Stop The Offerings!
Sermon
Sermons On The Second Readings
For Sundays In Advent, Christmas, And Epiphany
Go with me to the year 1968, to the basement of Good Shepherd United Methodist Church in Silver Spring, Maryland. I was the student assistant at that church, while attending Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. One Sunday morning, immediately following the Sunday school hour, the senior high teacher came hurrying into the fellowship hall and engaged me in an almost desperate conversation. The question had been raised in his class that morning, "How could the death of a man 2,000 years ago actually serve to do anything about the sin of someone in 1968?" The teacher had been confused and speechless before the class. Today I don't remember what I told him, but I remember clearly the question -- and I've heard it many times since.
As we celebrate this profound watershed day in history, I would like to reflect on this awesome, mysterious, paradoxical symbol of the Christian faith. I am making the assumption that there just may be some of you who also have struggled with this mystery, this often-spoken article of faith that "Jesus Christ died for our sins." And central to this question is the cross.
One of the golden oldies in our hymnal is "The Old Rugged Cross." It's a great song to sing and I wonder what people are thinking when they sing it! Remember?
On a hill far away, stood an old rugged cross,
the emblem of suffering and shame.
And I love that old cross, where the dearest and best
for a world of lost sinners was slain.
So I'll cherish the old rugged cross,
till my trophies at last I lay down;
I will cling to the old rugged cross,
and exchange it someday for a crown.
What does it mean to "cherish the cross"? I mean, the cross was the means of execution back then. It would be like saying, "I will cling to the electric chair," or "I hold the hang noose close to my breast," or "I keep a syringe in my pocket." Why would someone cling to the old rugged cross?
This scripture reading from the tenth chapter of Hebrews deals directly with this issue.
It's hard for us today to feel or understand the radical nature of what the writer of Hebrews was saying. Remember, up to this time the sacrifice of doves and lambs and bulls and goats was the only way people knew to please God, to rid themselves of the guilt that plagued them. The words in this tenth chapter really were revolutionary to the ears of the Jews of his day. Listen.
If the worshipers had once been cleansed, they would no longer have any consciousness of sin. But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sin year after year. For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins.
-- Hebrews 10:2b-4 (RSV)
Can you imagine the impact such words had? It would be like someone saying today that washing your hands does nothing to rid your hands of dirt and germs. What?! What do you mean? It is the way of doing so! But then the writer of Hebrews goes on, "Where there is forgiveness of [sins], there is no longer any offering for sin" (Hebrews 10:18 RSV).
In other words the writer of Hebrews is saying, "Stop the offerings! Jesus has made the one offering of himself and that is enough!"
Think of it. Growing up, knowing the pang of guilt, just like we do, but then regularly going to the temple with a dove in hand or buying one there, giving it to the priest and watching the blood fly, hoping that this time that nagging guilt would go away, the heaviness of spirit might disappear, peace might finally come. But if the report of Luke in the book of Acts is any indicator, it didn't happen. The law and associated guilt from not being able to carry it all out was a burden, not a pathway to God. Listen to the words of Peter at the Council of Jerusalem, as Luke reports: "Now therefore why do you make trial of God by putting a yoke upon the neck of the [new] disciples which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?" (Acts 15:10 RSV).
Peter is referring to the myriad of laws which the Jews had tried to follow, and which some of the leaders of the new Christian community were insisting new, non-Jewish converts had to observe when they became disciples of Christ. Like circumcision for example.
It wasn't working for us, said Peter, so why do we want to insist on it for others? Peter had experienced for the first time the thrill of freedom from compulsive offerings to try to get God to approve of him. And you will recall, he really tested that truth after he denied his Lord. And once more Jesus was found faithful.
It was Jesus' death on that cross which showed how much God loved humanity. It was the cross that got their attention, that revealed the lengths God would go to on behalf of his children. Are you brokenhearted? God really does know your pain.
Are you feeling distant from God? Jesus cried out on the cross, "My God, my God, why have your forsaken me?" The muck and the horror and the death and the chaos of this world has been experienced by God's Son. Like stopping a flaming oil well with dynamite, the world's sin was blasted into eternity at the cross, and in the calm that followed God calls us to believe God would never leave us or forsake us, no matter what, in this world or the next.
And yet ... and yet. Is your guilt gone? Is mine? Did Jesus die on that cruel cross in vain for you? For me? Are we still trying, still working at God's approval? Still holding out on loving others till they measure up?
Have you ever known a child or adult who never got the love and affection and affirmation from a parent that she so desperately craved? Do you know of the effort, the striving, the work required to live a life trying with every action, every phone call, to get approval and love from a father or a mother? Not a pretty way to live. Are you one such child?
The great Leslie Weatherhead wrote a book the year I was born, 1945, called The Meaning of the Cross. In that book he wrote this paragraph which speaks so stirringly about the power of God's action in Jesus through the cross and resurrection:
In some moods -- the mood, for example, in which I find myself on each Good Friday morning -- one feels it almost a sacrilege to argue and to discuss. One desires then only to bow in adoration before the mystery of a love whose depths no one can sound and the range of whose august purposes is like that of a shooting star. It sweeps in from the Infinite and the Unknown, and comes near enough to earth so that we may see something of its shining glory. We watch with awe and wonder; but when all that can be seen by human eyes has passed into the darkness, and a cry is heard, "It is finished," we still know that a purpose goes on, beyond our vision, in the Infinite and the Unknown, and we cannot even imagine its scope....1
You see, the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is not what we tend to make it and what those outside the Church assume it to be. Jesus' power was not just in his teachings of love, as central as they were. Why? Because the problem that afflicts us, the pain that dogs us, the reality that anyone can see in each of us is that so often we cannot love! Not consistently. Not fully. Not radically.
Instead we have to say with Saint Paul my personal theme-verse: "I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate" (Romans 7:15 RSV).
If this is true, then our real need is not more information about what we should do, how we should love, though it does give us a mighty goal and a great compass for our lives.
What we really need is a way to deal with our terrible failure at loving, a way to deal with the ugh in the gut, the whoosh of adrenaline rush as we realize we did it again, or we know we are about to.
For until we do feel at one with God again, we will be like the 400-pound man who has given up on dieting, for the way back seems just too far. Only when we know of God's unfailing love toward us, will we have the energy to recommit our lives to serve and follow in the footsteps of Jesus.
But the author of Hebrews knows how hard that is, and so he adds these words at the end of this scripture paragraph. Listen:
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful; and let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another.... -- Hebrews 10:23-25 (RSV)
What I love about these verses is not that they seem to be an argument for more church meetings, but that they recognize the real, honest-to-goodness challenge that faces all humans when it comes to holding on to our hope that God really does forgive us. We really do not have to press and stress to make God smile. These verses remind us that an isolated Christian is a very vulnerable disciple. One little puff of negative energy or temptation at just the right time will throw us into guilt or sin. Is that not our situation?
We must not fail to meet together for encouragement and on-going learning. The mysterious event of the cross and the powerful and even more mysterious event of the resurrection are so totally foreign to the mind-set and assumptions of the world in which we work and play and live, that getting together is a vital discipline, not an optional activity when we have the time. Worship, small groups, eating together in our homes -- all of these become the amplifiers which enable us to hear the too-good-to-be-true sweet voice of God, which said, "I love you," from the cross of Jesus -- and says it still.
It is in fact, amazing grace, the sweetest sound there is to the human ear and the most healing and empowering gift to the human heart.
____________
1. Leslie Weatherhead, The Meaning of the Cross (Abingdon Press), p. 21.
As we celebrate this profound watershed day in history, I would like to reflect on this awesome, mysterious, paradoxical symbol of the Christian faith. I am making the assumption that there just may be some of you who also have struggled with this mystery, this often-spoken article of faith that "Jesus Christ died for our sins." And central to this question is the cross.
One of the golden oldies in our hymnal is "The Old Rugged Cross." It's a great song to sing and I wonder what people are thinking when they sing it! Remember?
On a hill far away, stood an old rugged cross,
the emblem of suffering and shame.
And I love that old cross, where the dearest and best
for a world of lost sinners was slain.
So I'll cherish the old rugged cross,
till my trophies at last I lay down;
I will cling to the old rugged cross,
and exchange it someday for a crown.
What does it mean to "cherish the cross"? I mean, the cross was the means of execution back then. It would be like saying, "I will cling to the electric chair," or "I hold the hang noose close to my breast," or "I keep a syringe in my pocket." Why would someone cling to the old rugged cross?
This scripture reading from the tenth chapter of Hebrews deals directly with this issue.
It's hard for us today to feel or understand the radical nature of what the writer of Hebrews was saying. Remember, up to this time the sacrifice of doves and lambs and bulls and goats was the only way people knew to please God, to rid themselves of the guilt that plagued them. The words in this tenth chapter really were revolutionary to the ears of the Jews of his day. Listen.
If the worshipers had once been cleansed, they would no longer have any consciousness of sin. But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sin year after year. For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins.
-- Hebrews 10:2b-4 (RSV)
Can you imagine the impact such words had? It would be like someone saying today that washing your hands does nothing to rid your hands of dirt and germs. What?! What do you mean? It is the way of doing so! But then the writer of Hebrews goes on, "Where there is forgiveness of [sins], there is no longer any offering for sin" (Hebrews 10:18 RSV).
In other words the writer of Hebrews is saying, "Stop the offerings! Jesus has made the one offering of himself and that is enough!"
Think of it. Growing up, knowing the pang of guilt, just like we do, but then regularly going to the temple with a dove in hand or buying one there, giving it to the priest and watching the blood fly, hoping that this time that nagging guilt would go away, the heaviness of spirit might disappear, peace might finally come. But if the report of Luke in the book of Acts is any indicator, it didn't happen. The law and associated guilt from not being able to carry it all out was a burden, not a pathway to God. Listen to the words of Peter at the Council of Jerusalem, as Luke reports: "Now therefore why do you make trial of God by putting a yoke upon the neck of the [new] disciples which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?" (Acts 15:10 RSV).
Peter is referring to the myriad of laws which the Jews had tried to follow, and which some of the leaders of the new Christian community were insisting new, non-Jewish converts had to observe when they became disciples of Christ. Like circumcision for example.
It wasn't working for us, said Peter, so why do we want to insist on it for others? Peter had experienced for the first time the thrill of freedom from compulsive offerings to try to get God to approve of him. And you will recall, he really tested that truth after he denied his Lord. And once more Jesus was found faithful.
It was Jesus' death on that cross which showed how much God loved humanity. It was the cross that got their attention, that revealed the lengths God would go to on behalf of his children. Are you brokenhearted? God really does know your pain.
Are you feeling distant from God? Jesus cried out on the cross, "My God, my God, why have your forsaken me?" The muck and the horror and the death and the chaos of this world has been experienced by God's Son. Like stopping a flaming oil well with dynamite, the world's sin was blasted into eternity at the cross, and in the calm that followed God calls us to believe God would never leave us or forsake us, no matter what, in this world or the next.
And yet ... and yet. Is your guilt gone? Is mine? Did Jesus die on that cruel cross in vain for you? For me? Are we still trying, still working at God's approval? Still holding out on loving others till they measure up?
Have you ever known a child or adult who never got the love and affection and affirmation from a parent that she so desperately craved? Do you know of the effort, the striving, the work required to live a life trying with every action, every phone call, to get approval and love from a father or a mother? Not a pretty way to live. Are you one such child?
The great Leslie Weatherhead wrote a book the year I was born, 1945, called The Meaning of the Cross. In that book he wrote this paragraph which speaks so stirringly about the power of God's action in Jesus through the cross and resurrection:
In some moods -- the mood, for example, in which I find myself on each Good Friday morning -- one feels it almost a sacrilege to argue and to discuss. One desires then only to bow in adoration before the mystery of a love whose depths no one can sound and the range of whose august purposes is like that of a shooting star. It sweeps in from the Infinite and the Unknown, and comes near enough to earth so that we may see something of its shining glory. We watch with awe and wonder; but when all that can be seen by human eyes has passed into the darkness, and a cry is heard, "It is finished," we still know that a purpose goes on, beyond our vision, in the Infinite and the Unknown, and we cannot even imagine its scope....1
You see, the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is not what we tend to make it and what those outside the Church assume it to be. Jesus' power was not just in his teachings of love, as central as they were. Why? Because the problem that afflicts us, the pain that dogs us, the reality that anyone can see in each of us is that so often we cannot love! Not consistently. Not fully. Not radically.
Instead we have to say with Saint Paul my personal theme-verse: "I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate" (Romans 7:15 RSV).
If this is true, then our real need is not more information about what we should do, how we should love, though it does give us a mighty goal and a great compass for our lives.
What we really need is a way to deal with our terrible failure at loving, a way to deal with the ugh in the gut, the whoosh of adrenaline rush as we realize we did it again, or we know we are about to.
For until we do feel at one with God again, we will be like the 400-pound man who has given up on dieting, for the way back seems just too far. Only when we know of God's unfailing love toward us, will we have the energy to recommit our lives to serve and follow in the footsteps of Jesus.
But the author of Hebrews knows how hard that is, and so he adds these words at the end of this scripture paragraph. Listen:
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful; and let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another.... -- Hebrews 10:23-25 (RSV)
What I love about these verses is not that they seem to be an argument for more church meetings, but that they recognize the real, honest-to-goodness challenge that faces all humans when it comes to holding on to our hope that God really does forgive us. We really do not have to press and stress to make God smile. These verses remind us that an isolated Christian is a very vulnerable disciple. One little puff of negative energy or temptation at just the right time will throw us into guilt or sin. Is that not our situation?
We must not fail to meet together for encouragement and on-going learning. The mysterious event of the cross and the powerful and even more mysterious event of the resurrection are so totally foreign to the mind-set and assumptions of the world in which we work and play and live, that getting together is a vital discipline, not an optional activity when we have the time. Worship, small groups, eating together in our homes -- all of these become the amplifiers which enable us to hear the too-good-to-be-true sweet voice of God, which said, "I love you," from the cross of Jesus -- and says it still.
It is in fact, amazing grace, the sweetest sound there is to the human ear and the most healing and empowering gift to the human heart.
____________
1. Leslie Weatherhead, The Meaning of the Cross (Abingdon Press), p. 21.
