Sermon Manuscript:
From time to time I get a certain type of dream that
prevents me from sleeping peacefully. These dreams are not what you’d call
scary. The best word for them would be “annoying,” because there’s always
something that is wrong that I can’t get right. It is always something very
minor, unimportant. I get obsessed with it in my dream, and I can’t get it to
come out right. It feels like all night long I wrestle with this stupid
problem. Then I wake up with a headache. If my brain were operating normally, I
wouldn’t be concerned at all and would move on with my life. This would be the
sensible thing to do, because there are some things that we just shouldn’t
worry about.
This rule applies not just to dreams, but also to real life.
Sensible people know how to sweat the small stuff. Don’t worry about the small
stuff so that you can devote your energy to the big problems. Maybe, then, you
can solve some of those big problems. But Christian wisdom goes one step
further—a step that is too far for reason. “Do not worry about anything,”
Paul says in our epistle reading.
Well I don’t know about that! Don’t worry while you are
waiting for the results of the biopsy of the tumor? Don’t worry while your
child is lying sick in bed? Don’t worry while your child is lying dead in a
coffin? And are not these just a few of the many examples of things that we
might reasonably worry about? Haven’t we had enough things to worry about just
this year alone? How can you say don’t worry about anything?
There is a reason behind what Paul says, and it is this: “If
God is for us, who can be against us? Indeed, he who did not spare his own Son,
but gave him up for us all—how will he not also graciously give us all things
along with him? … What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will trouble
or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? … Neither
death nor life, neither angles nor rulers, neither things present nor things to
come, nor powerful forces, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in
creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our
Lord.” This is what Paul says in Romans chapter 8.
The key thought to all of it is this: “If God is for us,
who can be against us?” Everything else must give way. All other things are
merely created things—things that God has made and has control over. So if it
seems that these created things are winning against us, that simply can’t be
case. Their victory must only be a temporary victory, assuming, of course, that
God is for us. But we need not be in doubt about that either, for we know that
the heavenly Father did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all. This
is how we know that God is for us. The deed is done. God has declared his solidarity
with sinners and promised their salvation. Jesus is the Lamb of God who
takes away the sin of the world. God most certainly is for you and for all
people. You and all people are invited to believe this!
If God is for you (and he is), then everything is going to
turn out fine. Although this kind of sounds like little orphan Annie singing,
“The sun will come out tomorrow,” it is quite different. Because little orphan
Annie, together with all natural flesh, do not have true hope. The best that
they can hope for is a return to normalcy. If you get sick, the sun should come
out tomorrow, and you will get better. If you lose your job, the sun should
come out tomorrow, and you’ll get a different one.
But there is an iron clad limit to these hopes. All these
hopes must bow to reason. If the hope is unreasonable, then you can kiss your
little orphan Annie goodbye. At the deathbed nobody sings, “The sun will come
out tomorrow,” for the very good reason that the sun won’t come out tomorrow
for that person who is lying there. Tomorrow that person will be dead, and
apparently won’t be able to see the sun. The hopes are limited by what it
appears that this creation is able to provide.
It is quite different to sing something like this at the
deathbed: “Abide with me, fast falls the eventide. The darkness deepens, Lord
with me abide! When other helpers fail and comforts flee, Help of the helpless,
oh, abide with me. … Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes. Shine through
the gloom and point me to the skies! Heav’n’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain
shadows flee. In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.” Hallelujah, Christ is
risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia. Let us go forth in peace, in the name of
the Lord. Amen.
The endpoint of our life has been fixed, has been set, by
God. He has fixed this permanent point according to his promise of redemption
and eternal life for Jesus’s sake. Whoever believes this has exactly what the
promise says, for we are justified by faith in God’s promise. With this sure
and certain inheritance in place—that nothing in creation can take away—we may
sweat the small stuff. We may sweat the small stuff that the world would have
us believe is the big stuff.
Has the biopsy report come back? Has the CAT scan found new
growth? Do you have a surgery coming up? Allow me to put too fine a point on
this: Perhaps this is the way that God would have enter into eternal life. I’m
tempted to immediately follow this up with a word that our flesh finds much
more comforting—that it will almost certainly turn out just fine. That is very
often true too. But you, as a Christian, have no business making your home in
such hopes. You’re but a stranger here. Heaven is your home. “To live is
Christ, to die is gain.”
There are no limits or conditions that are attached to what
Paul says in our epistle reading today when he says, “Rejoice in the Lord
always! I will say it again: Rejoice!” He does not say, “Rejoice only when
things are going splendidly for you—in exactly the way that you would want them
to go.” Paul himself, as he writes this, is sitting in chains. He’s on his way
to Rome, where eventually he will be beheaded. Paul knew this was likely the
course his life was going to take, but he still says, “Rejoice in the Lord
always,” and he means it. He knew that whatever the circumstances God would
put him in, that it would be for his own good, and that others might very well
benefit through those circumstances as well. And so it was, that as Paul was
imprisoned God converted many to eternal life through the Gospel of the
forgiveness of sins for Jesus’s sake that Paul preached. Paul did not lose
anything by being in chains. Paul did not lose anything when he lost his head.
Jesus says that whatsoever we might lose for Jesus and for the Gospel we will
receive a hundredfold, and in the age to come, eternal life.
Therefore, as Paul says, we can be forbearing or gentle.
Easy come, easy go. We do not need to fight for every last scrap. The Lord is
at hand. Do not worry about anything, but in everything, by prayer and
petition, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.
Here we have added comfort on top of all that has been said
already. Already you know that the endpoint of your life is eternal life
together with Christ. Already you know that to live is Christ, to die is gain.
But you are not required to sit in silence, gritting your teeth, clinging to
the arms of your chair as you ride this wild rollercoaster. “Do not worry
about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,
let your requests be made known to God.”
Jesus himself, when the fierceness of his fight was on, let
his requests be made known to God in the Garden of Gethsemane. “Father, if
it is possible, let this cup pass from me. But not my will, but your will be
done.” Our Father who art in heaven is happy to hear the prayers of his
children. It is a lot better to make your requests known to God than it is to
worry. As Jesus says, “Who, by worrying, is able to add one cubit to his
stature? Who is able to extend his life by even one minute? Do not worry.
Consider the birds of the air and the flowers of the field. They do not worry
and fret, but your heavenly Father takes care of them. You are much more
valuable than they.” Worrying is a poor substitute for praying. We should
worry about nothing, but instead pray.
I’d like you to notice one little word that is tucked in
there, though, that is easy to overlook. Paul says, “with thanksgiving.”
“By prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to
God. With that little word, thanksgiving, you see that Paul is talking about a
believing prayer rather than an unbelieving prayer. He is talking about a
prayer that is prayed with confidence of it being heard, instead of a prayer
that is offered in despair.
What I am talking about here are prayers like the so-called
foxhole prayers. The trapped soldier, with death pressing down on him, might
cry out in terror, but that is not a prayer. He is just as content to call upon
his momma as he is upon this God that he has no confidence in. So also a mother
might scream to God when her child is sick and dying. She pours out her entire
spirit into such prayers. She cries out from the depths of her soul.
We naturally (but falsely) believe that such prayers have to
be heard. They seem to be so genuine, so heart-felt. But this is where our
reason tricks us into believing the opposite of what is the case. God does not
want us to pray in unbelief. God does not want us to pray as though we were
playing the lottery. When you buy a lottery ticket, do you really think that
you are going to win? Of course there’s a chance. If there weren’t a chance you
wouldn’t go to the trouble. But it’s kind of like a “Who knows? It would be
nice, but let’s not get our hopes up” kind of thing. So it is with these
prayers of desperation. They are basically calling God cruel and unreliable and
hardly likely to hear them, but who knows? Maybe it will work. Unfortunately,
with our fall into sin, nothing has been so severely damaged as our spiritual
knowledge, and that includes our stupid natural thoughts with prayer. People
know not what they do when they pray that way.
Instead, as Paul says, let us pray with thanksgiving. Note
the contrast. The guy in the foxhole might wonder what there is to be thankful
for. The believer can never be in doubt about what there is to be thankful for.
The believer knows that the endpoint of his life has been fixed by God. The
believer knows that whatever situation he might be in, that it is for his own
good and for the good of others. The believer knows that even if his flesh
should thus be destroyed, yet in his own flesh he will see God. The believer
knows that his Redeemer lives. What comfort this sweet sentence gives.
So imagine yourself to be in a situation that the world
finds hopeless. Imagine that you are dying with no hope of recovery. Think
about what Paul says here. “Rejoice in the Lord always! I will say it again:
Rejoice! … Do not worry about anything, but in everything, by prayer and
petition, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.” This
is a wonderful, gentle, comforting teaching. When you are dying, thank God.
That is a clear confession of faith. You are saying that God knows what he is
doing, and you know that whatever he is doing is for your own good and for the
good of others. Even though it might not be clear to you how it is good for you or others, you can thank God that it is so.
At the same time you may speak to him about what you are afraid of. Let him
know what you want. Speak to him like a dear child speaks to his dear Father.
Loving fathers listen to their children, and there has never been a loving
father like our heavenly Father.
Finally we will conclude with words that are so familiar to
us: “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard
your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” The peace of God is that there
is always hope. There is never, ever a situation that is hopeless for the one
who believes in Christ. And this hope is not dependent upon the sun coming out
tomorrow or upon any earthly thing. It is dependent upon Almighty God. He is
someone that is good to have in your corner, let me tell you. If God is for
you, who can be against you? What shall separate you from the love of Christ?
Everything is going to turn out just fine in the end. Thus you can sweat the
small stuff—like death, like sin, like hell, like the devil. The world cannot
even think of anything worse than death. You know that your God has overcome
not just death for you, but anything and everything that could be worse than
that.
Therefore, may the peace of God, that surpasses all
understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
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