Alienated By Jesus; Sanctified In Truth
Text: John 17:11b-19
Grace and Peace to you from
God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus
says that the world will hate the disciples, that the world will hate
Christians. Sorry for the grim news this
morning. I wish I could soften that up a
little bit, but I really can’t. You see,
the reason why there will be hostility from the world towards Christians is
because the world first hated Jesus.[1]
My friends, often times we
wrongfully communicate to individuals that they should become a Christian
because there will be all sorts of peace, tranquility, and that the Christian life
is full of ease. We wrongly communicate that
the life of a Christian is one where we go through life simply riding on fluffy
clouds, hearing harp music with not a worry in the world. Problems: what are those? Tension and hostility: never! No, my friends, this is not how it is. Now, it is true when we are in Christ that we
do have peace with God, for our sins are
not counted against us; however, even though this is the case, there is a great
deal of tension still when we walk in the here and now.
In the here and now—in our
day-to-day lives, in this vale of tears—we most certainly do have tension and
hostility. This unfriendliness comes primarily
from three enemies. The first aggression
is our sinful nature: full of rebellion towards the Lord. The second hostility is the Evil One: he wants
to kill, steal, and destroy our faith in Christ. The third source of hatred is the world: we
war with the methodologies of the world, the values of the world, and the
beliefs of the world. Indeed, we are at
odds with the ways of the world because we are not of this world. We experience hatred and hostility from the
world because we are not of this world.
Not of this world? That phrase sure seems odd to hear,
especially since all of us have been born of a woman, raised by parents, are of
flesh and blood, eat the world’s food, drink the world’s drinks, breathe the
world’s air, hold jobs in the world’s marketplaces, and so forth. That stated, even though we are in the world
as Christians we do not think, speak, act, or believe as the world does. What the world deems as right and wrong, we
don’t necessarily deems as right and wrong.
When the world says, “jump,” we are often compelled to sit. When the world tells us to sit, we are often
compelled to jump. Overall this
nonconformity does not seem to bother us too much for who doesn’t like to be a
bit different at times. However, when
this noncompliance leads to tension and brings forth hate, the tables turn.
My friends, when tension and
antagonism pours out upon us Christians we typically see two responses. Otherwise stated, it seems that there are
often times two responses to how we interact with the world that is in
opposition with us. On the one hand we cut
ourselves off totally from the world. We
create a fortified castle to live in, thus attempting to distance ourselves
from hostility to alleviate the tension.
We say that we are not ‘of’ the world.
On the other hand, we can seek to eliminate the antagonism with the
world by intertwining ourselves with the world so that we become ‘one’ with the
world. We say to ourselves, “How can
there be tension with the world if we have joined ourselves to the world?”
Beware! Both of these
options have severe downfalls.
If we dig a moat around
ourselves, reinforce the walls, pull up the draw bridge, run into our fortified
castle, and keep the world ‘out there’ in order to keep us safe inside our
metaphoric castles, all that we have accomplished is basically nothing except creating
our own castle, a castle ruled by our own self-deception. Permit me to explain. If all our time and energy and abilities are
spent on keeping evil away from us—keeping sin out in the world and away from
us—we can end up forgetting that sin is much closer than we think—it is inside
the walls of the castle roaming freely.
That’s right, when we build the walls up, dig the moat, and pull up the
draw bridge, we more times often than not end up being a bunch of
self-righteous jerks within our own exclusive castle where we excuse ourselves from
sin and shift blame to everything outside our walls, while not recognizing the
sin inside the walls of our self-made castles.
Dear friends, we have seen
in the scriptures and through the history of the church that we can certainly
take ourselves out of the world, but we cannot take the world out of
ourselves. In other words, the world and
the devil that are ‘out there’ are most definitely our enemies, but our biggest
enemy is right here on the inside, behind the walls, inside the moat, and
behind the drawn bridge… the biggest enemy is you—your very own sinful nature
that dwells inside the castle.
Listen, you can make the
walls higher, secure the draw bridge more, and make the moat deeper, but you
cannot escape the unholy trinity of me, myself, and I. The more we attempt to separate ourselves
from the world, the more that we simply isolate ourselves with our sinful
nature. It is futile at best. Furthermore, Jesus does not pray in His high
priestly prayer that Christians should be taken out of the world entirely.
With that stated, if the end
goal is not for us to be taken out of the world, the obvious conclusion or
assumption might be that we should become ‘one’ with the world. To be ‘one’ with the world is where our
Christian beliefs and values combine with the beliefs and values of the
world. It is when the Christian faith is
amalgamated with the ideologies of the world, resulting in the world loving us. It is when we lower the metaphoric draw
bridge. Better yet, it is when the walls
are brought down and the moat is filled with dry ground, so as to let
everything mix together. To be one with
the world is where tolerance reigns; there are no standards, there are no
distinctions, and as they say, we are in bed with the world.
As a result of belonging to
the world, we become skillful at concealing our sins. “Stinginess is disguised as good money-sense;
lust becomes [passionate love]; cowardice becomes caution;”[2] the killing of unborn children
is the right to choose; greed is camouflaged as ambition; homosexuality turns
out to be a committed emotional relationship; euthanasia is cloaked as
compassion; rioting masquerades as justice; and on and on and on. And naturally when our conscience bothers us
the world simply points us to a medicine cabinet of solutions or other options
to numb the pain of a convicting conscious.
Feeling guilty due to greed? “Nah,
you are just ambitious. Furthermore, remember
the charitable act that you did last month.”
Feeling bad about a sexual sin outside of marriage? “No reason to feel guilty as long as it was within
a committed relationship.” And so it
goes.
Dear friends, Jesus in our
Gospel reading is not calling us to strike up a balance between abstaining from
the world and joining the world. He is
not calling for a balancing act where we are to have one foot in the world and
the other foot out of the world. This
text is not about you joining the world and it is not about you constructing
your own castle, for this way of thinking assumes that you have the ability to
overcome and interact with the world by your own strength.
Repent one and all! Even though you are in this world—you live,
work, marry, and eventually die in this world—you do not belong to this
world. Repent one and all! Even though you separate yourself from this
world—you build tall walls, fill up moats, pull the draw bridge, and reside in
a castle—you are still powerless to counterbalance the world. Repent one and all for you are not of the
world and are not of your self-made metaphoric castles.
Baptized Saints, you who
have ears, hear. You are not citizens of
your own self-made castles of protection.
You can’t build the walls high enough; you can dig the moats deep
enough.
Baptized Saints, you who
have ears, hear. You are not of this
world. It does not possess you. It does not regulate you. It certainly does not love you.
Baptized Saints, you who
have ears, hear. “You are in this world
but you are of another world, the heavenly Fatherland. You are a citizen of heaven [by your
baptisms] who lives for a while—a very, very short while—here on earth.”[3] Do not run from the world or dive into the
world, for you have been baptized and you have been sanctified in the truth of
the Word. “[The Lord] has made you
holy. That does not mean He has made you
a ‘good, morally upright person.’ To be
holy means to be claimed by God as His very own. You do not belong to the world; you belong to
God; you are holy, His very own, God’s treasured possession, kept in Christ,
the holy One of God.”[4]
Like little Alaythia Jane
today, you have been baptized. When you
were baptized your citizenship changed: no longer apart of the world and no
longer needing to create your own citizenship.
In Christ!
Baptized into His death and
resurrection!
Eating and drinking from the
Altar of Christ.
You are home in Him.
You
are not embedded in the world or behind the walls of a self-made castle, but you
are buried deeply into the wounds of Jesus.
“You are of Christ. You are holy in Him. He gives you that holiness that is His very
own, for you to share. He washes away
the mud of this world, cleanses you of every stain [of self-righteousness],
makes you as He Himself is: a pure and sinless child of the Father.” [5]
And when your journey is
done, “He’ll take you from this vale of tears, from this desert of wandering,
into the land flowing with milk and honey, onto streets of God, midst angelic
choirs singing, announcing the arrival of another citizen of heaven, who made
it to home sweet heavenly home.”[6]
The peace of God, which
passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
_____________
[1] See also John 15:18-19.
[2] Chad L. Bird, Meditations and Sermons (Copyright 2014 Chad Bird), 182.
[3] Ibid, 183
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid, 184.
[6] Ibid.
[1] See also John 15:18-19.
[2] Chad L. Bird, Meditations and Sermons (Copyright 2014 Chad Bird), 182.
[3] Ibid, 183
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid, 184.
[6] Ibid.
Comments