Monday, September 21, 2009

Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity. September 20th September 2009.

Church of St. Athanasius, Glen Allen, VA.

“May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer.” Ps. 19.

Introduction:

Today’s scripture texts from Paul’s letter to the Galatians and Matthew’s gospel are the texts that I would like to focus on in this sermon - because both of them have a similar message, which is summarized very nicely by St. Paul in verse 14 – 15 of chapter 6 of Galatians. I quote:

May I never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything: but a new creation is everything.!”

Paul continues:

As for those who will follow this rule – peace be upon them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God.”

So that is the rule that Paul wishes us to adopt to be our guiding beacon:

Boast of nothing except the cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to us, and us to the world.


St Paul’s Letter to the Galatians:

Let us put this into a context. Paul is writing this letter to the church of the Galatians because there are problems afoot within the church. Some of the early Jewish converts to Christianity believed that the ceremonial practices of the Old Testament were still binding on the New Testament church. As a consequence of this they wanted the gentile converts to the church to be subject to circumcision. Paul hints in verse 12 that the reason they were taking this position was to avoid being persecuted by the Jewish zealots who objected to their associating with gentiles in the first place. So their reason was selfish and it was, as Paul puts it,

“..that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ.” V. 12

In other words, they were more afraid of the fanatical zealots among the orthodox Jewish community than they were interested in promoting the church of Christ.

Hence you see the reason for Paul insisting in verse 16 on the one and only rule: boast of nothing except the cross of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To harp on and on about your obedience to the law, by being circumcised etc., is to miss the point.

Now the opening verse of this selection which we have read today is open to various interpretations.

Paul says:

“See what large letters I make when I am writing in my own hand” v. 11.

You probably know already that St. Paul usually dictated his letters to a scribe who wrote his epistles for him. In this case he seems to have taken over from the scribe and either:

a) wrote large letters because of failing eyesight – and there could be evidence for this in chapter 4, v. 13-15: if you read those three verses you have the following text which could indicate that Paul suffered from poor eyesight:

“You know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel to you at the first. And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus. Where is then the blessedness ye spake of? For I bear you record, that, if it had been possible, ye would have plucked out your own eyes, and have given them to me” (Galatians, Ch. 4, vv 13 -15)

That could be one interpretation of the opening words of this selection; Paul suffered from failing eyesight. However, it is possible to adapt another interpretation:

b) Paul took over from the scribe who had written the letter up to this point, and wrote the remainder in large letters to emphasize the importance of his message – namely “BOAST OF NOTHING EXCEPT THE CROSS OF CHRIST”. Just the way we do today when we want to emphasize something we have written: we hit the caps button, the underline button, the bold button, and the italic button on our computers.

There is support for this latter interpretation of the text. This was an important message for Paul. We can see a similar rendition of the message when Paul preached to the Corinthians, for we see in chapter 2, verse 2 of the first letter to the Corinthians:

“For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.”

In other words, Paul resolved to make Christ the sole subject of his teaching and preaching while he was in the city of Corinth. Now we have the same message to the Galatians - “Boast of nothing except the cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to us and us to the world”.

The Gospel of Matthew:

I would like to go now to the gospel text that we read this morning and point out the connection between the two scripture readings. Paul’s letter had a simple message: concentrate on Christ crucified. Focus on God and forget about all the things that could distract you, such as the demands of the old law with its requirement on circumcision.

See how similar that message is to the message of Jesus in today’s gospel reading:

No-one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” V. 24.

Jesus is pointing out to his followers a message that was later taken over by Paul. You must serve God with your whole mind, body and soul and not let yourself be distracted by other concerns such as wealth, or the law, or the opinion of others and so on.

Jesus goes on to describe the attitude of the ideal disciple, in what is perhaps one of the best known and most quoted paragraphs of the New Testament:

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you – you of little faith? Therefore, do not worry, saying “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?” or “What shall we wear?” For it is the gentiles who strive for all these things: and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.”

The message is simplicity itself. Do not worry about the future, because you cannot change one iota of the future. Trust in the loving mercy of God. The coming day, even the coming hour, are placed beyond our control. It is senseless to pretend that we can make provisions for the future. The future rests in the merciful hands of God our Creator.

Sinful man imagines that there is a correlation between work and sustenance as of cause and effect. But Jesus explodes that myth; according to Him bread is not be valued as the reward for work; he speaks instead of the carefree simplicity of the man who walks with him and accepts everything as it comes from God.

There is an interesting commentary of Martin Luther on this passage of scripture which I shall read to you:

“Now mark ye, no beast worketh for his sustenance, but each has his proper function, according to which he seeketh and findeth his own food. The bird doth fly and sing, she maketh nests and beareth young. That is her work, but yet she doth not nourish herself thereby. Oxen plough, horses draw carts and fight, sheep give wool, milk, and cheese, for it is their function so to do. But they do not nurture themselves thereby. Nay, the earth bringeth forth grass, and nurtureth them through God’s blessing. Likewise it is man’s bounden duty to work and do things, and yet withal to know that it is Another who nurtureth him; it is not his own work, but the bounteous blessing of God. It is true that the bird doth neither sow nor reap, yet would she die of hunger if she flew not in search of food. But that she findeth the same is not her work, but the goodness of God. For who put the food there, that she might find it? For where God hath put nought, none findeth, even though the whole world were to work itself to death in search thereof.”


This is an interesting example of total dependence on God’s merciful bounty. It is an acknowledgement of God as the Creator of the universe and the Provider of all that we have.

There is a danger that modern man thinks he put the grain in the fields, the fruit on the trees, the fish in the sea. It is by modern man’s husbandry, as it were, that we have all these things available to sustain us. God does not have any part in the process. There is food on the table because we men have provided it! God had nothing to do with it. In all those hours under the hot sun when I was working in the field I did not see any God helping me!

This godless universe was brought home to me quite recently when I read a book, which I am sure some of you are familiar with, it was called: “The 100 people who are screwing up America”. One of these people was a woman named Ingrid Newkirk, a cofounder of PETA, who made the astonishing claim in September 1989 issue of Vogue, that “There is no rational basis for saying that a human being has special rights. A rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. They’re all mammals”. Somehow or other they are all equal! I thought this was so extreme as to be farcical until quite recently one of my students in a business ethics course wrote an essay on businesses using animals for medical research. I was astounded that she felt exactly like Newkirk: all life is equal, we are no different than pigs, or rats, or birds etc. We have no more rights than they have. And this was a mother with young children; she felt her children were no better than a clutch of chickens! I had not realized that this bizarre philosophy of the godless was permeating the society as much as it has obviously done so.

Contrast this with the words of Jesus, which show such respect for nature and God’s creatures:

“See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.”

And the words of Jesus condemn the godless philosophy of PETA and the bizarre arguments of the likes of Ingrid Newkirk:

“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?

Are you not much more valuable than they? Jesus affirmed the value of human life, we are creatures made in the image of God, we are children of God, and we should live our lives accordingly. We are not mere animals on the same level as the rats, the sheep and the goats and so on.

This is what is so abhorrent about scientists being permitted to play around with human cells and clone hybrids using cells from animals and humans. It is this same godless philosophy at work that we spoke of earlier – there isn’t any real difference between us and the animals so let’s see what we can create! This is the pagan philosophy of Richard Dawkins and the Darwinists and fellow-travellers like PETA. It is totally contrary to Christian teaching.

Conclusion:

The common thread running through today’s liturgy is the need to walk with God: to focus on God as the creator of all things, and to acknowledge that we have been saved by the Cross of Jesus Christ. We must remember that we are admonished by Christ to:

“…strive first for the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”

‘All these things’, in other words food, clothing, shelter. God our Creator is a loving Father and knows that we need these things and they will be provided. Stop worrying about these things and preach Christ crucified, by your mouth, by the example of your lives, and by everything you do.

Paul’s message is equally simple: Boast of nothing save the Cross of Jesus Christ.

Don’t be distracted by the unimportant. Walk with Christ and preach Him crucified.

That basically is the message of the Great Commission:

Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” (Luke, Ch. 14, v15).

That is your God-given directive, take it personally to heart, and go preach Christ crucified.





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