Sermon for Saturday, February 24, 2024

Sermon for the Second Weekend in Lent  

Saturday, February 24, 2024

“While We Were Still Sinners”

Romans 5:1-11

Let us pray: Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen. (Psalm 19:14)

The text for our meditation this evening is the Epistle lesson and especially these words of Paul: “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

I would like to begin, though, with our other two readings for today. We have already heard, the last few weeks, what we hear in our Gospel lesson, Mark 8:27-38 - how Peter could be so strong in faith one moment and so weak the next - so that he was even rebuking Jesus for talking about suffering and dying - which was an essential part of Jesus’ saving work. Peter, and we still today, needed a warning about being “ashamed of Jesus and His Words, in this adulterous and sinful generation” - where far too many people want to make fun of Jesus and His Word, or just not listen to it.

Think also about our Old Testament lesson, Genesis 17:1-7,15-19, and Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation and our spiritual father, too. He certainly had great faith at times, especially when he was willing to sacrifice his son, Isaac, as we heard last week if that was really God’s will. It was not, of course, but was a prophecy of the fact that Jesus, the only Son of God the Father, would be willing to take up his cross and lose his life, so that we may be saved.

At other times, though, Abraham did not do so well. God had promised a great nation from him and a descendant, (our Lord Jesus), who would be a blessing to all nations. This promise was first given in Genesis 12 when Abram first came to what was to be the Promised Land. God had renewed this promise, again and again, but Abraham and Sarai got tired of waiting and took things into their own hands, and Abraham had a child, Ishmael, by his wife’s servant - and he did other things that were not pleasing to God.

In today’s Old Testament lesson, God gives the promise once again to Abraham, and we hear that Abraham fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, “Shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?” And Abraham said to God, “Oh that Ishmael might live before you.” God said, “No, but Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac.”

Some think that Abraham was laughing in joy at this promise, but others think that he sounded very skeptical that God could or would really give him a son now, at such an old age - as if it was another bad joke on him. In fact, Abraham even reminds God that he does have a son, Ishmael, already. Wouldn’t he do as the promised one? God clearly says “No!” and renews the promise again. Sarah will have this child and name him Isaac, which means “he laughs.”

In Genesis, Chapter 18, the Lord and two angels came again to Abraham and renewed the promise another time. This time, Sarah was in the tent listening, and this time she laughed to herself, saying, “After I am worn out, and (Abraham) is old, shall I have pleasure?” It sounds like a very skeptical laugh, and the Lord says to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, “Shall I now indeed bear a child, now that I am old?” And God said, “Is anything too hard for the Lord?” Sarah denied laughing, for she was afraid, but the Lord said, “You did laugh!" It sounds, then, as if both Abraham and Sarah struggled at times to believe the promise. Maybe it seemed too hard for the Lord, and it just wasn’t going to happen.

I looked at a complete concordance of the Bible, with every word mentioned, and found that there are only 39 references to laughing or laughter in the whole Bible. And more than half of those were negative laughter, where enemy nations or people were making fun of God’s people or of God himself, and God can only laugh in return at their invalid and foolish attacks.

Some of this laughter was directed against Jesus Himself. In an Old Testament prophecy, in Psalm 22:7, Jesus is pictured as saying, “All who see Me laugh me to scorn, they mock Me; they make mouths at Me; they wag their heads (saying): ‘He trusts in the Lord; let Him deliver Him; let Him rescue Him, for He delights in Him.” Almost those exact same words were said by the religious leaders and others, laughing at and ridiculing Jesus when He hung on the cross (Matthew 27:41-44). Earlier in His ministry, the mourners for a young girl who had died laughed at Jesus when He came to help her, a dead person. They ridiculed Jesus until He raised the girl from the dead (Matthew 9:23-26).

There is still much challenging of God and His Word and mockery of Christians and what we believe, to this very day, isn’t there? - in both doctrine and moral teachings and so much else. Just take one example. In this age of evolutionary theory, how many people would really agree with the prophet Jeremiah’s words, “Ah, Lord God, It is You Who have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and by Your outstretched arm! Nothing is too hard for you.”

We have had questioning and challenges even in our own Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod at times. It was 50 years ago this past week that there was a walkout of the majority of students and most of the faculty of one of our seminaries, in St. Louis, protesting the suspension of the seminary president, because he was allowing faculty to teach false ideas.

I lived through that time, though I had gone to the other seminary. I knew there were serious problems, but didn’t realize how serious they were until doing more reading in more recent times. There were professors and others who were questioning the infallibility of the Scriptures, whether God really created the earth and universe, whether Adam and Eve really existed, whether the miracle of the virgin birth of Jesus actually happened, the real presence of Christ in the Lord’s Supper, the bodily resurrection of Jesus (was the tomb really empty?), and if there will ever be a resurrection of the dead in the future. You take those basic Christian beliefs away and what do you have left of the Christian faith?

We thank the Lord that we had strong leaders at that time, who with the Lord’s guidance and His Word, got things straightened out and kept our Lutheran church conservative and Biblical. I am grateful for my pastor here at that time, Marcus Lang, and other people here who were involved in that battle for the truth. That was so important for me as a young pastor. Most of those who walked out in protest left our Lutheran church and went elsewhere with their false teachings. But such false ideas are still around, and we have to keep guarding against them.

At the same time, as we look at great leaders like Abraham and Peter and Paul, we realize from Scripture that they were far from perfect and had ups and downs, but as is said of Abraham, “He grew strong in his faith,” “he acquired strength” - and that was not from himself but from God and His Word and promises” (Romans 4:20).

It’s a growing faith for us, too, by God’s mercy. A man in the Gospel of Mark had a son possessed by an evil spirit. He asked Jesus for help if He could help his son. The man wasn’t sure about Jesus, but he finally said, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief” - my struggles that I still have (Mark 9:24). At another time Jesus was teaching His disciples about forgiving others, and they cried out to Jesus, “Increase our faith!” - as they knew how hard it was to forgive at times (Luke 17:5).

Even after the resurrection of Jesus, when He appeared to the disciples, and they could see Him alive, He still had to say to them, “Why do doubts arise in your hearts?” (Luke 24:38) and Luke writes, “They disbelieved for joy” (Luke 24:41). Joy and disbelief were mixed together. Maybe it just seemed to be too good to be true! And even later on, when the eleven disciples (minus Judas) went to Galilee, as Jesus had asked them to do, we read that “when they saw Him, they worshiped Him, but some doubted.” Some were still struggling with all this (Matthew 28:16-17).

What all this tells us is that we do not have to have great faith or perfect faith and understanding for God to pay attention to us and help us. Jesus kept coming to His disciples to help them. And our Epistle lesson for tonight tells us that He does the same for us. In Romans 5:6 we read, "While we were still weak (not strong), at the right time Christ died (not for the godly, since none of us are godly enough, on our own) Christ died for the ungodly…“ and in verse 8, “God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners (not holy people) Christ died for us.” Paul uses an even stronger word for us in verse 10. “While we were still (not friends, but) enemies of God, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son."

Maybe, Paul says, we might be persuaded to die for a good friend or maybe for our country, to help protect the blessings and freedoms we enjoy, but we are not likely to want to die for weak, ungodly, sinful enemies. Yet that is what Jesus has done for us, while we were and still are struggling sinners.

We are justified, counted just and right with God by the blood of Christ, shed on the cross for us, to take away the wrath and judgment of God for sin, by taking it all upon Himself and forgiving us. We are also saved, Paul says, by Jesus’ life, His resurrection from the dead, with certainty that death is not the end for us, but the gateway to eternal life.

And there’s not a word about what we have to do to receive all this. The opening verses of Romans, Chapter Five, tell us that by the grace of God, we receive the gift of faith and peace with God and access to Him in prayer and hope for our future, through the love of God poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, given to us in our baptism and through God’s Word and in the Lord’s Supper.

Even as we suffer and struggle at times, the Lord can work endurance and character and hope in us. And while we may not always have laughter, the end of our Epistle reading says that we can have joy, rejoicing in God always, through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Let us pray: Lord we believe! Help us by Your Spirit and Words of promise, with our struggles and questions, and may the peace of God, which surpasses all human understanding, keep our hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.
(Philippians 4:7)