The Second Sunday after Pentecost ---- 18 June 2017

Romans 5:1-8

Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we^* have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, ²through whom we have obtained access^* to this grace in which we stand; and we^* boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. ³And not only that, but we^* also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, ⁴and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, ⁵and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.

6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. ⁷Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. ⁸But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.

But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.

·       It has become very “uncool” or at least uncomfortable to discuss sin, even in church. Maybe, especially in church. Any mention of sin brings on a load of guilt, of regret, of blame, and maybe punishment. It points fingers and call behavior into question, possibly even our own behavior.

·       A few ways to respond:

·       Give up and wallow in sinfulness, forgetting salvation.

·       Try really, really hard to be better and deserve God’s love and salvation.

·       Deny the existence of sin and call it all “character flaws” or other such dodges.

·       Accept the freely-offered love of God (God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.)

·       The last one might be the hardest to do. As humans, we want to achieve. We want to deserve. We want to have trophies.

·       What we don’t like is gifts. Gifts create obligations, in particular the obligation to reciprocate. At Christmas, we watch and see if our gifts to others are of equal value to their gifts to us. A visit or an invitation requires a return visit or a similar invitation. This is what makes the seating at weddings and funerals so troublesome.

·       We also like making deals. We like to negotiate for equal value or better. Whether this is in the stock market or at a yard sale, we like to deal. I’m not good at this. As a young boy, I collected baseball cards and they fell into three categories – ones to keep, ones to trade, and ones to use in games on the playground. I made lousy deals – really bad ones – to obtain cards of players from my favourite team.

·       What Paul talks about in this passage from the letter to the Romans is NOT a deal. Neither is it a denial of the reality of sin, whether that term is taken as personal actions that hurt the relationship we have with God or with others or as an expression of the brokenness of the world that leads us to act in certain unhealthy ways.

·       Paul would not have us wallow in sin. Nor would he have us strive and strive to better ourselves by obeying the Law in each and every way. Neither would he have us deny the reality of sin and place the blame for everything on something else.

·       No, he says it simply and bluntly: God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

·       Before we could redeem ourselves (an impossibility), or despair of being saved (a lie at best), or refuse to acknowledge our own reality (another lie), God loved us exactly as we WERE and ARE and WILL BE.

·       I find this to be “good news.” It reassures me that salvation comes in the freely given grace of God rather than from my own actions or my own decisions and commitments.

·       In fact, at best, all of our actions, decisions, and commitments flow from the grace God show to us in Jesus.

·       One of the things this grace-filled revelation lays before us is the question as to whether the church is a museum for saints or a hospital for sinners. As a contemporary writer said “The church should be seen as a hospital; a rehab clinic; a place of refuge. The church is NOT a country club.” The church at its best is a place of acceptance and not a place of judgement where people “‘need to get their act together’ in order to attend…”

·       Every last one of us has a history; there are no exceptions. AND every last one of us has a future, a future based on the love of God shown to us in Jesus Christ and lived out now in the Spirit. Because of this, we live our lives, not in fear and uncertainty, but in gratitude.

Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.