LWML Sunday - Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 5, 2014- Pastor Adam Moline
Grace,
mercy and peace to you from God the Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ. Amen. Our text today comes from the epistle lesson
just read, especially these words, “I have suffered the loss of all things
and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ.” Thus far our text.
Dear
friends in Christ, St. Paul writes today in a similar way as we so often do in
our obituaries, bragging himself up as he says with his own words, “confident
in his own flesh.” He is confident that
if it is possible to please God by actions that he has achieved it. He states he is the best of the best in terms
of holiness. He is the Jew of all Jews,
“circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe
of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as
to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the
law, blameless as blameless can be.
And
yet the very next words are quite striking.
“And yet all of my righteousness of works and holiness of living, I
count it all as rubbish.” The word he
uses is skubalon. That word very
piously, but wrongly translate as rubbish.
The real meaning is stronger, because the rubbish of which this word
speaks is the kind we so often flush down the toilet – yes, Paul crassly calls
his holiness and works sewage in very plain terms. Paul says that those good works are lost to
him, and that they won’t benefit him in God’s eyes.
Its
not that the works are good in a worldly sense.
They are. It’s not that they
haven’t benefited himself or even others around him, they have. Rather its that his sin is so large that no
amount of civil righteousness or worldly holiness can make up for his sin. Furthermore his worldly holiness gives only
empty rewards of money, home, riches and other things that cannot be taken with
him beyond the grave.
Instead
Paul trusts in something better than all the skubalon of our world. He trusts in Christ, and in his
promises. He happily would have all the
skubalon of the world taken from him so that he might gain Christ 9 and
be found in him, not having a righteousness of his own that comes from the
law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from
God that depends on faith— 10 that he may know Jesus and the power of his
resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his
death, 11 that by any means possible he
may attain the resurrection from the dead.
What
about you? The truth is often times we
get distracted by the skubalon of the world.
We are proud of our works, we have pride that looks down on others. We struggle to do what is right, but tell
ourselves that our best effort is good enough.
We get angry at other people for things they do wrong, when we turn
around and do the same things ourselves.
We slander and hurt other people’s reputations, and drag their names in
the mud.
And
then we boldly declare ourselves righteous to the world. We talk about the great things we’ve
done. We brag about how we spend our
money. We toot our trumpets to all who
will listen about the amazing things that we have done.
So
often we call this Christianity as well.
We have all seen the what would Jesus do bracelets. We’ve all heard the “Christians are supposed
to be better than everyone else, we’re supposed to act better.” And so often we tell people that we do! We take pride in our faiths. We tell others about how good our faith is –
Even if it isn’t the truth.
Dear
friends, it is all skubalon. It is
sin. It stinks. It kills us.
Count it for what it is, flush it away as it ought to be flushed. Repent.
Turn aside from you sin. Trust in
Christ, and in his mercy only. For only
in him is their forgiveness. Become like
him, in his death. Put your sin to death
in his body, in his blood and in his mercy and forgiveness.
Why? So that you might obtain eternal life. So that you might reach the reward of
heaven. And dear friends the only way
you can put your sin and pride to death is in Christ. His death on a cross is for you and your
forgiveness. His blood poured out so
that you might be forgiven. You were
baptized into that forgiving death. You
were washed in that blood. You are holy,
not by your own actions or works, or by your pride, or your selfishness. You’re holy in Jesus, and in Jesus
alone.
And
so that’s how we live. That’s how LWML
works, that’s how our missions work, we set ourselves aside in faith in Christ
and serve our neighbors. We don’t brag,
except in Jesus. We don’t trumpet
ourselves, but we tell all we can about the good work Christ has done in
us. Because, dear friends, when we talk
about Christ, we avoid the skubalon.
In
the name of Jesus. Amen.
