Sermon October 30, 2016

Sermon October 30, 2016

Oct. 30/16, text: John 8:31-36, theme:  “Free”

I’d guess that when most of us hear that something is free we, almost routinely, assume it can’t be worth much.  After all, we live in a society that readily believes you get what you pay for.  There are no free rides.  All those wonderful discounts and bonus options offered when you buy a new car - well - you’ve just got to know they’re buried somewhere in the price.  Should any promised freebee actually be worth something - then we’re inclined to ask, “So what’s the catch?”  There has to be a catch hidden somewhere in the fine print.  Overall, we’re skeptical by nature.  When something’s too good to be true it’s likely not true.

For these reasons and others, Jesus’ words in this morning’s Gospel can be a bit of a challenge to appreciate.  I pray that the Holy Spirit helps us to see past the limiting assumptions of this world so that we recognize our slavery to sin.  And then that we are led to give thanks to God for the freedom we’ve been given in Jesus – acknowledging it is nothing we could ever achieve on our own.  We can’t work ourselves out of the problem of our sin and eventually free ourselves from its consequences and punishment.  We are set free by God’s grace alone in Jesus Christ. 

“God keep our land glorious and free,” goes a line from our national anthem.  It’s one that may help us appreciate why Jesus’ audience reacted as they did on that day long ago.  How could they be set free when they were not, at least to their way of thinking, captives of anyone or anything?  It’s a question that might easily come to our minds as well because we usually define freedom without any reference to sin.  We often see it as meaning not much more than living in a land where we enjoy rights and privileges that many other people on this planet do not.  We are free already.  Sometimes we may think of freedom in terms of material things like the freedom to buy whatever we can afford and then to charge the rest – although that’s a potentially dangerous freedom.  We may see it in terms of relationships where commitment to others is placed second to one’s personal wishes and perceived needs.   And sometimes we may see freedom in terms of life and time.  It’s my life and I’ll do what I want, when I want.  I’m free.  Isn’t that what retirement is all about?  I guess I’ll soon know. 

Around us society only encourages us to continue thinking about freedom along such lines.  There’s plenty of emphasis placed on one’s personal rights and freedoms – though sadly too often at the neglect of personal responsibility as well as any responsibility toward others.  People are free to believe whatever they want.  This may be most certainly true but that doesn’t mean people are always right in their beliefs or free to do whatever they want.  Through the ages humanity’s slavery to sin has continued to distort our vision and hamper our understanding of the need to be free, and how that happens only through Jesus.  And hence His talk of the truth, of slavery and freedom may seem a little confusing, somehow not quite applying to us 

Unwittingly we can be like the Pharisee in last week’s gospel who arrogantly stood in his pride, failing to recognize that he too, like the tax collector, was every bit a sinner before God.  We aren’t comfortable with the thought that we could be slaves to sin – surely not us.  We were baptized – though we fail so often to see that as God’s work.  We sat through confirmation classes for hours – some of them not so interesting.  We memorized stuff.  We’ve attended church and even volunteered, taught Sunday School, helped out at pot lucks – though eating doesn’t count.  We signed up for work bees and served on boards and committees.  We know we’re not perfect, but being slaves to sin – well that can seem just a little strong.

But is it?  Gratefully this morning, most of the people sitting around us, if not all of them, don’t know much about our repeated sins.  We’ve never shared with them our darker inner thoughts nor are we inclined to do so.  They don’t know the resentment that we may be holding against another, the jealousy we feel when others get recognition but we don’t, the things we’ve said or done to deliberately hurt others, the lust we’ve nursed in our hearts, the judgments we so readily make about other people – about their faith, their education, or family.  If we’re truly honest with ourselves we’d have to admit that our record looks pretty dismal before the Lord who calls for perfection – not just something close or mostly good.  We’d soon realize too that no matter how many times we’ve promised ourselves and the Lord to be different, to try harder to be more loving, more forgiving, more generous - yet we keep slipping and failing.  Sometimes it can seem like such a black hole from which no matter how hard we try we simply can’t escape.  When we dare to be honest – brutally honest with ourselves and the Lord, we have to agree with Jesus that we are slaves to sin, continually drawn to it day in and day out.  It is there in our thoughts, our words and actions, in our reluctance to help those we consider unworthy, and in the confidence we so foolishly and easily place in our accomplishments.  

There is only one solution to such slavery.  Someone has to pay to set you free.  At the old courthouse in St. Louis there used to be an iron ring firmly anchored into the steps to which slaves were chained and sold as late as 1857.  When they were bought they weren’t set free.  They were set to work. Jesus paid the price to set us free.   He kept the law perfectly, not in part or nearly but perfectly, something that we simply cannot do by our own reason or strength.  On trial for your sins and mine, He was found guilty by the evidence of our lives.  He accepted the verdict of heaven’s judge and was sentenced to death - a death He willingly died so that we might be spared, set free and live. 

Jesus said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free…So if the Son sets you free you will be free indeed.”  Such freedom is certainly not based on what we have done as we so clearly heard in the reading from Romans 3.  It is neither offered to us because of what good we may think we have done, nor is it denied to us because of the evil we have done or the good we have failed to do.   It is free by God’s grace and received through faith.  The slate is clean.  Our guilt is washed away by the blood of the Lamb.  That’s God’s promise today and through all your tomorrows and He keeps His word. 

Though you can buy a car, a bed, most furniture, computers or other electronics and make no payments for three months or more interest free, you know you still have to pay for it in the end and I suspect the company will somehow recover even the lost interest.  With the Lord there is no fine print – no hidden payment schedule, no penalties.  By His grace alone through faith in Jesus you are freed, freed from the accusations of satan, your conscience and the world around you.  Oh it did cost and cost a lot only you or I didn’t make a single payment.  Jesus paid it all.  For all this it is our privilege to serve Him in gratitude, dwelling in His word, drawing strength from Him as we struggle to love the poor and the rich, the unattractive and the beautiful, the young and the old, the educated and those not so, to love as He has loved us, continually returning to feast at His table and there be assured our sins are forgiven.

In life one’s actions can be motivated by a desire to get something or they can be done in response to what another has done for us, to say thank you without any prompting from mom, dad, grandma or grandpa.  Our response to this amazing grace of God is one of thanksgiving – not repayment.  It is one of grateful service, of sharing this incredible good news with all who as yet don’t know such truth – who struggle with the burden of guilt and who, striving to do the impossible are so often wearied and brought down by repeated failure.  This is the truth that frees us and in such Christ found freedom we are privileged to continue in His word, to hear it speak to us as we reflect on it, to let it guide our words, thoughts, and actions, and to know its comfort when we fail - as we do and will.  But fear not, for when the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed!  Amen.