Is there some other Gospel?

Read: John 8:31-36

 

Reformation Sunday - October 27, 2013

The Rev. Kenneth R. Elkin

 

Today is Reformation Sunday which we can regard in a variety of ways.

Sometimes it has been used as Lutheran triumphalism; we're better than anyone else...we have something no one else has.

That doesn't ring true.

Sometimes it has been used as an historical reminder of the breaking apart of the church in the16^th century,

--with sadness that it was necessary, --with wistfulness that it could be healed someday,

      --or with gruff determination that it is  to be  permanent.

But a history lesson is not sufficient for us this morning.

The questions are rather about what these scriptures are doing to us.

What are they demanding of us today, not just back in the 16^th or in any other century.

 

Remember Paul's advice to Timothy that we heard as the Second Lesson last Sunday: For the time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths.

 

Is the story of Jesus true?

Is it sufficient for us?

Is it adequate for these troubled and complicated times?

Does it need to be supplemented or superseded by some other story, some other person, or a different Savior?

 

We are well aware that a very small percentage of the persons who report the news to us want to have anything to do with the church of Jesus Christ.

We have watched the glamorous movie stars who dabble in Scientology or Buddhism, or astrology and crystals.

We ought to be dismayed by the claims of radical Muslims who clearly say “convert to Islam or we will kill you.”

 

Are these challenges new?

Is this a different situation than the early church faced?

And the answer is No.

It may be dressed differently, but it is exactly the same sorts of problems that the church has faced from the very beginning.

Paul warns the Corinthians to watch out for those who will proclaim another gospel than what he had given to them. (2C11:3-5)

Paul admonishes the Galatians:

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to another Gospel – not that there is a different gospel, but there are some who are confusing you and want to pervert the Gospel of Christ. (Gal 1:6-8)

 

The old, old problems of “Who is this Jesus and what has he to do with me?” are very much alive and at work these days.

The major problem in front of us is:

Shall we talk about divine redemption or something quite different, divine acceptance?

 

“Jesus, save me!” is the ancient plea.

The basic problem in creation is human sin, and Jesus' action in the cross and resurrection is God's solution to it.

God confronts us in our sinfulness; God forgives us; God raises us to new life in Christ Jesus.

Thereafter our whole life consists of turning to that truth again and again, knowing that we mess up our lives constantly, but that God is determined to reach us, to transform us, to save us.

That is the faith to which the scriptures call us every day across the millennia, divine redemption.

 

The current version of the old heresies is about “divine acceptance”.

In this view, sin is not within us, but is in the  oppressive structures of society that have excluded people from being fully accepted in their “created goodness.”

We don't have to change anything about ourselves. 

God loves us just as we are.

In this world-view, there is no wrath, no condemnation for sinners, no judgment.

The cross is not needed; it is unimportant.

Love means an uncritical acceptance of whoever shows up and whatever they are saying or doing.

This view rejects the idea of a “tough love” that calls us to account, which bids us to take up our cross and to wrestle with what it means to follow Jesus to Calvary.

In this kind of gospel, love is not about repentance for sin, but a celebration of acceptance of ourselves just the way we are because God loves us as we are.

 

This other gospel should make us queasy since it is so foreign to what we have been taught in scripture and through the tradition of the church.

Unfortunately it has been making great inroads in the church in recent years, with disastrous results.

Here are samples:

(1)some apologize for having missionaries in other lands, saying that they have their own path to God and who are we to suggest something different.

But the rapidly growing churches who live under persecution in Africa do not feel that way; they are even sending some missionaries to the US these days.

(2)some can't think or talk clearly and Biblically about human sexuality, and the church is terribly divided.

(3)some find it so difficult to talk about our faith with friends and neighbors, having lost both the language and the nerve to do so.

(4)some treat the Bible as irrelevant in decisions about what is right and true and good and useful, rather than being the basis and ground from which we work.

(5)some twist Baptism into our complete  acceptance by God rather than a dying and rising with Christ,

(6)some have been claiming that Jesus is not God's unique way of reaching out to us, but only one among many ways.

 

As has often been the case when the church goes off the track, this other gospel uses the same language we have known, but makes up new meanings for the words.

Baptism, forgiveness, love, freedom, gospel ...all of them have been twisted into something different.

It has been portrayed as a healthy diversity of hearing lots of voices.

Rather, let us be clear that we are engaged in a life and death struggle for the church itself.

Paul puts it very strongly to the Galatians:

Even if we or an angel from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what you received, let that one be accursed.” (Gal.1:9)

 

On Mt Carmel, Elijah exhorted the people of Israel, “How long will you go limping with two different opinions.  If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, follow him.” (1K.18:21)

There is no doubt that the church is indeed limping these days. 

The Reformation is not just a particular point in church history 500 years ago, it is the constant call to receive the Good News, to think clearly, and to boldly act in accord with that News in this day.

 

At a meeting of the Lutheran—Roman Catholic Commission on Unity this past week, Pope Francis was given a symbolic gift from the General Secretary of the Lutheran World Federation.

It was a small teapot from a refugee in Kenya where 400,000 persons wait and suffer.

As he received the little gift, the Pope said, “We are attacked by those who don't accept us, whether a person is Lutheran or Roman Catholic, Orthodox or Coptic.  Our blood is not divided.”

He was moved by the gift, which he said was pointing to the ecumenism of martyrdom.

This is how serious a struggle it is.

 

And so let's hear those scriptures in humility, holy fear, and joy:

“I will write it on their hearts,” says the Lord; “and I will be their God and they shall be my people.” (Jeremiah 31:33)

“Since all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith.” (Romans 3:23-25)

“If you continue in my Word, you are truly my disciples.” (John 8:31)

 

These are the true words, the words that kill and make alive, the words that point us to life in God's completed kingdom and how to live in the in-between times right now.

These are the words that help us to answer those questions that keep coming up in front of us:

Is the story of Jesus true?  YES

Is it sufficient for us?  YES

Is it adequate for these troubled and complicated times? YES

Does it need to be supplemented or superseded by some other story, some other person, a different Savior?  NO

Lord, keep us steadfast in this Word, and let us not fall prey to another.  AMEN.