Sunday, August 3, 2008 
Scripture reading: Romans 2: 17-29
17 But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast of your relation to God 18and know his will and determine what is best because you are instructed in the law, 19and if you are sure that you are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, 20a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth, 21you, then, that teach others, will you not teach yourself? While you preach against stealing, do you steal? 22You that forbid adultery, do you commit adultery? You that abhor idols, do you rob temples? 23You that boast in the law, do you dishonour God by breaking the law? 24For, as it is written, ‘The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.’
25 Circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law; but if you break the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. 26So, if those who are uncircumcised keep the requirements of the law, will not their uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? 27Then those who are physically uncircumcised but keep the law will condemn you that have the written code and circumcision but break the law. 28For a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is true circumcision something external and physical. 29Rather, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the heart—it is spiritual and not literal. Such a person receives praise not from others but from God.
Sermon Title: "SOME BIG IF'S" Sunday, August 3, 2008
PASTOR HUDSON: The Book of Romans is a book
that I think many of us find challenging because Paul
delves off into some things that are fairly detailed
that require us to engage in a thoughtful reflection.
Paul's writing style tends to be a little bit
cumbersome, so when you put those things together, I
think at least for some, the Book of Romans does not
garner the attention it really deserves.
I think it does deserve attention because the
Book of Romans could be described as Christianity 101.
In it are many of the foundational ideas and presuppositions
from Paul's understanding of what the church ought to
be. So over the next few weeks I want to spend some
time in Romans.
Today to catch what Paul is saying it would be
appropriate for you to understand that he is writing
to Christians. He begins with a series of
propositional “Ifs”. He says if you brag about your
relationship to God, if you're convinced that you are
a guide for the blind and a light for those in the
dark because you have the embodiment of knowledge and
truth, then you're assuming you are God's elect and
that's an example of arrogance. You are presupposing
you are unique and special apart from anyone else.
Now every one of these “Ifs” speak to the
kind of motivation, the kind of mental framework out
of which a person can operate when they understand
they have something very, very significant. When you
believe in your heart of hearts that God truly has
invested within you the way to eternal salvation and
the very best of what life ought to be, then the door
is open for you to assume some significant things.
One is that you are God's elect.
Paul's point is that when you brag you have to
understand there are consequences. As a church we
love all the good stuff about this serving Jesus
thing. We just find the consequences of it horribly
inconvenient. You see, once we have embraced all these
things, once we've said we've got a way to reach out
to the poor and the lost, and we can tell you the way
to Heaven, that God loves us and is right here in our
midst, once we affirm those things and proclaim them,
there are some consequences.
The consequences are we do more damage to the
church because we want to embrace what Christianity is
conceptually, but we don't want to follow through with
the obligations. When we demonstrate a total lack of
love for one another within the life of the
congregation it doesn't take people very long to
figure out that what we say about the church and what
we live about the church is totally at odds. When we
do not do that, it takes the world about 30 seconds to
figure out that the church is a wonderful place for
hypocrites.
The truth of the matter is to be a hypocrite we
would actually have to set out to intentionally do
that, and I think Paul understands that these
people weren't intentionally doing it. They really
thought they were doing the right thing. It is just
that what they had chosen to do didn't work.
How many of you have made life decisions that had
unintended consequences? We make wrong choices in
life. Paul is setting us up to spend chapters
discussing how to balance the grace of God in Jesus
Christ with the transformative effect it should have
on the way we live.
Let's go to the Jewish image for a moment.
Circumcision has value if you observe the law, but if
you break the law, you have become as those who have
not been circumcised. Circumcision and baptism had
the same value. There is an old sermon by John Wesley
in which he talked about the circumcision of the
heart. Paul right from this very passage will speak
to that. Circumcision is a matter of the heart, not
of the flesh.
John Wesley picked that up and used it to segue
to the idea of baptism. He actually was able to make
his British peers of the day realize that even though
they had been baptized as a young infant, the truth is
the way that they had lived and responded to that
baptism/circumcision had essentially sinned away any
of its benefits. A man and a woman is a Christian if
the baptism is a baptism of the heart by the spirit,
not by a written code.
It has always been understood that baptism is not
a formal act where we pull the lid off and dip up some
water and then toss it on someone and willfully they
are a believer. We understand that that is the
outward act that demonstrates that something has
happened deep within the heart, that is exactly what
Paul is saying.
Over the next several chapters Paul will
challenge us to think through just exactly what it
means to be Christian.
Put Paul in jail, and he'll baptize the
jailers. Now that kind of confidence is a part of the
picture that is neither black nor white, but rich in
color.
Is that the image of our Christianity? Is that
the kind of Christianity that when people look at us
they say, wow, look at the colors? Are you living
your life in color?
In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy
Spirit, Amen.