SERMON FOR JULY 26, 2020          TEXT: ROMANS 8:31-39

          Oh, these wonderful, mysterious parables: the kingdom of heaven is like a tiny mustard seed that becomes a mighty tree; like yeast that a woman mixes in with three measures of flour. The kingdom of heaven is like a person coming unawares upon a great treasure and selling all she has to buy the field where it lies hidden, or a merchant eagerly liquidating all his stock so he can possess one perfect pearl. The extravagant growth of seed to a veritable bird sanctuary, of bread rising up over the sides of the pan. The determined action of those who recognize the kingdom when it is within reach.    They set their sights on making it their own and do not count the cost. These parables invite us to go and do likewise.

          Then comes the final one in the series: “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad. So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Mathew 13:47-50). Here Jesus utters the same warning of anguish, fury and despair, that concluded last Sunday’s Gospel reading, the parable of the wheat and the tares. “Let anyone with ears listen!” he proclaims.

          This week the urgency and violence of his words hit me. I found myself pricking up my ears and reacting to the threat — this means you. I consider myself a generally decent, nice person, and I am, in the rather conventional, middle class way I was brought up to be. Some days I think it is getting easier all the time to look good when compared to the appalling behavior displayed in the conduct of our nation’s public life. On the measuring stick of morality, common decency stands out as exceptional when the median is corruption.

          But the ethics of discipleship are as extravagant and mysterious as the kingdom of heaven revealed in these parables. Jesus sums it up in this simple, confounding statement, “Be perfect therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). Speaking for myself, if that’s the requirement, I’m screwed. I often know the right things to do, and not infrequently I do them. But I artfully avoid some demands that come my way and actively resent others. I can feel the threads of my soul breaking under the weight, weakened by selfishness and sloth, but also shredded by exhaustion and helplessness. I’m only human, and that is the human condition.

          Among the pictures coming out of Portland, Oregon, this week was one of the wall of moms who gathered to shield their children and the protesting children of others. The yellow-shirted mothers, dutifully wearing their masks, faced the unidentified federal law enforcement personnel occupying their city. In the middle of the line stood a short, stolid woman holding a sign that read, “I am so disappointed in you,” signed “Mom”. I imagined seeing those words on judgment day, as a prelude to the weeping and gnashing of teeth to follow. I had a moment of panic, wondering if there is any way out of this grind. The older I get, the less time and energy I have to up my game. And I have too much experience to count on any semblance of perfection in our Heavenly Father’s league.

          The passage we just heard from Romans 8 is a standard text for funerals. I have read it over the open graves of people I had never met, about whose relationship to Jesus, or lack thereof, I had no direct experience. Often grieving relatives would insist that, although their deceased loved one hadn’t been a church goer, he was a good person, certainly good enough, they longed to believe, to avoid the weeping and gnashing of teeth option. I couldn’t make any promises on the basis of their assurances, not because I couldn’t verify their secondhand testimony, but because at this moment it was beside the point. We were not there to build a case for our client; we were there to hear the verdict: “It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us.”

          This stirring proclamation upholds us in the face of death to be sure. Yet Paul intended it for those in the midst of life, people like you and me, facing weariness and fear and the constant frustration of not doing the good we want but falling prey to the sin that dwells within. Luther, who waged a take-no-prisoners war against good works as the means of salvation, was roundly condemned for letting people off the ethical hook. Without the prospect of unwelcome consequences, people will not exert themselves in the faith, his critics objected. They won’t hear the Word and bear good fruit. They’ll settle for riding on the coattails of a cheap grace, sliding by on a gentleman’s C in the school of discipleship. But Luther wasn’t plagued by a lack of discipline. He was haunted by the prospect of God’s judgment, the weeping and gnashing of teeth at the end of time. He was paralyzed by despair. “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” cries St. Paul (Romans 7:24). The same question tormented Luther. He found the pearl of priceless worth in God’s unfailing love. “If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else?” The answer is a resounding “yes”.

          If you’re a texter, you know about GIFs. These are images, sayings, and pictures, including shots from movies and TV shows, that you can embed in a text. For example, instead of writing a message I often send my daughter a    picture of Winnie the Pooh dancing or that great scene from Dumbo where mama elephant rocks her big-eared little one in her trunk. But there is one particular GIF I use on the occasions when Lucy is feeling discouraged or disappointed in herself or fearing my disapproval when we fall short of being who we want to be for one another. It is the scene from the movie “Love Actually,” where one character offers to another a sign saying, “To me you are perfect.” This week I put that alongside the Portland mom’s “I am so disappointed in you.” I imagine God holding up both, because God knows who we are and who we are becoming and cherishes our lives. “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor ruler, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Amen.