Sermon Roman 8:18-30 “Our Future”

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard
Pittsgrove Presbyterian Church
Sermon Roman 8:18-30 “Our Future”
March 29, 2020

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Today is the final Sunday in Lent and our third Sunday in our quarantine for the coronavirus.  So far during Lent, we have been looking at the sin that pervades our world and how God has decided to deal with it.  We have received from God the gift of justification with the forgiveness of sin and the promise of eternal life.  Through Jesus Christ, we have been adopted as children of God and filled with his love.  We have been sanctified by the Holy Spirit, freed from slavery to sin and enabled to grow more and more like Christ throughout our lifetimes.  And today we will look at the glorious future that awaits all of creation.  We will get to this, but first, let’s pray.

Lord God, we thank you for your covenant promises to forgive us and to help us lead the lives you created us to live.  We eagerly await your coming in glory to redeem the world.  As we wait, lessen our sufferings, hear our prayers and give us patience and endurance.  We pray this in the glorious name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Romans 8:18-30  18 I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.  19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God;  20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope  21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.  22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now;  23 and not only the creation but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.  24 For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen?  25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.  26 Likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.  27 And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.  28 We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.  29 For those whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family.  30 And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.

Before becoming a pastor I owned several businesses.  At one time I managed my father’s Baskin Robbins ice cream store.  I owned a chain of wicker furniture stores that sold furniture, baskets, and macramé from the Philippines.  I owned, with a partner, a technology business that sold computers and software.  And I owned an internet business that sold point of sale software all over the country.  All of these businesses were started with great fanfare and tremendous hope for success.  But now, all of these businesses have closed.  Businesses have a life cycle; they are born, grow up, change, and eventually die.

Everything in creation has a life cycle.  Everything has a beginning, a middle and an end.  This is clear evidence that we live in a fallen world.  When God created the world everything was good.  There was no decay or death.  All of creation was designed by the creator with an eternal warranty.  But one day the terms of the eternal guarantee were violated and the promise of God to protect creation was withdrawn.  We call this “the Fall” when humanity began deciding for itself what was right and what was wrong.  Because humanity had dominion over all of creation our sin resulted in the decay and death of everything.

We have seen in our look at Romans how God has dealt with the effects of the fall and sin in our lives. First, God forgave our sin and promised us eternal life.  This is called justification and occurred two thousand years ago on a cross in Jerusalem when Jesus died on a cross.  Then, God raised Jesus from the dead and exalted him to a position where Jesus could offer us God’s unlimited love as adopted children.  Then, God sent the Holy Spirit to fill us with his love and worked to make us holy, sanctified as we were created to be.

But what about the rest of creation, what has God done to redeem it?  As we look around our world we have to say that not much has been done.  Disease and death are still with us.  We still have earthquakes, mudslides, droughts, wildfires, tsunamis, hurricanes, tornadoes, gangs, murders, robberies, wars, and as we now see, viruses.  The list can go on and on.

God knows of our present suffering in this fallen world.  God knows of our stresses at work.  God knows how much we will miss our children and grandchildren who are so far away.  God knows about the financial pressures we are under.  God knows of our difficulty in changing to a new job or into retirement.  God is with us in the hospital and as we recuperate at home.  God also knows of the suffering of those whose homes and lives are destroyed by wildfires in the American southwest, the tornadoes in the Midwest and South, the earthquakes and mudslides in California, the tsunami in Southeast Asia and other disasters around the world especially the coronavirus.

When a business goes on a downward slope the managers want to stop the slide and return the business to growth.  One company helping businesses to do this is Lego.  Now you think that Lego is a company that makes toys that little kids use to build things and you would be right.  Lego is a huge toymaker and has the Legoland theme park in California.  But now Lego’s consultants help failing businesses to model different strategies for returning the business to health.  The Lego building blocks are used to create three-dimensional models, or “metaphorical abstractions”, of the business which can easily be changed to test different options.  The hope is that a company in trouble can test its options and find one they can put into practice.  For example, if the boss is crunching the spirits of the employees then a giant boss could be constructed from Legos stomping on a bunch of little people.  In other words, they flesh out on the model ideas and feelings so that the business knows what underlying problems are that need to be solved.

The prophet Ezekiel saw God using a similar strategy.  He saw God using something like Legos. Rather than using a box of Legos, God used a valley of dead bones.   And God showed us how he intends to recreate our fallen world.  God’s strategy was to take what has died and decayed and restore it by giving it new flesh and breathing into it new life.  All disease, death, decay, and destruction in the world would be used by God for the purpose of re-creating the world as it was originally created to be.  This process of re-creation has already begun and will be completed when Jesus returns.

God, in His infinite love, uses the church to begin the work of re-creation by dealing with the suffering that happens today.  The Presbyterian Disaster Assistance is available to help wherever disaster strikes and Christians need to respond.

When a cyclone struck Bangladesh killing 3000 people and destroying thousands of homes, Presbyterian Disaster Assistance worked with local agencies to provide emergency shelter and helped people to return to their homes and rebuild their lives.  PDA worked in Kenya to help people who are displaced by the post-election violence.   And PDA helped the people of New Orleans deal with the effects of Hurricane Katrina and recreate their lives.  The work of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance is made possible through the One Great Hour of Sharing, our Palm Sunday special offering.  This allows you to participate in God’s re-creation of the world.

God also uses our prayers to do the work of re-creation. God hears our prayers and listens to our suffering.  Even when we don’t know what to say, God hears us because the Holy Spirit can read our minds and our hearts and knows exactly what we need.  So there is no need to worry about if we have done enough or said enough because God understands what we need and will use us as his adopted people to help others.

God’s work of re-creation consists of displaying his glory to the world.  God’s glory was initially revealed when light pushed out darkness during the creation and was displayed in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.  This glory can be present in us through our faith in Jesus Christ.  We then glorify the church as we become more like Christ.   Through the work of the church, we bring God’s glory to the whole world.

But just as God’s glory was veiled on the cross it is sometimes today veiled by conflict and controversy within the church.  This makes the church a community of sufferers, like Christ, waiting for the final manifestation of God’s glory when we will be resurrected with Christ.  So we need to pray that in this life we are guided and strengthened by God’s glory and that God will give us patience and endurance until Christ comes again.

So long as Christ is in the church we have the hope of a future re-creation and of the experience of the full glory of God.  This future hope includes our resurrection when God will put flesh on our dead bones and will breathe the spirit of life into our lungs, just as God raised Jesus from the dead.  One day we will all be raised in a resurrection harvest and experience God’s amazing glory for ourselves.  The whole world will be freed from futility and corruption.  And Christ will return filling all of creation with God’s glory and power.  Let’s pray.

Lord Jesus, we wait patiently for your coming.  Come quickly with all of God’s glory and power.  Protect and comfort us as we wait for this glorious day.  And form us in your image so that we may display God’s glory to the world.  We pray this in your glorious name, Amen.

Sermon – Romans 5:1-11 “Adopted as the Children of God”

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard
Sermon – Romans 5:1-11 “Adopted as the Children of God”
Pittsgrove Presbyterian Church
March 22, 2020

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Order of Worship for March 22

Today is the fourth Sunday of Lent.  Lent is a season of 40 days, excluding Sundays, when we focus on our faith and relationship with God.  We reflected on the reality of sin and when we choose to decide for ourselves right from wrong, we set the bar lower and lower thus deluding ourselves into thinking that sin no longer exists.  Then we saw the great act of God, who freely forgave our sins and granted eternal life to all who believe in Jesus Christ.  Today we will see what it means to be adopted as God’s children.  Will you pray with me?

Father in heaven we come to you today as your forgiven children.  We thank you for this gift and ask that you allow us to enter into a relationship with you.  We ask that through Jesus Christ, who reigns with you in heaven, that your anger and justified wrath against us be pardoned.  And we ask that though the Holy Spirit your love be poured down upon us.  We ask these things so that as your children we may be shaped into your image as you created us, and be filled with your glory, Amen.

Romans 5:1-11  Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,  2 through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God.  3 And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,  4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,  5 and 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.  7 Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person-- though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die.  8 But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.  9 Much more surely then, now that we have been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from the wrath of God.  10 For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life.  11 But more than that, we even boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

God has freely granted to all the faithful the forgiveness of all sin and assurance of everlasting life.   This is a wonderful gift from a loving God.  Jesus’ death on the cross made all of this possible because his death paid for our sins and made our deaths unnecessary.  So even though we are mortal and will one day die we can be assured that one day we will rise from the dead, just as Jesus did, to live forever in the presence of God.  But since all of this takes place either far in the future or far away in heaven we can legitimately ask if there are any gifts that God gives us now while we are still alive.

The Israelites following Moses certainly had this question in mind.  They had already received the wonderful gift of freedom from slavery in Egypt.  They had watched as the waters of the Red Sea had been parted.  They had followed a pillar of smoke by day and a pillar of fire at night.  They knew that God loved them very much.  But when their problems multiplied and they were facing a lack of water they forgot all about all those things God had done for them and focused only on their pressing needs.  And God, as a loving parent, blessed them and provided for them with water coming out of a rock.

God invites us to be in a relationship with him as his children.  Of course, we have in one sense, always been in a relationship with God.  That relationship was characterized by our rebellion.  We turned our backs on God and hid.  But now God is offering a new kind of relationship, one based on peace and the health and well being of our bodies and our souls.  As with any relationship, our relationship with God needs frequent attention.

I have always had a hard time with relationships.  That is probably why I did not marry until I was nearly 50.  But now, with Grace, I see the importance of meeting people regularly and calling people more often on the telephone.  To form a relationship with God we need to meet with God and talk on a regular basis.  That is why we need to pray, worship, and read scripture regularly.  A daily practice of Bible reading and prayer is essential in developing the kind of relationship that God is offering us.  This relationship is made possible because God chose to come to us as the incarnate Jesus Christ to meet us where we are and experience what we experience.  So through Jesus Christ, we can have a wholesome relationship with our creator.

We see from this that Christianity is at its root relational.  We have a relationship with God and with each other.  The American church has often stressed the individual nature of faith and has told us that we can have a personal relationship with Christ.  This is true, but we should not forget that our faith is also based on our relationship with each other and with all of God’s people.  We worship God not in isolation but as part of a church.  And our particular church worships God not alone but with all the other churches on the planet.  Our faith is relational; we are all bound together by God’s love.

As we develop a relationship with God through Jesus Christ amazing things begin to happen.  We begin to change; we are transformed.  This happens gradually.  Every time you come to worship, every time you meditate on scripture, every time you pray a stitch is made in the fabric of your life.  You mature, over the years, into what you were created to be.  You see God created us in his image and likeness.  So as we mature as Christians we become more and more like God.

The apostle Paul called this “sharing in the glory of God.”  Usually, Paul tells us to be humble.  But as we form a relationship with God and become more like God, Paul wants us to boast and to proclaim to the entire world all that God has done for us.

This all sounds really great.  God not only forgives us but helps us to become more like God.  But we still experience all of the trials and tribulations of life.  Our health fails and we wind up in the hospital.  Our parents become old and frail and need our care.  We find it difficult to pay our mortgages and all the bills that come due each month.  Our children live in another part of the world and we can’t see them as often as we would like.  We have to adjust to living in a new land, learning a new language and culture.

In a world beset with difficulties, how does a relationship with God help us?  By nurturing a relationship with God with prayer and Bible study and worship we are able to endure these hardships and withstand the problems that befall us because we know that God is there with us.  And God will use our trials to refine us, improve us and make us into what we were created to be, shining examples of the glory of God.

The way God transforms us into his image is through the Holy Spirit, who enters into our hearts and fills us with God’s empowering love.  We experience this love in worship as the Holy Spirit comes upon us, as it did to the apostles on the Day of Pentecost, to fill us with God’s Spirit empowering us for the work God wants us to do.  We know, through the Holy Spirit, that our prayers will reach God and that God will answer us in our prayers, worship, and meditation on scripture.

So how do we know that God loves us and cares for us?  What other explanation would you have for God having his own son die for us so that our sins are forgiven and we are assured of eternal life?  God, most certainly, is motivated by his love for us.  We certainly do not deserve this love, but God loves us anyway.  And this love is the basis and power for the transformative relationship which we have been offered.

But we also get an even greater gift.  Death could not hold Jesus Christ in its grip.  Jesus was resurrected from the dead and now sits at the right hand of God interceding for us.  Satan still approaches God and accuses us by telling God all we have done, all of our sins, and recommending that God give us what we really deserve.  With such a formidable opponent we have little hope of escaping God’s wrath.  But with Jesus Christ, our defender before God in heaven, we will not be punished.  We escape from God’s wrath, saved by our savior.

But there is even a greater gift from God than even his love and forgiveness.  We are given the right to boast, to tell others the glorious things God has done for us.  We can declare to the world that Jesus Christ is our Lord and through him, we have been reconciled with our creator and blessed with God’s love.  We can boast because our new relationship with God is not of our own doing, but we have a restored relationship with God because of God’s gift of Jesus Christ.

We have been adopted as God’s children.  We are invited to have a wholesome relationship with our creator through his son, Jesus Christ.  God’s love is poured into us through the Holy Spirit, shaping us into God’s very image and glory.  The risen Jesus Christ intercedes on our behalf saving us from the wrath of God.  And we can shout to the world about all the great things God has done for us.  Let’s pray.

Lord Jesus, we thank you for all your gifts:  for the gift of the Holy Spirit who brings to us God’s love, for the gift of a restored relationship with the Father, and for your intercession on our behalf before the throne of God saving us from God's wrath.  We thank you and bless you and glorify you, our Lord and Savior. Amen.

Sermon – Psalm 91 – God is Your Refuge

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard
Pittsgrove Presbyterian Church
Sermon – Psalm 91 – God is Your Refuge
March 15, 2020

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March 15 Bulletin Insert

March 15 Bulletin

Today, we are worshiping in our homes because of the Coronavirus.   Fears of infecting members of the congregation with this disease have forced us to cancel worship at the church today and next Sunday.   The session and I urge you to stay at home and avoid this virus.  We do not want you to get sick.   We do want you to worship God at home.   And so we are providing you, electronically, our weekly bulletin and this meditation.   Please use these to worship God in your home with your family.

Today we will see that whatever happens to us in this life we can trust God who is our refuge, our fortress in times of trouble.  We will get to this, but first, let's pray. 

“Grant unto us, O Lord, to be occupied in the mysteries of thy heavenly wisdom, with true progress in piety, to thy glory and our own edification. Amen.” (John Calvin)

According to the church father, Athanasius, “If you desire to establish yourself and others in devotion, to know what confidence is to be reposed in God, and what makes the mind fearless, you will praise God by reciting the 91st Psalm”.

Listen to the good news from the psalmist.

Psalm 91: 1 Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.  2 I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.”

The psalmist wants us to think of God as a fortress, a refuge.  Whenever you experience trouble, whenever you have problems, whenever you can't pay your bills, whenever your relationships are on the rocks, whenever your health fails, there is one place you can turn.  You can turn to God.  God won't prevent all your problems.  There is just too much sin in the world for that.  But God will comfort and strengthen you in your difficulties if you turn to him. 

Once I was planning a memorial service for a family.  They didn't know God and didn't go to church.  They were filled with grief and had no idea what to do about it.  Prayer was an alien concept for them.  But I prayed with them and they seemed to appreciate it.  And I designed a memorial service that would explain to them the benefits of knowing Christ.  My hope was that through this they would find Christ who would be a refuge for them in times of trouble.

We are so privileged as Christians to worship God every Sunday and pray every day so that when we experience the loss of a loved one, or the loss of a job, or a loss of our health, our relationship with God will sustain us.  God is our refuge.  Here is how the psalmist put it.

3 Surely he will save you
    from the fowler’s snare
    and from the deadly pestilence.
4 He will cover you with his feathers,
    and under his wings you will find refuge;
    his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
5 You will not fear the terror of night,
    nor the arrow that flies by day,
6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,
    nor the plague that destroys at midday.
7 A thousand may fall at your side,
    ten thousand at your right hand,
    but it will not come near you.

I was once talking with a young couple preparing for marriage.  The woman had grown up in a Presbyterian church.  She went to church every Sunday and prayed every day.  But she was concerned about her future husband.  He grew up feeling forced to attend church with his family.  Church was not a part of his adult life and he rarely prayed.  But he knew about his future wife's faith and was willing to go with her to church on Sundays.  He wanted to pray more, but he was uncertain about how to begin having a more fervent prayer life.  I suggested that the two of them could pray together before each meal they shared.  The woman's family had done this when she was growing up.  And the man agreed that this would be a good thing to do.  My prayer is that God will always be a refuge for them, somewhere they can go whenever they experience trouble.  Listen again to the psalmist.

9 If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,”
    and you make the Most High your dwelling,
10 no harm will overtake you,
    no disaster will come near your tent.
11 For he will command his angels concerning you
    to guard you in all your ways;
12 they will lift you up in their hands,
    so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.

Is this true?  Can we jump off the roof of the church with the assurance that angels will catch us?  Are the words “The Lord is my refuge” a magical incantation that will protect you from all harm?  There was one Bible scholar who interpreted Psalm 91 this way.  His name was Satan, and he had a discussion about this psalm with Jesus.  Here is what he said. 

Luke 4:9 The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down from here. 10 For it is written: “‘He will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully; 11 they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’”

So is this true?  Will God prevent all harm regardless of what we do?  I think not.  That would be a very foolish thing to think.  And Jesus responded to Satan's interpretation of Psalm 91 this way. 

Luke 4:12 Jesus answered, “It is said: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

God will protect you from evil, but not from your own stupidity.  I once heard about a young woman who was learning to drive.  She was a good girl and very active in her church.  Her parents put her in a driver education class and gave her plenty of practice driving the family car under their supervision.  On her sixteenth birthday she got her driver's license and her parents gave her a used car.  For the next few months, God protected her as she drove to and from school.  But then one day she was at a friend's house.  The friend was drinking beer and offered her some.  After a couple of hours of drinking together, they decided to go for a ride.   The young woman started driving recklessly.  Her car was going too fast around a curve and overturned in a ditch.  Both girls were hurt. 

Why didn't God protect them from the accident?  God does protect us from the consequences of sin.  But we should not test his protection because testing God is itself a sin.   And taking God for granted is never a good idea.  God does not always protect us from ourselves.  So what should we do?  We should avoid sin and rest in the assurance that God is our refuge when trouble arises.  God will be in the hospital room after an accident.  God will be with you in physical therapy.  God will be there as you recover at home because God is faithful and loves you.  Let's go back to the psalmist.

14 “Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;
    I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
15 He will call on me, and I will answer him;
    I will be with him in trouble,
    I will deliver him and honor him.
16 With long life I will satisfy him
    and show him my salvation.”

I once visited a woman in a nursing home.  It had been a long journey for Dora since her strokes.  But throughout the healing process, God was with her.  Her brain was slowly recovering.  She not only remembered who I was, she actually seemed like the old Dora.  We talked about the day when she could be with us once again in worship.  And I thanked God that he has been with Dora comforting her, healing her, and being her refuge.

The promise of scripture is that the God you worship will be with you always.  So I urge all of you to continue deepening your relationship with God because this relationship is your refuge in troubled times.  It is very important that you worship every Sunday.   The protestant reformers told us that we should also worship in our homes during the week.   Through these practices, your faith will grow.  This faith will sustain you in times of trouble.  You will then experience the presence of God as your refuge.  Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, our refuge in times of trouble, we ask for your blessing during this time of fear for the coronavirus.   Protect us from infection.   Heal us if we become sick.  Keep us from infecting others.   Bless our church as we worship at home this Sunday and next.  And then, when it is safe, bring us together to worship you in church.  This we pray in Jesus’ name.   Amen.

Sermon – Romans 4:1-5, 13-17 “Justified by Faith”

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard
Sermon – Romans 4:1-5, 13-17 “Justified by Faith”
Pittsgrove Presbyterian Church
March 8, 2020

Last week we began the Lenten Season by looking at the doctrine of Original Sin.  We saw that our desire to decide for ourselves right from wrong allows us to set the bar lower and lower so that we mistakenly think that sin is out of our lives.  But, no matter what we might think, sin is still with us and something must be done about it.  We have no ability to do anything about sin.  So today we will look at what God has done to rectify this situation we find ourselves in.  We will get to this, but first, let’s pray.

Lord God, we have messed up our lives through sin.  Once again we bow before you in confession and plead for forgiveness.  We thank you for the free gift of our salvation through our faith in Jesus Christ.  Open our ears and our hearts today to hear the message you have for us.  In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.

Romans 4:1-5  NRS Romans 4:1 What then are we to say was gained by Abraham, our ancestor according to the flesh?  2 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.  3 For what does the scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness."  4 Now to one who works, wages are not reckoned as a gift but as something due.  5 But to one who without works trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith is reckoned as righteousness.

Romans 4:13-17   13 For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith.  14 If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void.  15 For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.  16 For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us,  17 as it is written, "I have made you the father of many nations")-- in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.

God promised to bless Abraham.  The promise was huge. Abraham’s children would be more numerous than all the stars in heaven or all the grains of sand in the sea.  They would form a great nation that would extend from the Red Sea to the River Euphrates and eventually around the world.  But the question that has perplexed scholars for thousands of years was:  Why did God make this promise to Abraham; why was Abraham chosen?

One of the ancient biblical scholars who tackled this issue was a rabbi named Yeshua ben Eleazar ben Sirach who wrote in the second century before Christ.  His book of instruction was well known by Jewish and Christian writers during the New Testament period.  The Apostle Paul would have been very familiar with his writings.  Ben Sirach said that the reason Abraham received this promise of a blessing from God was that Abraham had kept the law of the Most High God.  Abraham had obeyed God’s commands and decrees.  And thus he was a role model for the faithful.  If we obey God’s law then God will bless us too, or, put another way, good things happen to good people.

This is what the apostle Paul was taught as a Jew and a rising Pharisee.  But as Paul experienced God’s blessings for himself he realized that ben Sirach’s connection of law and blessing was flawed.  Paul was as lawless as they come.  He thought he was keeping the law as a good Pharisee but realized later that this had been a rationalization.  He had just set the bar lower.  His behavior, of persecuting Christians and permitting the stoning of Stephen, was evil.  Paul realized that he had been a great sinner.  And even though he was one of the worst sinners of his time, God blessed him richly.

As Paul searched the scripture he saw that Abraham too was a sinner.  Soon after arriving in Canaan with his wife Sarah a great drought occurred and they were forced to flee to Egypt.  Abraham convinced Sarah to pretend to be his sister and traded her to Pharaoh for sheep, oxen, donkeys, and slaves.  Pimping out your wife is peculiar behavior for someone who supposedly always obeys God’s law.

Paul realized that God blessed Abraham not because of Abraham's behavior.  Paul also realized that God had not provided the law to his people until the time of Moses, many generations after Abraham.  There was no way that Abraham could have kept God’s law because the law did not yet exist.  So God’s blessing of Abraham could have nothing to do with obeying the law.

So if Abraham’s behavior did not merit God’s blessing and if there was no law to keep why did God bless Abraham?  Paul searched scripture and found this.

Genesis 15:6 And he (Abraham) believed the Lord, and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness.

Paul realized that righteousness must be a free gift from God.  Abraham, obviously, had done nothing to deserve a promise of great blessing, and neither had Paul.  But both of them had been blessed by God.  The only explanation was that this blessing was a free gift from God, called grace.

  There was one thing that both Abraham and Paul had in abundance.  They both had ample portions of faith in God.  And faith was the reason God had blessed Abraham.  The reason God blessed Abraham was because of Abraham’s faith.  Paul realized that God would bless the faithful even if they were ungodly.  This became an important doctrine in the church called justification by faith through grace.

You will remember from last week that the reason we are blocked from eating the tree of life is because of sin.  But God wants us back in the garden eating from the tree of life.  So God forgives our sins and gives us eternal life as a free gift.  And we receive this free gift through our faith in Jesus Christ.

Justification, God’s blessing of the ungodly, has three important aspects.  First, it is provided to us by our creator who loves us, forgives us and offers us eternal life.  Second, it is a free gift with no cost to the believer.  And third, the only thing you have to do is to have faith in Jesus Christ.

In the 16th century, the church was divided by arguments over what “justification” meant.  This period was called the Protestant Reformation and is the reason why we have so many different churches today.  Some churches emphasized the fact that justification comes from God.  Others emphasized the fact that justification is a free gift.  And still, others emphasized the fact that faith is necessary.

The Roman Catholics have focused on the need to be faithful.  They ask, “What does it mean to be a faithful person?  The Bible teaches us that being faithful is not just believing something in your head.  It goes beyond that to having a way of life that comes from a relationship with Jesus.  And so they argue that justification requires living a faithful life as a follower of Jesus Christ.

 But if the need to be faithful is emphasized too much it begins to look like justification is no longer a free gift.  If faith becomes something we do to earn justification then justification is no longer free.  So we have to be careful not to overemphasize the working out of our faith as a part of justification, and accept this blessing from God as a free gift.

The Lutherans have focused on the fact that justification comes from God as a free gift of God’s grace.  They asked, “How do we find a gracious God?”  The Bible teaches us that we don’t find God at all.  Rather God finds us.  God sent his own Son into the world to save us. There is nothing that we have to do.  The Lutheran slogan, “by faith alone”, indicates that there is nothing that we do, no law to keep, to earn God’s blessing.  God’s blessing of the ungodly with forgiveness of sins and eternal life is a free gift from a loving God.

But if the idea of a free gift is emphasized too much it begins to look like justification requires no behavioral change at all.  We think that we can keep on sinning confident that God will keep on forgiving us.  But the Bible is clear we must not keep on sinning.  Repentance and amendment of life are important.  So we must be careful not to overemphasize the importance of the free gift as part of justification, and realize our obligations as faithful people.

We Presbyterians and other Reformed churches have focused not on our faithfulness nor on the free gift.   We focus on our sovereign God who decided to bless the ungodly with forgiveness of sin and eternal life.  Our response to God’s free gift of justification is to live gratefully according to God’s law.  That is why we are using the Ten Commandments as our thankful response to God’s gift of forgiveness in our liturgy during Lent.  God alone chooses who will be blessed.  As faithful people, we joyously thank God for his blessings with our obedience.

But if God has already chosen who will be blessed then why is faith important? Why should we evangelize nonbelievers and demand conversion and faith before someone can receive God’s blessings if there is nothing they have to do?  An overemphasis on God’s choice minimizes our need to choose God and be faithful.  So we must be careful not to overemphasize the fact that it is God who justifies us and remember that we must believe in Jesus Christ and follow him as Lord.

So the doctrine of justification rests on a three-legged stool.  The first leg stands on the choice of God to forgive us.  The second leg is that faith in Jesus Christ is required.   And the third leg is that this blessing from God is a free give for which we respond with grateful obedience.  All three legs are important and have to be balanced for us to have a correct understanding of the doctrine of justification, that God blesses the ungodly.  In other words, our loving God chose us, to be faithful and receive, as a free gift of grace, our blessing of forgiveness of sin and eternal life.  John put it so elegantly this way: 

John 3:16  "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

If you believe that Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior and that he was raised from the dead, then you can be assured that God will bless you with the forgiveness of sin and eternal life.  I urge you now to obey God’s commandments as your thankful response for this free gift.

If you do not accept  Jesus Christ as your Lord and believe in his resurrection,  I cannot give you the assurance that God will bless you.  If you would like to know that your sins are forgiven and that you will enjoy eternal life I invite you to pray asking God for the gift of faith which will lead to forgiveness of sin and eternal life.

Justification, God's blessing of the ungodly, is available to all who have faith in his Son, Jesus Christ.  It comes to us from God as a free gift.  In gratitude let us follow Jesus Christ as Lord of our lives.   Let’s pray.

Heavenly Father, I ask for the gift of faith in your son, be given to everyone in this congregation.   For all who gladly receive this wonderful gift I ask for your blessing of forgiveness of sin and the promise of eternal life.   Help us all to gratefully respond to this wonderful gift by joyously obeying your holy law.   In Jesus’ name, we pray.   Amen.

Sermon Romans 5:12-19 “Original Sin”

Rev. Jeffrey T. Howard
Sermon Romans 5:12-19 “Original Sin”
Pittsgrove Presbyterian Church
March 1, 2020

This morning we have arrived at the first Sunday of Lent.  Lent is an ancient practice of the church.  Beginning in the 2nd century, Christians spent two or three days fasting in preparation for Easter.  By the 4th century, this had developed into a forty-day season remembering the 40 days of rain in Noah’s time, the 40 years the Israelites spent in the wilderness, and the 40 days of the temptation of Christ in the wilderness.  This was a time of preparation for new Christians before baptism on Easter, and it encouraged Christians to reflect on their own baptismal vows.  In the centuries that followed Christians were encouraged during Lent to consider their sin and repentance in anticipation of Christ’s suffering on the cross.   Today we consider sin, but first, let’s pray.

Father in heaven we come to you this day with penitent hearts and a desire to repent.  We ask that you forgive our sins and restore us to your presence.  We pray this in the name of our savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Romans 5:12-19 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned— 13 sin was indeed in the world before the law, but sin is not reckoned when there is no law. 14 Yet death exercised dominion from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sins were not like the transgression of Adam, who is a type of the one who was to come.

15 But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died through the one man’s trespass, much more surely have the grace of God and the free gift in the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for the many. 16 And the free gift is not like the effect of the one man’s sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brings justification. 17 If, because of the one man’s trespass, death exercised dominion through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness exercise dominion in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

18 Therefore just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all. 19 For just as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.

We live in a free country.  Our freedom is given to us by God and protected by our Constitution and Bill of Rights.  We have the freedom to speak our minds even if the government does not like what we say.  We have the freedom to assemble without the government’s interference.  And we have the freedom to worship God. 

We are free because our creator made us free people.  We were placed in a garden called Eden with the freedom to go where we wanted and eat what we wanted.  God created us, provided for us, cared for us, and loved us.  In this paradise, God intended that we live in the presence of the creator forever.  Our freedom was almost unlimited. 

We enjoy our freedoms, but as we grow older and make choices our options begin to disappear.   As a youth, you had numerous options and things you wanted to do.  Your potential was unlimited.  But as you grew older you began to realize that the freedom you once had to be anything you wanted to be had turned into: you are what you are.  Your freedom to marry anyone you want is now limited to the one you are married to.  The freedom to do anything you want to do is now limited by the education and career choices you have made.  The longer we live the more limited is our freedom.     

There was a tree in the center of the Garden of Eden.  One of the freedoms we enjoyed in the Garden of Eden was that we could choose to eat from this tree.  Of course, God told us “Don’t eat it!”, but we still had the choice.  We don’t know much about this tree.  We know that it looked nice and that its fruit was delicious.  We also know that our creator warned us about this tree.  God said that if we eat from this tree we will die.

We know that this tree was called “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil”. Now here is a question for you.  What do you think it would mean to eat from a tree called “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil”?  I suspect that if someone chose to eat from a tree with that name that person would want to decide herself or himself what was good and what was evil.  Eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil means that we, humanity, will decide for ourselves issues of right and wrong.  Not eating from the tree means that we let God decide for us.  Which will we choose?  Would we want to decide for ourselves what is good and what is evil?  Or would we let God make this decision for us? 

We know the decision all of humanity has made because the consequences are obvious.  All of us have chosen to decide for ourselves what is good and what is evil.  We know this because the consequence of that choice is death and all of us will die.  Death is proof that all of humanity has chosen to defy God and eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

So, now that we have chosen to decide for ourselves what is good and what is evil what should we do?  Our attempt to get ourselves out of this mess is to try  do good and not do evil.  But since our sin was deciding for ourselves what good is how could this help us?  We simply set the bar low enough that anything we do is good. You can see this at work in our society today; fewer and fewer things are called evil.  Today, the greatest virtue is to be tolerant of those practices which we once considered to be evil.  And God does not figure in these debates at all.

Sometime humanity will eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil by forming a committee to study a problem and make a decision.  Our colleges train people in ethics who sit on these committees and vote on whether something is good or evil.  Some of the hot button ethical debates going on today deal with abortion, transgenderism, and socialism.  You probably have your own ideas about each of these and feel at least somewhat qualified to decide what is good and what is evil.  We all eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil from time to time.  We think that it is our right to decide for ourselves what is right and what is wrong.  Sadly, the consequence of making these decisions, not the decisions themselves, but our choice to make the decisions ourselves results in death.

We can’t go back into the Garden of Eden and let God decide the difference between good and evil for us.  It is too late.  The choice has already been made.  Humanity has already eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  We have tasted the fruit that is so pleasant to look at and so delicious to eat.  The temptation to decide for ourselves what is right and what is wrong is just overwhelming.  And therefore the consequences are assured.  We will die.  There is no going back.

Throughout history, only one person even chose not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  Only one person ever resisted the temptation to decide for himself what is right and what is wrong.  Only one person allowed God to make these decisions.  Only one person was fully obedient.  That person was Jesus Christ.

Our creator God placed Jesus not in a garden but in a wilderness.  There was nothing there to eat or drink for 40 days.  Jesus was tempted to decide for himself whether turning stones into bread was good or evil.  He was tempted to decide for himself whether jumping off the temple was right or wrong.  And he was tempted to decide for himself whether or not worshiping Satan was good.  Jesus responded to each of these temptations by saying that only God can decide what is right and what is wrong.  Jesus refused to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  Because of this decision, Jesus did not suffer the consequence that plagues the rest of humanity.  Jesus Christ was not sentenced to everlasting death but was chosen by God for eternal life.

So is there any hope for us who have chosen to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?  Our only hope is that the obedience of one man, Jesus Christ, is greater than the disobedience of all of the rest of us combined.  Here is the good news.  It is!  Jesus’ decision to allow God to determine what is right and what is wrong was sufficient to restore us to a right relationship with God and eliminate the calamitous consequence of our choice to make these decisions ourselves.  By being obedient to God, Jesus reversed the effects of our disobedience and the condemnation of death has been abolished. We call this reversal “grace”.  Grace means that God entered the world to reverse the harmful effects of what we have done. The victory over death is won.

You see there was a second tree in the Garden of Eden.  Presumably, this tree was also beautiful to look at and its fruit was delicious to eat.  The name of this tree was “the tree of life”.  Anyone who eats of the tree of life will live forever.  When we chose to eat from the other tree our pathway to the tree of life was blocked.  And without the nourishing fruit of the tree of life, we experience mortality and death.  But in Jesus Christ, the pathway to the tree of life was restored.  This restoration was a free gift from our creator God who wants us, really wants us to live together with him forever.

By giving us access again to the tree of life God has given us the freedom to choose.  It is not the old freedom to choose what is right and what is wrong because that choice leads to death.  The new freedom that we are given in Christ is to choose God.  And we are free to choose God because God has chosen us first.  God chose us to be the beneficiaries of Christ’s obedience.  So even though we are disobedient and still eat from that other tree, Christ’s obedience to God is transferred to us as if we were the obedient ones.  Christ is handing us the fruit of the tree of life as a free gift.

So when you look in the mirror tomorrow morning remember that you are not the product of all the choices you have made.  Rather you have unlimited potential with an infinite number of options for your life because in Christ your past choices are wiped clean and you can choose to follow him into eternal life.   Christ gives you the freedom to love and follow God forever.  Let’s pray.

Heavenly Father, we confess that we decide for ourselves what is good and what is evil.   This decision has led us to mortality and death.   But we put our faith in Christ Jesus, who obediently lets you decide what is right and what is wrong.   And we thank you for transferring his righteousness to us so that the penalty of death is annulled, our sins are forgiven, and we will spend eternity with you.   Amen.