Lent is the Christian season of repentance. And Last week Pastor Akiko talked about repentance and this week I will follow up with a sermon about grace. I’ll begin with a short story shared by the Christian author, Philip Yancey in his book “What’s So Amazing About Grace?”
I remember once getting stuck in Los Angeles traffic and arriving 58 minutes late at the Hertz car rental desk. I walked up in kind of a bad mood, put the keys down and said, “How much do owe?” The woman says, “Nothing. You’re all clear.” I said I was late and she smiled, “Yes, but there’s a one-hour grace period.” So, I asked, “Oh really, what is grace?” And she said, “I don’t know. [They must not cover that in Hertz training classes.] I guess what it means is that even though you’re supposed to pay, you don’t have to.” “Even though you’re supposed to pay, you don’t have to.” Grace. A gift from God. Jesus paid for all of us sinners. We receive that grace and we try, with God’s help and love, to be better people. We may not be perfect but as John Wesley once said, “We are going on to perfection.” We've fallen short. Perfect? Not even close. It's a process. That's what our founder John Wesley wrote. We are “going on” to perfection in love. We have not made it! Looking at the Bible and we can see that it is filled with imperfect people, people who had fallen short of their “best selves.” There are flawed people, imperfect people in scripture. Just to name a few: Moses, whose bad temper led to murder and rebellion against God; David, who committed adultery and murder; the prodigal son who squandered his inheritance; Peter, who rejected Jesus multiple times; and Paul, a former persecutor of Christians. God gives us another chance. It’s seems unfair but that is grace. Those people in the Bible times, and also for us today, are not so broken that God’s grace cannot reach us! Philip Yancey once said in an interview; “We can never sink so far that God’s grace will not reach us. At the same time, grace does not leave us there. It raises us to new heights.” . I, myself, have fallen short of what God asks of me and I repent before you. I hope we can all repent before God and one another especially during this season of Lent. The question isn’t whether God will forgive us in the future, it’s whether we will repent and ask for forgiveness. In Pastor Akiko’s sermon last Sunday she said, ”What happens after we repent isn’t the thing we need to worry about as much as the act of repenting itself.” The Good News about grace is that God still loves us, picks us up when we make mistakes and fall down, and then allows us to try again. This concept of grace should be extended to our relationships with each other, as well. There are so many times we are not our best selves but we still receive God’s grace. So, then we would do well to extend the same gift to others. The problem is: it’s hard to do! It’s one thing for God to give us— for God to forgive us, recognize that our less than good moments do not define us, and allow us to move on. But it’s quite another for us to do so for others, when they aren’t their best selves—to forgive them, recognize that their less than good moments do not define them, and allow them to move on. We all have people in our lives who rub us the wrong way—some of them members of our church or maybe for some people it could be their own family. We say we love one another as Christians but do we like one another? I have to confess that I have sometimes struggled with people who have different theological perspectives or different politics or different ideas than mine. It’s easy to show grace to people who think just like you do, much harder to show grace to those who offend you or with whom you disagree. Are we critical or do we look for the good? Do we really listen to each other? Do we listen to God? In this season of Lent, all of us can repent before God. We can ask God to create us in a clean heart (Psalm 52) is something to do daily, not just Lent. God has entered the parts that feel most forsaken, without judgement. When God enters the place of our deepest pain and our deepest sins, then that part of us can be transformed into something new. God brings forgiveness and grace. God is a resurrection God. Repentance means a change and new growth and healing. Paul states that "the goodness of God leads you to repentance" (Romans 2:4). Several things go along with true repentance. Nothing we say about repentance, or about grace, should contradict that statement. Paul says that God will enable us "to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God." (Colossians 1:10). Peter agrees with Paul, and places upon us responsibility for our own conduct because we are no longer ignorant but live in the knowledge that we "were redeemed with the precious blood of Christ..." (1Peter 1:19). From Paul who was writing to Titus, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people, instructing us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live in a self-controlled, upright, and godly manner in the present world..." (Titus 2:11-12). Titus was thought to be written by Paul when he was in his first imprisonment in Roman to his fellow co-worker, Titus. Titus was a Gentile who had been led to Christ by Paul. (1 Titus 1:4). You could say he was a “born-again” Gentile Christian. Titus tasked by Paul with visiting Crete, a place infamous for sin and corruption. He was asking Titus to go there and share about God’s grace. In this text in Titus 2:11-14, grace is described as having some effects that everybody would expect, but also some that few would expect. Paul tells us that when the grace of God appeared, it brought salvation for everybody. Every single human being who will ever be saved from their sins will be saved by the grace of God. Without that grace, we would have no hope. However, according to Paul, grace doesn’t merely to save us. It also trains us to do three things: to renounce ungodliness, to live godly lives, and to wait for the appearing of Jesus our hope. The more we understand God’s grace, we will work to “Be the Church.” We work on removing sin from our lives. We will work on being kind and loving towards one another. We will do good works, not because we have to but because we want to as followers of Christ. Being a Church filled with God’s grace means to focus on Jesus and live as he lived and wants us to live. It means to be a product of grace-based salvation. We might wonder how that can be. Thankfully, Paul explains that grace produces these results in our lives because Jesus intended it to. He gave Himself up for us on the cross. He cleansed us. He helps us to be better by loving us and transforming us. This gift of grace freely given inspires us to be eager to carry out God’s will in every area of our lives. We can be so thankful for the grace that we have been shown that we want to offer everything we have in return. The first use of the word 'grace' is found in the Bible is in Genesis 6:8: “But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD.” The Hebrew word used is often translated as to show “favor” or “to be gracious” or “have mercy.“ In the New Testament, the word “grace” is translated as charis which refers to good will, loving-kindness, and the divine influence on the heart, and the loving mercy given by God. God now judges us as if we had never sinned, through the filter of his Son Jesus. . What is the difference between grace and mercy? And I heard this definition once of the difference between grace and mercy: mercy is not getting what you deserve while grace is getting what you do not deserve. Grace is given to us as a gift by God. It is used over 140 times in the New Testament and divine grace is a central concept in the theology developed by St. Augustine of Hippo, who was one of our very early church fathers. Augustine said, “God anticipates us…that we may be healed…anticipates us that we may be called…that we may lead godly lives”. (Augustine of Hippo, “A Treatise on Nature and Grace.) Grace helps us in the words of Augustine to live “godly lives.” Grace helps us to live grace-filled lives and work on filling our church with grace and love. Kobe Union Church has a Vision Statement that says: “To be a grace filled and Christ led church, that is a welcoming, growing and sending body of Christian believers in Kobe.” The first line says, “To be a grace filled and Christ led church…” There are many ways to do this –through prayer, repentance, confession, forgiveness, love, kindness, reaching out to others, discipleship, and more. Also by studying the Bible and praying together. We have do have prayer groups at KUC. You can join on online or make your own prayer group. One group at our church for women to pray, study the Bible as well as support one another is known as WOW (Women on Wednesday). Recently we have been studying Ephesians and we discussed grace a few weeks ago. One woman said an example of grace is the letting go of a past wrong done to you. Another woman said grace is undeserved gift and we just need to open our hands to receive it from God. Another woman said grace is given to us and we extend God’s grace to others. It seems simple but it can also be difficult. But, it’s part of our faith. Grace gives people both motivation to grow and room to make mistakes while it gently guides them into maturity. Growth in grace has as its goal in Christlikeness. A church that is serious about making disciples will help people grow deep in the Christian life. Grace frees us to love and serve God, which means we should love and serve others also. A grace-oriented church will teach how to love for God and others. This means that in areas of conscience or questionable things, we are encouraged to consider how it will affect others and by acting only out of love. We are encouraged to serve others as followers of Christ We are called to love one another. Those who have been freely blessed should be willing to share that blessing with others. If a church is seeking after God's heart, we will be active in reaching others with the gospel of grace, because that is where God's heart is. As a grace -filled church and to “Be the Church” and these are words that Pastor Chuck would often tell us. To “Be the Church” we must also look at look at the reality of sin. We will do personal confession and restoration. Being the church, a grace-filled church, means a healing environment rather than a critical one. We remember the grace we were shown by God and then reflect that same grace to the other people. Let us “Be the Church” a grace-filled church and grace-giving church is in knowing that transformation is always happening through the Holy Spirit. Amen. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Before singing “Amazing Grace” today, I’d like to share about the author, John Newton who really needed God’s grace and was transformed by God. John Newton was born in London, in 1725, Newton went to sea at a young age and worked on slave ships in the slave trade for several years. In 1745, he himself became a slave of a woman in Serra Leone, Princess Peye, until he was rescued. He then became a captain of slave ships and later an investor in the slave trade. You would think having had been a slave himself he would have not gone into the slave trade but he did. However, God touched his heart. He became a minister in the Church of England a supporter of abolitionism. He served as a church minister for two decades. He also wrote hymns, including "Amazing Grace" and "Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken. Newton lived to see the British Empire's abolition of the African slave trade in 1807, just months before his death. God showed Amazing Grace to him. Let us sing “Amazing Grace” as our own prayer for God’s grace. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now I'm found; Was blind, but now I see.
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Let us pray.
Lord, we are the ones for whom you prayed on the cross. You said, “Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34). We are sinners, Lord, and we don’t even know that we’re doing it. Please guide our heart to realization as you speak to us through your Word. In the name of your son Jesus, who is our way, truth, and life (John 14:6) we pray, Amen. I feel like there has been a lot going on lately, to say the least. For one thing, we have what’s been going on in Ukraine. It is absolutely devastating to witness the suffering that is happening over there. And if that wasn’t enough, COVID is still very much a thing. In fact, at the beginning of this month one of my family members came down with COVID, so our entire family was in quarantine for a while. Among the people I know there have been several deaths, and others are wrestling with some very difficult, painful news given to them as well. It feels like the whole world is on fire. And I can’t even say where it all began because everywhere I look it feels like something is burning down. It feels like everything is on fire somehow. But amidst all of that, I think one of the beautiful things about Christian community is how we are able to share our burdens together. When we or a loved one receives a difficult diagnoses, when we come down with COVID, when we can’t afford our groceries for next week, when we’re wondering if we should move to a different country, find a new school, or change jobs - when death comes to us- we reach out to our Christian family. We rely on our siblings in Christ, and pour our hearts out. We pray together, experiencing God’s love in a very real, very tangible way together, as a community. I hope you all have experienced the power of prayer like that, when you face difficult times. When we pour out our hearts, bringing before God our honest concerns, and worries, God touches deep within our hearts. Our burdens can be lifted from our shoulders, and we can even begin to feel Christ helping to carry those burdens with us. The things that troubled us might not be resolved exactly, our burdens aren’t taken away from us, but somehow we can begin to feel better; feel sustained, supported, guided and loved. For me - maybe because there’s so much going on in my life, the life of our church, and in the world right now - I am finding myself with ample opportunities to truly experience the power of prayer. And I’ve been fortunate lately to be able to have extensive time praying with a wide variety of different people. Recently, I had a very powerful experience with someone I give pastoral care to regularly, and - with his permission of course - I’d like to share with you what happened. This person had recently gone to the doctor, and felt that he would soon be receiving a difficult medical diagnosis. So, we spent some time talking together on Zoom. While we were talking, he began to share with me his thoughts and concerns, and started trying to make some plans just in case he didn’t make it. The potential of this diagnosis was so great that he had begun to consider that he might die. So we talked, and we prayed. And as we prayed, he confessed to me the sins he had committed in his relationship with his family. And as I listened to him crying out in pain and prayer, I also felt led to confess my own sins as well. When my father had decided to remarry I was so sad, so upset that I couldn’t find it anywhere within myself to be happy for his remarriage. In my pain I hurt my dad with harsh remarks, and damaged my relationship with him and his wife, my new step mother, in ways that still affect us to this day. And in that moment, as we prayed together and dwelt in our shared sinfulness, he and I experienced a holy moment together. When I say holy by the way, I don’t mean that our hearts were pure, and we approached God as though we had been made perfect somehow. In Greek, the word “holy” means “set apart.” We had set apart time to truly be with God in confession and repentance. We acknowledged just how covered we were with sins not only as individuals, but as members of our particular families, members of particular church communities, and as citizens of this world. We saw just how far removed the communities and groups we belong to are from what God asked of us, and from what God’s kingdom on earth is meant to be. As a pastor, I hold many prayer meetings. And I love being in prayer with other people. Some of these prayer meetings are one-on-one, and others are held in bigger groups. But no matter the size or intent, I must say that not all of the times we come to God in prayer are as deep, transformational, or peace-giving. And I think that is because our prayers to God are often about us making requests of God, rather than confessing our sins, and repenting before God instead. From the very beginning of his ministry, Jesus said, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven (God) is at hand.” (Matthew 4:17 and Mark 1:15). Jesus often spoke about repentance through parables, such as the famous ones about the lost sheep (Luke 15:1-7), or the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). His disciples, having heard these teachings firsthand, passed on the significance of repentance in their own teachings, preaching on it repeatedly as well long after Jesus ascended into heaven to be with God. Jesus and the disciples talked about repentance a lot, but what about us? Is repentance something we talk about all that often? Do we focus on repentance in worship service, or during our Zoom bible studies? Does it come up during our prayer groups, or when we’re spending time in fellowship with our siblings in Christ? It’s no wonder we have trouble with repentance - we don’t even talk about it among ourselves! When we come together as a church community, it’s not meant to be all that different from when we exchange marriage vows: in good or bad, sickness and health, we are meant to love and cherish each other. As a church community we come together to celebrate new life when a baby is born in our community, when someone receives baptism, or in other moments of joy. As a church community, we also come together in challenging times such as when someone shares the burden of a difficult medical diagnosis, when we lose someone, and when we lose those things that were important to us - jobs, relationships, safety and security, and things like that. And I think that we usually do a good job coming together as a church when those rough things happen. I have seen you all come together to help church members when they need groceries, cooked meals, new furniture, or help with language our culture acclimation: all those times where we see need in our community. But I don’t see that same closeness when we see sin within the community. When we see sin, we tend to either avoid it or separate ourselves from it. This isn’t a problem specific to our church community though: the truth is that this is a fundamental human problem that affects us all, regardless of the time and place in which we live. Today’s story in the scripture starts with a scene of Jesus talking to a crowd. Some of the people in that crowd had come to Jesus and were telling him about a rather shocking event that had recently happened. The Roman governor - Pontius Pilate - had killed some Galileans (Jewish believers) while they were in the temple giving their sacrifices to God. In short, a great sin - murder - had been committed in God’s house. Hearing this, how does Jesus respond? Here is what he says. “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans?” (Luke 13:2) In this moment Jesus reveals a powerful human tendency. When we witness sin, we love to analyze it and decide who must be blamed for it: who must bear the consequences for that sin. We want to know everything about that sin we have seen because we love to decide who is righteous, and who is the sinner. Even worse, when we do this we can begin to think that those who suffer in and around these acts of sin are somehow getting what they deserve - the fair result of their own actions. But when we do this, when we begin to pass judgement on the righteousness and sinfulness of others, we begin to reject a fundamental, Biblical truth that applies to every last one of us. “There is no one who is righteous, not even one; there is no one who has understanding, there is no one who seeks God. “ (Romans 3:11) No matter what we might think or feel about ourselves, we as a people never have a true or complete understanding of things. We might behave as though we are pure and righteous people seeking after God’s own heart, but if we are approaching sin only in terms of what other people do or what other groups need to work on, then we are deceiving ourselves. We are not really seeking God by being this way. Jesus didn’t buy into that human nonsense of figuring out blame and assigning consequences to those unfortunate enough simply to have been at the scene of the crime - like we do. We often think of sin exclusively as a matter of “them.” “They” sinned. “Their” sins. Sin, for us, is something that is done by an entirely different group of people, some group that we are in no way a part of. Sin doesn’t touch on us. It’s not our problem. Have you ever looked at a situation and just found yourself instinctively analyzing the whole thing? I know I have. I sometimes find myself looking at situations, especially intense situations or conflicts, and breaking down who I think was responsible. “This person must have said this,” I start thinking, “so they’re wrong. But then this person also responded that way and they have no idea what they’re talking about. This never would have happened if they hadn’t done this one thing, or if they had done something else instead.” Our hearts are quick to jump to judgement, and when we are stuck in a place of judgement, it is easy to overlook an important practice in our faith walk with God. “Unless you repent, you will all perish.” (Luke 13:3 and 13:5) Remember who it was that Jesus was speaking this verse to. He wasn’t speaking to any individual, but to a crowd. Sure, some people had brought news about a terrible sin committed by some other people but, bluntly speaking, the crowd had nothing to do with what had happened. But in that moment, Jesus did not waste his time attempting to identify who was right or who was wrong, didn’t bother to engage in a conversation on who deserved to suffer and who did not. Instead, he went straight to the point, woke up the crowd spiritually and said, “Unless you repent, you will all perish.” (Luke 13:3 and 13:5) To God there is no such thing as “us vs. them.” It’s just “God with us.” If all of us don’t take seriously the idea of repentance, if we don’t take it personally and of deep importance - then our destination is destruction and the grave. As someone who is often in the position within our church community of hearing all about the “sins” committed by others, let me be the first one to say that I have sometimes been exactly the sort of person who Jesus said “no” to in this story. Let’s face it: this is a church and we, as Christians, are a collection of people desperately in need of a savior. Of course we would be covered by sin. I have seen and heard of many incidents where one person, or one group of people, acted towards others in a way that seemed to completely abandon the love, forgiveness and compassion that Jesus asks us to practice. And when I heard of these things, even though I never said it out loud, I know that my mind instinctively went to that place of judgement and criticism. “It makes sense,” I think, “because that person is like this. Of course that person is mad; this other person has done something terrible.” In those moments, whatever my intentions might have been, what I wasn’t doing was going to God in prayer and humility, asking how I might be a part of this sin and what God might be asking me to repent from too. In those moments I stuck with that spectator mindset; analyzing and exploring these things as though they were only something “they” did, and not something I shared in myself. Today I want to seek forgiveness from God and from all of you because that wasn’t what God wanted from me as a pastor who God had placed in the service of this community. Over the last few weeks, as a result of spending time with God in prayer and facing the depth of my own sin, God has shown me my weakness - God has shown me that I can’t speak about repentance without repenting myself first as well. Those of you who know me know that I like peace. I really don’t like confrontation, and I am not someone you might call strongly outspoken. I like to hang out in the shadows, to hide in the corner. I certainly don’t like coming up here in front of you all and highlighting my own sinfulness by preaching about repentance while still being a sinner myself! But through today’s Scripture, and through this whole Lenten season, God has made it clear to me that I need to confront sin more boldly when I witness sin in our church community, and work more strongly towards healing and resolution. What’s more I need to own is that I am a part of the sin that happens in our church community, and not just someone observing it. I need to be as upfront about what I am witnessing as I try to be with my own personal sinfulness, and I ask you to support me and the rest of the pastoral team in your prayers as we do this. What about you? Has today’s Scripture spoken to you? When you hear about sin in our church community, what comes to your mind? Feelings of indifference? Disappointment? Or are you thinking, “Oh, I knew it! This again!” Or maybe you’re thinking “I have nothing to do with this,” or “I had no idea…this is so sad…” Maybe you’re just thinking “I have no clue what she’s talking about because I’m new here.” Well, whatever you might be thinking, I want to invite all of us to be in prayer and discernment, looking to see what it is that God is telling us in this time and place. God might be telling you to pray about it more because you don’t fully understand what is going on, or God might be telling you to confess and repent for the part you played in the sins of our community. God speaks to us all in different ways and, since I am not God, I can’t tell you much more than to lift it up to God in prayer But, from my personal experience I can share this with you: it is hard to come face-to-face with our sins and engage in real repentance when our heart is hardened. We are a people who are quick to make requests of God, but very hesitant to come out and own the fact that we are sinners. I mean, Jesus went to the cross just to help with that persistently sinful nature of ours. So if any of you are feeling at this point like there is nothing you need to repent for, I would recommend that you spend a little time worshipping God. When you spend time giving thanks and praise to God through song and prayer, you might be surprised what realizations come your way. You might begin to see that there is a clear, and terrifying, difference between the perfect ways of God, and the way you are as a person. Or instead, you can spend time getting in touch with whatever strong feelings are dwelling within you, like anger or sadness. Let these strong feelings all come out, share these deep feelings with someone you trust, someone from whom you don’t fear judgement or criticism. See what happens when your feelings are allowed to come out in a loving, supportive environment. See how God is there for you. But I can also tell you that you can’t stay mad or sad forever. As you reveal yourself, God also reveals God’s self to you, showing how you can turn away from your hardened heart and sinful ways, and return to God in confession and repentance. Today’s Scripture reading ends with Jesus’ favorite way of storytelling; parable. And the parable in today’s reading shows us in a concrete way what the point of repentance is; what it looks like, and why we do it. This parable about the fig tree, unlike many other parables, doesn’t give us a clear ending, does it? We never learn if the barren fig tree, which almost got cut down, would up bearing fruit in the end, or if it just got cut down the next year. To Jesus, the productive outcome isn’t the most important part when it comes to repentance. What happens after we repent isn’t the thing we need to worry about as much as the act of repenting itself. What is most important in repentance is the sense of urgency; our willingness to give our all so that something thatseems so broken can have another chance at life, even when what’s broken is ourselves. The Gardener in the parable, who is trying to do the work of repentance, knows this. He pleads “let’s give the tree one more year and let me do the digging and put the manure on the barren fig tree.”(Luke 13:8) He doesn’t want to sit around for another year to wait and see if the tree will produce fruit on its own. He’s ready to get his hands dirty, to be active in turning things around for the tree. He is determined to do the work, and dedicated to that tree now as if there is a time limit. When it comes to repentance, we need to approach the task with the same sense of urgency. It’s not about looking to tomorrow, next week, next month, or even next year, wondering when the fruit is going to show up. It’s about getting our hands dirty now, and doing the hard, smelly work of turning things around now. So…are we doing the work? Are we listening to God’s call to repentance and asking ourselves how we can answer that call both personally, and as members of our community? Are we persistent in seeking God’s guidance when we are unsure, determined to own our part in the sins surrounding us without blaming others, without looking for fault, or without talking about sin as though it’s something that only happens to other people? Are we willing to get our hands dirty, and try to give that fig tree another year? Or are we just going to let it continue not to bear the fruit that the Gardener desperately wants it to bring forth? I hope and pray that we can all come together to seek God’s guidance, and to hear that call to repentance deeply and personally, so we might work toward turning things around together with God. Amen. Interestingly, at the Japanese Diet meetings, Kokkai, the term “theological discussion” was repeatedly used for the argument. The politicians who used that term had very little understanding of Theology but he only wanted to use that term to mock his counter-argument as the discourse which would bring nowhere and to confusion and ambiguity. Theology is “the study of the nature of God and religious belief,” so it is said, and the image taken of that diet member is not totally wrong. For example, Dr. Karl Barth, a Swiss Theologian in the 20th century wrote his representing work “Church Dogmatic” in 31 volumes in full set. Thomas Aquinas 13th Century Catholic Theologian wrote a monumental work called “Summa Theologica” and you can read it in one volume with 1116 pages, from Amazon. But if St Paul could read these works, how would he respond to them, or our modern theologians' numerous arguments on many subjects, or even my sermon today. Too much talk, too many words and rhetoric, and too ambiguous.
Since Paul’s fundamental theological idea is quite simple and clear, and if you understand his basic point, even the Epistles of Romans seems to be a bit long but you can see his main point from each chapter, each verse, or word, and of course today’s scripture as we have just heard. I may say it as “Sinfulness of Human Beings in front of God,” no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight” (Romans 3:20) and this point is quite meaningful to our present situation, or today’s issue. Sinfulness should be understood in many ways. Ohh, I might have just started my ambiguous theological explanation. Look at the front page of today’s morning paper, and its headline. War! Human beings have been killing each other for quite a long time. The Ukraine situation is not a new incident. The history of humankind can be said to be the history of war and killings. We thought we, who live in the 21st century, would overcome that past and predict the new era of peace and justice. But today’s situation is the same as in any age of History of the world. For example, in 1572 there was a great massacre called “St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre” that happened in France and from 5000 to 300000 people were killed in this happening. It was one incident that happened during Reformation and battles were drawn between Catholic and Hugno (French Calvinists). They were all Christians and in the name of God, they claimed their own cause, and denied their counterparts as their enemy. How did they hear Jesus’ remark “Love your enemy!” and how do you think we are today, are we much much better than 16th century’s people (Christians)? “Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know.” (v.15-17) Here starts another sphere of our sinfulness. We neglect to see our own true nature and tend to convince ourselves that we are much better than them or have progressed and achieved a certain degree of higher human value, calling it as “civilized. “ What is progress, what is the meaning of development of our society. Where are we going for the future? Does humankind have enough intelligence or wisdom, more than that, the ability to create a better condition of our lives. No, I don’t think so and we are just pretending to be someone with better nature. We are too afraid to see our true identity. “Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.” (v.13) In the Roman Church to which Paul wrote this letter, there are many different people in their racial origin. Among them, Paul mentions the Greeks and the Jews (v.9). And there was some kind of rivalry or tension between them over the contents of their faith. The Jews were converts from their original belief of Judaism, and they had a great deal of knowledge of the Old Testament as their own Bible. They regard themselves as having higher or deeper faith in God. And Paul pointed out the Jew’s misunderstanding or misguided concept of Christian faith. Paul himself was a convert from the Judaism to Christianity. And he also had great pride in his former faith, as he refers to it as “for righteousness based on the law, faultless.” (Philip 3:6) but when he became Christian, then he realized these prides are all “garbage.”(Phil 3:8) Why so? Try to think how much you find differences between you and new members of the Church with the knowledge of Christian ideas. Maybe you are well acquainted with the Church system, and more experienced. And which is the bigger of differences between you and the new member, or between you and God? And from the eyes of God, gaps among us are just nothing, and we human beings are quite eager to emphasize these zero differences and do not see the huge, unthinkable big differences between God and us. And we claim that zero-difference has great meaning, that is another side of our sinfulness. Our pride of Christian faith does not depend on human effort or experience to be Christian but only upon the fact that God loves us no matter who we are. Once Jesus was asked “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” (Mark 12:28), and he replied “The most important one,... Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” (v. 30) Do we love our God enough? How do we do it? Yes we pray to God, we (sometimes) think of God. We thank and praise God in today’s service as usual. Is that enough? If we follow the theology of Paul in a very simple way it is to surrender only to God, give up your self-confidence, and leave everything to God before you do anything. A Danish pastor and a theologian, Søren Aabye Kierkegaard, preached that the first thing to serve God is to keep silent before Him. Stand still in front of Him and wait until you will be given real communication from God. Surrender yourself to his initiative, so be humble and patient. After that The second thing Jesus taught us is this “‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:31). Yes, the fundamental thing is just simple and our problem, difficulty or sinfulness is to overlook this very point and make matters complicated. If I preach this, and say so, People in “the real world” might say, “See how Christians are far from the reality of the world. Just praying and not doing anything better. Then I want to answer and ask them, what can you do with your intellectual, complicated theory, just like a theological argument at the Diet council. How can you solve the world serious problem, jut by your knowledge? The fundamental thing to face today’s world-wide uneasiness as Christians, is to trust God and pray for the peace, or we only say “Stop the War!” repeatedly and stubbornly. No further detailed arguments are not our business. I just want to conclude today’s sermon with a short Latin Prayer, saying “Dona Nobis Pacem!” Give us Peace, Lord! Amen.. Let us pray: Lord, today we repent ourselves not having surrendered ourselves to you. In other words, we have not actually believed “in God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth,” even though we confess it repeatedly. At this time today, please make us ones who sincerely love you and trust you as the ultimate guide to our whole world. And now I just pray “Dona Nobis Pacem,” to you our only source of life and peace. In the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ, Amen Picture by Sadao Watanabe, “The Temptation of Christ: Jesus said to him, “Get away Satan!” (Matthew 4:1-11 and Luke 4:1-13) 4 Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, 2 where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing at all during those days, and when they were over, he was famished. 3 The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” 4 Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’” 5 Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. 6 And the devil said to him, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’”9 Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10 for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’11 and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” 12 Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” 13 When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time. -- Luke 4:1-13 Today is the first Sunday of Lent and I have a story for you. A priest was coming back to his rectory one evening in the dark when he was accosted by a robber who pulled out a gun and said, “Your money or your life!” As the priest reached his hand into his coat pocket he revealed his clerical collar. The robber said, “I see you are a priest. I will let you go.” The priest being grateful pulled out of his pocket a chocolate bar and offered it to the robber. The robber said, “No thank you. I gave up chocolate for Lent.” Many people, like the robber in the story, look for ways to grow closer to God during Lent and so some people give up something during Lent. Lent is a period of 40 days, not counting Sundays, that begins every year on Ash Wednesday. We held our KUC Ash Wednesday service this past week to begin Lent. Lent is a time traditionally set aside for fasting, prayer, and reflection in preparation for Easter when we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Lent is a time of spiritual renewal. The English word Lent is a shortened form of the Old English word lencten, (related to “lengthen,” referring to the lengthening of days in the spring, so Lent meant “spring season” until it became part of the liturgical calendar around the 2nd century. So, Lent is an invitation to a springtime for the soul. These forty days in this Lenten season s when we ask God to help lead us through prayer, penance and acts to renew or reinvigorate our faith. We ask God to create in us a clean heart, and renew a right spirit within us. (Psalm 51:10) During Lent, some people give up something. Some people like to give up something like chocolate or coffee or even social media. But you can also try changing your daily habits and committing to something new by adding something to your life. One person I know added “gratitude" each day during Lent. Another person added “patience.” The last few years some people in our church have tried during Lent the Daniel’s Fast ( https://www.allrecipes.com/article/what-is-the-daniel-fast/ ). Something else to try to do this Lent is to find a prayer partner to pray with weekly for six weeks. Prayer partners help you to be accountable! Or keep a prayer journal. Another idea is to do some kind of social service. You may want to add or give up something but Lent is also a time to give back. Find a way to help others. Find a way, your own way, to make Lent meaningful for you. The first Sunday of Lent often begins with the scripture reading of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness, the Judean desert, which is found in Matthew 4:1-11 and Luke 4:1-13. Mark’s account is very brief, merely noting the event. (Mark 1:12-13). In the Gospel of John, the temptation of Jesus is not explicitly mentioned but in this gospel Jesus does refer to the devil, "the prince of this world", having no power over him. (John 14:30) Good words as the devil has no power of us either. God is always stronger! Our text in Luke tells us that after Jesus’ baptism, he is led by the Spirit into the wilderness, where for forty days he is tempted by the devil. Now, the devil is blamed for so many things. C.S. Lewis wrote a fictional and entertaining novel called The Screwtape Letters It about a senior devil who mentors his nephew devil on how to tempt and corrupt a human. Sometimes people say; “The devil made me do it!” In western countries, they say this as a kind of a joke (or maybe they really mean it). For example, “I was tempted and could not control myself! It was the devil who made me eat that last piece of cake!” ☺ In Japan children have fun throwing beans on Sestubun no Hi, a day marking the beginning of Spring on the lunar calendar (which was February 3 this year). Children throw roasted soybeans known as fukumame at someone with a demon or ogre mask on and say, “Oni wa soto. Fuku wa uchi.” (“Devils out. Happiness in.”) Good luck s supposed to come for the year. Especially f you also eat makzushi, known as ehō-maki ("lucky direction roll"). Seriously, some people may do something that they feel they have no control over. They feel they are not the one responsible. It could be anything such as compulsive buying, drinking too much, compulsive lying, bullying or cyberbullying, uncontrollable anger, being abusive verbally and psychically, etc. The list goes on and on. If it is “the devil’s fault” that means you don’t have to be responsible for your own actions. Now there may be a few cases of demon possession and people actually tormented –that is not my area of expertise – but we do find this kind of demon possession in scripture where Jesus told the demons to go out of the man and go into the pigs. (Matthew 8:28-34, Luke 8:26-39). But I am not talking about that kind of devil but rather using the devil as an excuse. God created us with a free will. So, it might be an easy cop-out to blame others and/or to blame the devil for our problems or events in life. We cannot fear the devil either. We can laugh at the devil. A speaker once told the participants at a women’s conference to be the kind of person who wakes up in the morning and when your feet hit the floor, the devil says,”Oh, no! (your name) is awake!” Tell the devil to get lost and worship God knowing God will protect you. Be not afraid. Jesus is not afraid of the devil. He meets the devil in the wilderness. Jesus counteracts every temptation the devil throws out at him with scripture. (Deuteronomy chapters 6-8.) Jesus was led into the wilderness by the Spirit after his baptism by his cousin, John, in the river Jordan. In the preceding verses, we read how Jesus’ baptism was a glorious scene. As soon as Jesus was baptized, he came up out of the water. Heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.” (Luke 3:22) Jesus goes from this a wonderful and glorious baptism into the barren wilderness. What a contrast. Why he had to go we don’t know for sure but maybe for Jesus this was a time to refocus on who he was, where he was going and how he was to get there. Therefore, he had to go before his ministry began. I would just like to mention the world in which Jesus lived. Roman Empire had conquered Israel and they were a constant, looming, oppressive force that cast a shadow over everything. The people of Israel were also divided in their response to the Roman oppressors among the Herodians, Zealots, Sadducees, Pharisees, and Essenes. He was going into a world that would not be an easy place to do ministry. Maybe being in the wilderness looked a whole lot better than the real world at that time. Being in the wilderness may have been like a retreat except there was no food for 40 days and the devil kept harassing him. Have you ever experienced the wilderness? A time you were isolated and alone? Maybe a time you lost hope? Perhaps a spiritual crisis? Or a crisis such as something tragic happening that was unexpected? A time you felt desperate? A time you were depressed? When Martin Luther became depressed, he saw it as a temptation of Satan and he would turn to his ancient foe and cry out, "I am baptized. I am baptized." He needed the assurance of his identity, that he belonged to Jesus. Even though his faith might waver, God's love would not. Some people may go in and out of the wilderness several times during their life. It is not an easy task to be in the wilderness. The people of Israel did not do well in the wilderness. For 40 years, the Israelites wandered in the wilderness. They complained against God. They forgot how God had provided for them, and they chased the gods of the kingdoms of Canaan, and it nearly destroyed them. You can read their story in Exodus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Listen to the words that Moses spoke to the people about these years from Deuteronomy 8:2–6 (NRSV) 2 Remember the long way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, in order to humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commandments. 3 He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, with which neither you nor your ancestors were acquainted, in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.4 The clothes on your back did not wear out and your feet did not swell these forty years. 5 Know then in your heart that as a parent disciplines a child so the Lord your God disciplines you. 6 Therefore keep the commandments of the Lord your God, by walking in his ways and by fearing him. The Israelites struggled in the wilderness and complained bitterly. There are different kinds of wilderness experiences – the wilderness within, or the wilderness we find ourselves in. Perhaps you felt you were distant from God? Or, maybe during then you were able to feel closer to God? But sometimes after coming out of a very difficult hardship and being in the wilderness, you look back and see how God was still there. One of our church members who faced a tragedy said that during the crisis, the power of God was almost overwhelming at times. I have a poem to share. The author is unknown but this poem was written during WW2, on the wall of a cellar, by a Jew in the Cologne concentration camp. “I believe in the sun even when it is not shining And I believe in love, even when there’s no one there. And I believe in God, even when He is silent. I believe through any trial, there is always a way But sometimes in this suffering and hopeless despair My heart cries for shelter, to know someone’s there But a voice rises within me, saying hold on my child, I’ll give you strength, I’ll give you hope. Just stay a little while. I believe in the sun even when it is not shining And I believe in love even when there’s no one there But I believe in God even when he is silent I believe through any trial there is always a way. May there someday be sunshine May there someday be happiness May there someday be love May there someday be peace….” May there be peace. Indeed, with the situation in Ukraine now and other parts of our world, we pray for peace. We may feel a loss of hope at times. We may cry out, "where is God?" in the face of random or meaningless suffering, immense stress, depression, illness, debilitating grief, war, and tragic death. We feel we are lost in the wilderness. How do we find our way out of the wilderness? We rely on God. I know, this may be easier said than done. But it is what we do. We rely on the power of God. Jesus knew that he had the power of God’s love on his side and did not succumb to temptations in the wilderness. Temptations are not necessarily bad – it is what we do with them that is often the problem. Look at his first temptation, when Jesus was tempted to turn stones into bread because he was hungry after 40 days in the wilderness, he used the Word of God. The devil asks Jesus to turn the stones into bread. But Jesus’ replies “One does not live by bread alone.” (Taken from Deuteronomy 8:3 –“He humbled you by letting you hunger, then by feeding you with manna, with which neither you nor your ancestors were acquainted, in order to make you understand that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.”) We have God and God’s promises in the Bible letting us know that God loves us and will never ever leave us. Next, Jesus is taken to a high place and shown all the kingdoms of the world and offered all their authority and power if he would bow down to the devil. This temptation is more than simply the temptation to pursue power; that would not have appealed to Jesus at all. Rather it is the temptation to claim that power from the devil so that it can be used by Jesus to do good things in the world if he only worships the devil, this power is his. The devil says he controls the world and this is scary. The devil claims the power of the world and this means he can give this power to Jesus. (Luke 4:6) But in Luke 4:8 Jesus answers him, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only God.’ Jesus is quoting directly from Deuteronomy 6:13, “Honor the LORD your God, worship only him, and make your promises in his name alone.”) Jesus does not grasp worldly power, but empties himself of it. The gospels say that the Jesus did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life for the liberation of others. The way of Jesus leads to a cross and the cross signifies death, not the acquiring of status and power. Jesus tells his followers to take up their cross and follow him. Anyone who follows Jesus should have no illusions about what that means. In the final temptation, the devil took Jesus to Jerusalem, placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, symbolizing the top of the religious world itself, and tells him to some play testing games with God. “Throw yourself off and the angels will catch you” (Luke 4:9-10, Matthew 4:6). It’s the only time in the Bible where the devil quotes Scripture. The devil uses this scripture in Psalm 91:11-12 by saying the angels will guard Jesus in all ways, lift him up if he falls, and not even let Jesus strike his foot against a stone. Using scripture this way is dangerous. As Shakespeare said in *The Merchant of Venice,* (Act I, Scene 3, line 99). "The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose". It is a lesson for the church is that evil intentions can be supported by quotations from scripture. Oppression of peoples, wars, and abuse have often been supported by quotations from scripture. We need to discern and listen with discriminating ears to hear what is said who is saying it. Are we listening to temptation? People can use Scripture for selfish purposes. These choices between the right thing and the wrong thing are sometimes not easy ones and knowing which path to take. How was Jesus able to be strong during this temptation? Because he knew who he was. The voice echoed through his ears, “You are my Son, by beloved, in you I am well pleased.” We are loved by God. We don’t know what the future brings but what we do know is that God is with us so we are not alone. Listen and hear the voice of God that says, “You are my child, my beloved. In you, I am well pleased. Let us pray. God, help us to look carefully into our hearts with discernment and understanding. May we not be afraid to admit to what we find there, knowing that you still love us and accept us unconditionally. Teach us your ways, O God. May we be energized by the power of your love and not the power of the world. And may we be tuned into your Spirit—doing what you want us to do in the way you want us do it. Amen. |
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