I am preaching this morning. On the lectionary. So, unusually for a Sunday I am (a) preparing this post early and (b) not referring directly to the texts for the third Sunday in Lent.
This evening I have printed the sermon out — Yes I write it completely — re read it, rehearsed it. Out loud. Twice. Discussed with Robyn the feedback drafts of it have had. I put more effort into this than I do the teaching I am paid to do. Because the Sermon is not about me: it is about Christ.
Our worship is not about us: it is about Christ.
Our salvation is not our doing: it is the work of Christ. Who descended into hell, so that those within could be saved.
25“Very truly, I tell you, the hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. 26For just as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself; 27and he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. 28Do not be astonished at this; for the hour is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice 29and will come out – those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation.
1There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. 3For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law – indeed it cannot, 8and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
9But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. 10But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
I have no concerns about the correctness of what I will preach. But it will offend: about as much as this place would offend. It will challenge. For that text is You shall not make any graven image. And the text for the reading is that you will not rely on the flesh but in the spirit.
And this is where we forget it. There have been those who worship those who have gone before: be they Calvin, or Martin Luther King, or Billy Graham. None of these men would have told people to do that. They looked to God. It is those who preach in a mechanical way, who conflate the gospel with material success or doing good, as if there will be liberation from the evil of this age in this life, who lead us to error.
Their rhetoric and delivery may be far better than mine, but their theology is of the flesh.
They preach what the world wants. Not what the spirit demands. As if there is peace between Christ and our satanic, secular, cathedral.
Finally, Jesus declares that “those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake…will save it” (8:35). I think in our own context it may be most useful for the church to think not of our individual lives being at stake, but rather our corporate lives as the church. That is, to follow Jesus means to risk taking positions that may cost us members, that may offend our donors, that may run us afoul of imperial values, in the struggle for abundant life for all people. It means letting go of some mythical past in which we imagined ourselves a center of power (“Get behind me, Satan!”). It means embracing a future in which we are willing to lose members, to shutter our doors, to go out of business if that is what it takes to secure justice and abundance for those on the margins. To follow Jesus, the church must be willing to die.
But the promise of this passage is that on the other side of death there is new life. If we die fighting for justice, so be it. Only in death is there the possibility of resurrection.
Robert Williamson, Jr
We need to preach Christ. Crucified.
We need to preach that it is our sins and actions that mean we need Christ.
And we need to preach not that we can find our own way to God. Salvation is not universal.
And we should never tire of preaching this. We should never try to be fashionable. For those who follow fashions, who collect credentials, and who have been conformist, pleasing others, will find that they have no cross to bear.
For they are preaching not what the world hates.
Do not be them. Do not be like them.
Thank you. A timely and encouraging article for me!