, not God the Father. And in light of our Gospel lesson for this morning, it brings to me, a different insight. Listen again to our text: “Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem… undergo great suffering… and be killed. And on the third day, he would rise again.
But Peter took him aside and began to rebuke Jesus, saying, ‘God forbid it Lord! This must never happen to you.’ But Jesus turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting you mind not on divine things, but on human things.”
Prior to my conversation with Bruce, I had always interpreted the main point of this story to mean that Peter was trying to prevent the death of Jesus, because it was according to God’s intention for him to die. Thus, Peter was trying to prevent Jesus from fulfilling God’s ordained plan for our redemption. But if it were not God’s pre-ordained plan for Jesus to be put to death on the cross, but Jesus’ understanding that his death would be inevitable, if he were to fulfill his mission to bring us into a right relationship with God, then the emphasis of this text changes to Peter’s mind being set on human things, rather than the divine things, which Jesus has been sent to proclaim.
Thus, the reason for Christ’s crucifixion, is not by God’s intention, but by our own human sinfulness. Even Peter, who just moments before, Jesus called blessed, and declared to be the rock of the church, because of his confession that Jesus was the Messiah, could not rise above his human sinfulness. Thus, you and I, in our sinfulness, share in failing to truly understand the will of God for our lives, and certainly fail to live according to it. It is for our sinfulness, that Jesus endured the cross, not by God’s design. And that should make us all think a little less of our own ability, and humble ourselves before Jesus the Christ, who in love for our fallen humanity, gave himself for our redemption.
Pastor Blair and I have talked many times about how little we, living in today’s society, really think about sin as a human condition. And Pastor Blair and I are not alone. Many of the pastors in our confirmation camp program have shared their own laments about the failure of our youth to even embrace the concept of sin. It seems as though the “I’m okay – you’re okay” philosophy which was designed to help differing people come to live together without bias toward one another, has become a model for “It’s your life, live it as you please.”
Unfortunately, such an attitude fails to take into consideration how our actions may actually hurt and effect those around us. Such an attitude fails to take into consideration any respect for God, our very creator, and his design for life to be lived out in love for one another.
This brings me to the final point of my message this morning, and that is that if God did not send his Son into the world to die on the cross for our redemption, but that our sins drove Jesus to the cross, what a gift of love and God’s saving grace we behold Jesus’ death for our redemption. And the beauty of Christ’s gift of himself for our redemption, is that he willingly did so, without our even understanding what he was doing. “Get behind me Satan,” Jesus said to Peter, “for your mind is set, not on divine things but on human things.”
As God incarnate, in the person of Jesus the Christ, we behold far more than the perfect revelation of God’s will for our lives, we behold his love and saving grace, freely given to redeem us from sin. And it is my belief, that the more we come to understand our human propensity to sin, the more we will appreciate God’s gift of love and grace, in Jesus the Christ.
Amen.
