The Power of Joy

 

Text: Matthew 1:18-25

Focus: Joy

Function: to help people enjoy the Christmas season.

¹⁸Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be pregnant from the Holy Spirit. ¹⁹Her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to divorce her quietly. ²⁰But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. ²¹She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” ²²All this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet:

²³“Look, the virgin shall become pregnant and give birth to a son,
    and they shall name him Emmanuel,”

which means, “God is with us.” ²⁴When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife ²⁵but had no marital relations with her until she had given birth to a son, and he named him Jesus.

Good morning and welcome to Advent four, the contemplation of what Joy means to us this Christmas season.

I am sorry that the text that I choose for today was not a text with a command for us to rejoice, but rejoicing is what we do when we express the feeling or emotion of joy. We started out Advent focusing on hope, then we switched to peace, and then we switched to Love and today we are finishing the four with Joy.

And as I was preparing this, I realized that all four of these themes can be classified as an emotion, or a reaction to, or progenitor of, different emotions.

I find the concept to be divine. I find it incarnate.

What I mean is, when I see the four themes of advent tied to emotion and feeling, I realize that God is calling us to a state of being.

Be hopeful. Be peaceful. Be loving. Be joyful.

Romans 2: 14-16 tells us that God has given the Spirit of God to the world entire.

The Spirit of God dwells inside of us to draw us close to God, to help us trust God, and to give us the power to love others as Jesus taught us.

The Spirit of God moves us.

It is part of our being. And it connects us with the divine. When we experience Hope, Peace, Love and Joy, we are experiencing the moving and the power of the Holy Spirit of God in our lives.

These four elements seem to me to comprise what we call the Christmas Spirit.

In the spirit of Christ. Not the Holy Spirit of Christ, but you know the idiom “In the spirit of” which means the tradition of, so, In the Spirit of Christmas we intentionally take time to stop and experience the feelings and emotions of hope, peace, love and Joy.

As I mentioned, rejoicing is the action expressed by the emotion of joy.

I find it fitting that we sort of begin, or have a precursor to Christmas with Thanksgiving. Because gratitude and thankfulness, taking the time to celebrate what God has done is a form of worship because together we take the time to have and experience the joy we have.

What good is it to be joyful if we don’t allow ourselves to enjoy it? That may seem impossible, be joyful, but don’t enjoy it is a contradiction. SO, that isn’t what I mean.

What I mean is that there is oftentimes a lot of reasons for us to be joyful and we refuse to allow ourselves the luxury, or the hope of joy.

Some people are clinically depressed, and speaking about how we are supposed to be joyful just makes it harder for them because they do not have the resources to experience the joy that is normal when people allow themselves, what I call, the luxury of joy.

Why is joy a luxury?

Because when we are experiencing joy, when we are rejoicing, we are living in the moment.

What that means is that we are not living in the fear for the future, God, we believe, is loving and benevolent and cares about even the little sparrow that might fall from the sky.

Christmas is that time of year when we stop to celebrate all that is good, moral and loving.

I say we STOP to do it. We take the time. We are intentional. We are intentional about the Christmas Spirit being reflected in our lives and in our relationships with each other.

I guess it is too bad that we have to stop to do it. Perhaps what it means for us to be Christians is for us to practice the Christmas Spirit all year long and remember to react to everyone as if we are having the best day of our lives and we want the same for them.

We all wish the Christmas Spirit was with us all year long. And it is, if we choose for it to be.

And again, taking the time to reflect and experience joy draws us closer to that Christmas Spirit all year long.

I mentioned how some people cannot relate to the four themes of Advent because they are clinically depressed.

I believe the promise that Jesus came to bring us to an abundant life. I used to think that if I had enough faith, I would not be depressed and would be able to experience joy.

That wasn’t the case. There is no judgment in this theme of Advent that we express and experience our joy as an act of worship because it demonstrates our faith and trust in the provision of God.

If we can’t do that because of depression we need to understand that depression is a medical condition, not spiritual.

I was raised singing this song, At the Cross where I first saw the light and the burden of my heart rolled away. He is talking about the joy of salvation and the experience of having the feeling that our sins have been forgiven by the grace of God. It brings joy when we are connected with God. One of the fruits of the Holy Spirit is joy. (Also love and peace.)

But in the chorus we sang the line, “And now I am happy all the day.”

I can attest that I didn’t feel happy all the time.

And again, sometimes I think too much and that lead me to doubt if I was even saved by grace.

But it is important to remember that depression is a medical condition and not a spiritual condition.

There are lots of reasons for depression. Mine has to do with a combination of a traumatic assault when I was 11 and a traumatic brain injury that I suffered when I was 18.

Imagine the joy I felt when I found out that it wasn’t a spiritual condition that lead me to depression.

I remember that while pastoring a church in Grand Rapids Michigan and Kathy was still living here in the Dayton area I was listening to the song “Pass me Not” and the artist cries out in the song; “Save Me.”

It is a cry from the soul, the cry of faith to the living God. And I remember the impact of praying that prayer and telling God that I needed deliverance.

And I had a mini stroke that day which lead to a complete breakdown and I thought I was done with the ministry.

But I didn’t realize that God was doing something for me. God was answering my prayer. And I was correctly diagnosed, finally, and was able again, to get the help I needed.

And all of that lead me here to be your pastor and I believe that God has a plan for all of us here at Painter Creek.

The healing came when God showed me there is no shame in depression and lead me out.

I rejoice in that. God heals us Spirit, Soul, Mind and body.

The Power of Love

 

Text: 1 John 4:16-21

Focus: Love, Advent 3

Function: to help us embrace Christian love

¹⁶So 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. ¹⁷Love 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. ¹⁸There 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. ¹⁹We love because he first loved us. ²⁰Those who say, “I love God,” and hate a brother or sister are liars, for those who do not love a brother or sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. ²¹The commandment we have from him is this: those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.

Welcome back to our Advent as we prepare for the coming of Jesus Christ, the hope of the world.

We are following the advent themes, Hope, Peace, Love and Joy this year. Today we focus on Love.

Those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.

I was asked by a friend of mine a few weeks ago about my position on universal restoration. I know, it is theological jargon. He was a preacher.

I admitted to my friend that I believed that in the end, the love of God will win out and all of God’s children will be reunited with God in heaven.

He believes that God will allow people to suffer torment. And although the Old Testament never mentions hell there was popular literature around during the time of Jesus about the vengeance of God against the Roman occupation that included images of retribution in hell. And some of that got picked up in the New Testament scriptures. We have to remember that when the Bible speaks symbolically, a literal interpretation is not being faithful to the teachings of Jesus or the power of the Spirit inside the preacher.

Anyway, all of that is to say that Jesus doesn’t teach about hell, instead He is helping the Jewish people cope with the desperate circumstances the Roman occupation has caused them.

So, my friend asked me, if you don’t believe in hell, what difference does it make in how people live and what do you preach about?

I told him that I preach this, Love your neighbor as yourself, no matter who that person is. A prisoner, a refugee, a Muslim, Gay, straight, queer, Christian, atheist, jew, black, white, male female, rich and poor, love them all.

But he pressed me about leaving out the passages about judgment.

And I told him that my understanding of a vengeful God was inconsistent with the fact that the God we worship has described God’s own self as LOVE.

God is love. God IS love.

Thru out the scriptures we read about God describing us as God’s Children. God describes Gods own self as a loving Father. God describes God’s self as a nurturing Mother. And God describes us as the children that God dearly loves. I love my children. I get the love a parent has for a child.

And I will always forgive my child. The worse thing that I can imagine is for my child to be cut off from me for eternity in a place of torment at worse, and a place of utter darkness without love, at best.

So, if God is love. Let us look at the power of God inside of us when we manifest the love of God for others. There are several promises in this passage.

The first one to mention is boldness on the day of judgment. Again, my boldness comes from my absolute belief in God’s loving nature of forgiveness for me. And if it isn’t big enough for the worse person I can imagine, then it isn’t big enough for me. Otherwise, I am filled with pride thinking I deserve salvation and others deserve condemnation. We are called to love others. And when we practice that love, it gives us a sense of boldness, or peace when we think of the possibility of judgment.

The text says that love is a reaction to God. We love because God first loved us. It is a natural response to love to give it back.

I believe that this in the power of the Holy Spirit. Remember, when we choose to abide in Love, when we choose to react with love instead of hatred, bitterness or strife, we are abiding in love and in God.

I believe that the promise of God is this, the fact of God’s universal love sets us free from the fear of God’s judgment. When we love, we are perfected, completed, we become mature in God’s love.

Why do people fear God’s judgment? Because we in our human nature want revenge for the wrongs committed against us.

But we believe that God placed God’s wrath on Jesus on the cross. For a moment, the Jesus felt rejected as He bore the sins of the world.

And Jesus gave us one final, all encompassing commandment. Love one another. He called it the New Commandment.

Listen to John in John 14: ³⁴I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. ³⁵By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

And he gives us a promise with that new commandment: Look at 1 Peter 4:⁸Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins.

It isn’t that God doesn’t care about justice. The concept of hell is that there is a God who will exact revenge on evil doers. And that comforts us when we have been the victims of evil. I have often said that hell would be loving response of a just God on behalf of the victims.

The thing is this. God’s response to evil was the cross of Christ and sin itself was crucified on that cross in order to purchase our redemption.

God doesn’t need to get revenge. We are the one who feel it. And the image of the cross and all the wickedness that mankind can perform, one person to another is exemplified there in that torture,

When we accept Christ into our hearts, we join the path of love and forgiveness. It is another way of living.

This passage and today;e theme is about love. I would be remiss to leave the sermon there without mentioning love’s relationship to the racism that we still experience and are called to root out of our lives.

I have shared in the past with this congregation about how when I first came back to Christ after backsliding for a little while, For some reason, while I wasn’t a practicing Christian, I developed a prejudice toward Jewish people.

But God changed my heart. The first church I attended after coming back to Christ had several Jewish believers in it. And I noticed a strange attraction to them.

I knew that this miracle of a change of heart was the reaction to Jesus loving me through the power of His Holy Spirit inside of me.

I felt it. So, the passage about God’s love gives us a warning against the hypocrisy of racism. He says, the one who says they love God and then says they hate their brother is a liar. Apparently, because God’s Spirit is now inside of us, we are compelled by God’s Spirit to love others.

I mentioned that I backslid for a while. I lost faith in the Church during my teenage years and the civil rights era.

The neighborhood my church was located in was becoming integrated and the Church decided to move because they didn’t believe they could effectively worship with black people.

I had been a passionate Christian and was raised singing the song; “Red and yellow, black or white, they are precious in His sight, Jesus loves the little children of the world.” We had missionary conferences where it was okay to go to them, but it wasn’t okay for them to come to us.

I left the faith because of the hypocrisy. And now I forgive them for their sin against God. Because love covers a multitude of sins.

As I have mentioned the phrase from Galatians 3:

There is neither Jew or Greek, Male or Female, Slave or free, but all are one in Christ.

They all quoted that when they were baptized as a statement that the Christian faith was one of universal love instead of racial mistrust and fear. They started a different kind of kingdom. The Kingdom of God. And when they were baptized they confessed that there is no preferred race: Jew or Greek, no preferred gender: male or female and no prfeferred class: Slave or free.

Unfortunately, White Supremacy has still infiltrated the Church and it is important, I believe, if we are going to build the kingdom of God, that we act like the family of God and extend our welcome to everyone because everyone is our neighbor.

Love covers a multitude of sins and we are called to practice love, not just feel it.

Love and forgiveness gives us power over sin and evil. If we react with God’s love, we are walking in God’s will and when the heavenly reward is passed out, we will have something to gain by living sacrificially in love for others.

The Power of Peace

 

Text: Romans 15:4-13

Focus: Peace

Function: To see the importance of peacemaking during this time of advent

⁴For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope. ⁵May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, ⁶so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁷Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God. ⁸For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the circumcised on behalf of the truth of God in order that he might confirm the promises given to the ancestors ⁹and that the gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. As it is written,

“Therefore I will confess you among the gentiles

    and sing praises to your name”;
¹⁰and again he says,“Rejoice, O gentiles, with his people”;

¹¹and again,
“Praise the Lord, all you gentiles,
    and let all the peoples praise him”;
¹²and again Isaiah says,

“The root of Jesse shall come,
    the one who rises to rule the gentiles;
in him the gentiles shall hope.”
¹³May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Welcome to the second week of Advent. Last week we focused on the power of Hope as it helps us to prepare for the changes that God is bringing on society through the teachings of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit.

Remember, the 4 themes of Advent are Hope, Peace, Love and Joy. So, I choose our text because of that last verse, “May the God of Hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that you might abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

He mentions three of the four themes, Hope (he mentions twice) and peace and joy.

The implication about the power of the Holy Spirit in this passage is that the Spirit of God fills us with joy and peace. Remember, hope is a conscious decision to have faith and it is the emotional acceptance of what faith can do.

Hope, in spiritual terms is a mystery to me, still.

But, that was last week. This week, we are looking at peace and the passage tells us that through the power of the Holy Spirit we get peace.

I also believe that peace, in the spiritual sense, is mysterious.

Well, I suppose everything that is associated with the power of the Holy Spirit is mysterious since it is God at work and not us.

Peace, to me, is the calm that comes from resting in the trust that God is in control and we are living according to God’s will for us in our lives.

That does not mean that all that God wants for humanity is accomplished already, God left the church on planet earth to transform it into a place where everyone has a chance to receive justice and mercy from God and others. And Jesus told us that we are to take up our own crosses and follow in His footsteps. Jesus died to change the course of humanity from one of empire to one of mutual love and respect for each other. A peaceful existence between us all. And this passage is about the Jewish people giving up their own racial pride and accepting non Jews into the family of God because God has called us to break down barriers between people. God has called us to be peacemakers.

I can look at the angst in this world and all the violence and mistrust and greed and selfishness and as we know, when we let that overwhelm us, we can lose hope. But, we respond to the condition that the world has become with the Hope that Jesus’ power to change humanity has not wavered and the mission of the Church, to bring the family of God and God’s new way of doing things, loving others as much as we love ourselves.

The response in faith, to the evil of this world, with the hope of faith leads me to a sense of peace.

I love the beatitudes, the blessings, given to us in Matthew 6:

³“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

⁴“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

⁵“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

⁶“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they will be filled.

⁷“Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

⁸“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

⁹“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

¹⁰“Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of justice, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

¹¹“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.

They are the blessings of what Don Kraybill, the author of Amish Grace, the book the Lifetime movie Amish Grace was made of documenting the forgiveness of the Amish after the Nickle Mines School Massacre. It was right in our neighborhood and one of my parishioners was the first EMS on the scene. We lived the horror of that massacre.

Don Kraybill calls it the Upside Down Kingdom. The blessings are different from what the world around us values. It has nothing to do with riches or worldly success, but attributes of the way the Holy Spirit works in our lives.

I think my favorite, or the one that hits me the most from the list is “Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God.”

I think the most important part of our worship is our prayer time and every week you hear me pray that God would fill us with God’s Holy Spirit so that we can become the peacemakers that God has called us to be.

I know that I titled the sermon, The Power of Peace in a way to help you understand the power we have as Christians when we follow the teachings of Jesus. And I want us to finish with that.

Jesus is called the Prince of Peace and Jesus made peace between God and man and Jesus made peace between man and fellow man.

Jesus is the prince of Peace.

And yet, the Prince of Peace took extreme action with both His words and deeds when He confronted the injustices that surrounded Him.

His message was powerful and it changed the course of history.

And they killed Him for that message.

And He calls us to follow His example, to take up our crosses and follow Him.

I hope that doesn’t mean that we have to be martyrs for our faith. But we do need to put to practice what Jesus taught us and Jesus warned us that if they treated Him so, they might also treat us badly.

That is part of what it means for us to live by faith. We are trusting in our heavenly reward and laying up for ourselves treasures in heaven instead of earth.

Jesus is the Prince of Peace, but it came to Him at a terrible price.

It makes us willing to give ourselves in our testimony so that we too can be witnesses to the peace that Jesus has called us to make.

This week, we celebrated the life and death of Rosa Parks who simply refused to allow the system of oppression to continue and instead of giving up her seat to a white man, she was arrested and started a movement.

She was a peacemaker. The Civil rights marches followed the non-violent teachings of Jesus.

Her protest was a peaceful silence in the face of oppression and the power of that peace changed a culture. Jesus was a work in her.

Jesus has called us to non-violent responses to the situations that we face. We Brethren practice the principle of turning the other cheek when we are offended because we have hope in the ultimate power of peace to either shame or expose the systems used to perpetuate violence against peoples.

It isn’t a call necessarily to silence, but a call to trust in God to take care of us when we are oppressed.

I hope the severity of the price that the Prince of Peace paid to get His message out doesn’t discourage us from practicing the peace that Christ has given us.

To me, it came first when I asked Jesus to forgive me and live inside of me. I remember that day, a peace from God came over me and I knew that I was forgiven. Jesus came into my heart and I felt His presence there, as a four year old little boy.

It is inspiring and it leads us to live our lives in service to God by serving others and trying to bring the peace that Jesus offers.

The Power of Hope

 

Text: Matthew 24:36-44

Focus: Hope

Function: First Sunday of Advent, Hope

³⁶“But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. ³⁷For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. ³⁸For as in the days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, ³⁹and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so, too, will be the coming of the Son of Man. ⁴⁰Then two will be in the field; one will be taken, and one will be left. ⁴¹Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken, and one will be left. ⁴²Keep awake, therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. ⁴³But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. ⁴⁴Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.

Good morning and welcome to Advent as we spend the next 4-5 Sunday’s celebrating and understanding the meaning of Christmas and the belief that God saw the struggling of humanity, clothed Himself in an human body, walked among us and showed to us, a different and a better way of living.

As we focus on advent, we focus on 4 constant themes to remind us of different parts of our spirituality that keeps us centered in the purposes to which God has called us.

Those themes are Hope, Peace, Love and Joy.

Today, the first Sunday in Advent, we focus on hope.

Our text to illustrate the need and power of hope comes from the apocalyptic teachings of Jesus where He predicts the destruction of Jerusalem.

It is a passage about being watchful and waiting. I guess one of the sins that we have to overcome is dissipation. Or specifically to this sermon, dissipation as Spiritual Laziness.

And to me, that is why the constant, year after year reminder of the same themes are important. They keep us focused on the most important things. Advent helps us focus on the love Jesus wants us to express for others.

We speak of the Christmas Spirit and celebrate a time when people stop the business of life to examine the importance of relationship and community as they give gifts and celebrate together.

We light lights to give to us a sense that the darkness can be overcome by light. It is a beautiful metaphor against the dark cold of winter. It gives to us a sense of security and warmth as we take time for the extravagance of decorating, meals, cards, gifts and worship services.

Without hope, it seems to me, that none of this is possible.

I suppose, in the context of Advent, that hope relates to us as faith. The passage that we looked at reminded us to have faith even when it seems like nothing spectacular is happening.

We have faith that the King of peace, who will bring justice to the oppressed, is indeed coming. And we don’t give up that hope.

To have hope in the coming of Jesus, to me, is to have hope in power of the Holy Spirit to transform me into someone who does not feel the need to pay back evil with evil, but like, Jesus can forgive those who have harmed me.

To have hope in the coming of Jesus, to me, is to have hope in humanity and Jesus’ purpose to transform society into a caring and nurturing environment instead of a dog eat dog environment where only the toughest thrive.

Jesus came that we might thrive. In another passage where Jesus speaks of the thief who tries to rob us from God’s blessings in our lives, He said, I come that they might have abundant life.

But hope and faith are different. Faith is trust. Hope is believing in the possibilities and searching for them in the way that we live our lives before God.

Believe in the possibilities. That is a powerful statement. When we look at the world as it actually is, we can lose hope.

It is a violent place. It is a jungle out there. It is an every person for themselves environment and Christ Jesus came along to help us see that there is a better way of comporting ourselves.

Our business practices, for example, I don’t believe, should be dog eat dog, but win win so that everyone prospers.

Hope leads us to being the kind of people who aid and and assist others because Jesus lived His life in a sacrificial way on behalf of others.

Hope helps us to overcome the despair that we can sometimes feel when the darkness seems to be closing in.

Hope is us lighting a candle in the darkness instead of cursing it. Hope is us not giving up despite what we see.

I remember the Sunday sermon that I preached 24 years ago after the Columbine massacre.

I stood up and assured the people that in the end, good will triumph and that we should not lose hope.

This has been another particularly shocking week. I am so tired of the mass shootings that we are experiencing. I don’t have anything to preach anymore about it. Back then, 24 years ago, I was an angry preacher and I vented the communities anger and outrage against the senseless loss of life. And now, it is commonplace. I need hope to overcome the despair that it causes. The passage reminds us to keep focusing on the coming of Christ no matter what we see in the world around us.

We, as people, need to find someone to blame. We blame mental illness. I lay partial blame on the NRA’s marketing campaign of fear and freedom that has kept us from limiting access to weapons from people who are not fit to carry them. We can blame the politicians for their gridlock on the situation when 80% of us want some sanity in our gun laws. And then there is the frustration with access to mental health for these people. The list of blame can go on and on.

But the problem with blame is that it merely leads us to anger and frustration. For me, it leads me away from hope.

Let me beg a line from my favorite Christmas hymn, O Holy Night. “A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, for yonder breaks a new an glorious morn…”

I love the imagery, the thrill of hope. Beyond faith, or trust, there is an emotion aspect to hope.

Hope is less of a cognitive decision as it is a feeling. So, the author uses the term, the thrill of hope.

But it is also a cognitive decision. I believe that it is something that we allow to happen.

I have been taking the time to speak with the homeless on the street corners when the traffic lights are long enough.

I make sure I look them in the eye, ask them how their day is going and try to give them the dignity of being human. Instead of a condescending look of derision as I give them a dollar, it is important to lift up their spirits and give to them a sense a worth.

That is another line from the hymn, O Holy Night.
“And the soul felt its worth.”

Sometimes you can see a spark of hope in their eyes as someone else treats them like they have worth. We, brothers and sisters, are Jesus in this world today and it is up to us to share the good news with everyone we meet. I don’t mean preach at them, but I do mean love them as much as you love yourself. Even the homeless.

Our text today leads us to ponder the meaning of the coming of Jesus. It very much leads us to allow ourselves to have hope for the future and spread that hope in any way we can.

Loving Mercy

Text: Luke 23:33-43

Focus: Mercy

Function: to help people be happy about undeserved grace.

³³When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. ³⁴Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they cast lots to divide his clothing. ³⁵And the people stood by watching, but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!” ³⁶The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine ³⁷and saying, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!” ³⁸There was also an inscription over him, “This is the King of the Jews.”

³⁹One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” ⁴⁰But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? ⁴¹And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” ⁴²Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come in your kingdom.” ⁴³He replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

One of the hot political topics of the day is the idea of forgiving people of massive college debt.

I promise that I am not getting political. As a Christian, I find the discourse fascinating.

Those who have known me a while know that one of my life verses in scripture is Micah 6:8. He has shown you, mortal man, what the Lord requires of you. Three things: the first is an action verb of doing. Do justice. Be active participants in joining Jesus and standing against the systems that perpetuate poverty and oppression. The second is not so much an action verb as it is a passion. Love Mercy. Be happy about mercy, in other words. Seek mercy for yourself and for others as part of your religious expression. And the third command is a principle to walk by, walk in humility before God. In other words. Acknowledge that God exists and will lovingly judge God’s children fairly. So, lovingly care for your neighbor and put aside the pride that keeps us from loving each other.

We see a lot of pride in this passage when we look at the people who were mocking Jesus.

Today, my objective is to help us celebrate the mercy shown to this condemned man.

I suppose that I would be remiss if I didn’t pause for the first paragraph of our text. You could title the whole passage, “Jesus on the cross” but it is actually two stories.

The first, again, the pride of those who murdered Jesus and the way that they were insulting a man who was enduring probably the worse kind of torture that humanity has ever fomented against people.

The Romans had a terrible way of enforcing their justice. If you didn’t follow, not only did you lose your life, but you lost it in an incredibly painful way.

The other two men who were crucified with Jesus were not particularly evil men. They were thieves, not murderers or terrorists or something profoundly evil in the way it treated others.

As a matter of fact, thievery, to provide for a starving family, is the only forgivable transgression of the OT law.

But not according to the Romans. Their rule was an iron fist and they tolerated no division.

And the Jewish rulers sold their souls when they allowed the transcription, “The King of the Jews” to be placed upon His cross. It was proof of their domination over the people.

Jesus was judiciously murdered to silence His message of universal love, sharing and brotherhood. The idea of the rich giving up their wealth in order to live this new Kingdom flew in the face of the established system. And they killed Jesus because of that message.

They set Him up, had Him murdered by the Romans. It was evil. He was innocent of any wrongdoing. He brought hope to thousands and healed them.

And Jesus forgives these killers with unconditional love.

Jesus calls us to the same level of forgiveness. It isn’t easy. It takes faith. Jesus had faith, being God and all, He knew He would reappear, risen with victory over death. So, He died in faith, forgiving those who treated Him so badly.

I find that to be an incredible example of love.

And that kind of love is extended to the thief on the cross.

Initially, they were both mocking Jesus.

And we do not know what happened. I imagine it this way. Jesus, praying out loud forgives His oppressors and the thief sees it and realizes that this is certainly someone special.

I can picture Jesus, right after the prayer, right after forgiving the people who are mocking Him looking over at the other thief with that look of love and invitation in His eyes that conveys to him, the thief, who is dying on the cross, that he too, has value and his soul is worth saving. Jesus’ forgiveness, without anyone asking for it, because Jesus’ love and forgiveness are unconditional, is given freely to this thief and he, by pausing for a moment and looking at Jesus for who Jesus is, realizes that his soul too has found its worth, if I may beg a line from the Christmas hymn, O Holy Night.

Jesus gives several parables about loving mercy and being happy about mercy extended to others.

We looked a few weeks ago at the salvation of Zacchaeus, who by virtue of Jesus’ request to dine with him, man to man, human to human, person of worth to the God who redeems, is saved by the mercy and kindness of Jesus.

And yet, people complained about it.

I want to be careful to be a person who, regardless of the hardship that I have experienced, am happy about the mercy given to others.

There is the parable of the prodigal son. It really was given to help people understand the mercy given to us by God. The story is about how the elder brother resents the forgiveness given to his younger brother who didn’t deserve it and had proven so by the way he squandered his inheritance.

Then there is Matthew 20 and the story of the 11^th hour. It is a parable about workers hired the first hour of the day were paid the same as workers who were hired the 11^th hour of the day. They resented the master’s generosity because they didn’t get it for themselves.

It doesn’t seem fair. For the workers who bore the brunt of the days sun, heat and exhaustion to be paid the same as those who barely contributed seems out of balance to us.

And that is one of the “problems” with mercy.

And yet, the command from God is for us to love mercy.

The command from God is for us to be happy, not envious when others get undeserved favors.

Matthew 20 tells us that they were jealous of the generosity given to others.

He reminds them that they were paid a fair day’s wage and it wasn’t that they were cheated, it just so happens that the master was generous.

But we get jealous because it doesn’t seem fair.

And that is why God asks us to live by faith and rest in God’s provision for us. And don;t compare ourselves with others.

I suppose that is part of what is meant for us to be humble in our relationship with God and others.

Is it pride that makes us think that we deserve more than others? Can we be happy about their success? What if they get their success by less than honorable means?

Living by faith is an attitude that gets hard at times because it calls us to be content in God and with what God has provided for us.

And, let us be part of God’s kingdom by loving the mercy that God freely gives.