200426 Easter 3 Order of Service
Sermon Manuscript:
There are a lot of different voices that say, “Follow me!”
Your financial adviser says, “Follow me; I’ll make you a lot of money.” Your
professor says, “Follow me; I’ll lead you out of the darkness of superstition
into the light of reason.” Your doctor says, “Follow me; I’ll make you
healthy.” Your political candidate says, “Follow me; I’ll lead you into a
better future.”
There are a lot of such voices, and they do not all agree.
One financial adviser says, “sell;” another says, “buy.” One professor says “study
humanities,” another professor says, “humanities are a waste of time. You
should study the STEM subjects.” One doctor says this medicine will work,
another says it won’t. And as for the politicians, they talk as though they are
worlds apart, but they all seem to be in the rich people’s pockets.
This multitude of voices, all saying, “Follow me!” is part
of the human condition. It goes all the way back to the earliest days of
creation. Adam and Eve had heard a definite, “Follow me,” but they followed someone
else instead. Adam and Eve’s descendants followed different voices. Their sons
Abel and Seth followed in the paths of their parents, but Cain and his
descendants did not. When you read this very early history of mankind in
Genesis chapter 4, you find out that although Cain was a murderer and a
vagabond, his descendants were great innovators. They discovered many things
about agriculture, metallurgy. They were the first artists and musicians.
Adam and Eve’s son, Seth, was born after Cain murdered his brother
Abel. When Moses describes Seth and his descendants you don’t hear anything
about innovations. All that you hear about them is that they called on the Name
of the Lord. That means that they were preoccupied with what God had said to
Adam, and they prayed, praised, and gave thanks.
Whereas the family line of Cain culminates in Lamech
bragging about how he has two wives instead of one, and that he would kick
anybody’s butt who tried to stand up against him, the family line of Seth has
its highpoint in Enoch. Enoch lived 365 years. Enoch walked with God. Then,
Enoch was not there, for God took him. Enoch is one of the very few people who
have been taken into heaven, body and soul, without experiencing the bitterness
of death. What a contrast you see between these two! Lamech was a mover and a
shaker. Nobody was going to tell him what’s what. Enoch’s outstanding feature
was that he walked with God. God said to him, “Follow me,” and Enoch followed,
until he was no more, for God took him.
It is interesting that Moses wrote what he did about this
earliest of all histories. In a sermon a while back I talked to you about how
surprisingly honest the Scriptures are about the many embarrassing and shameful
things that it records. There is no effort to clean up the family history. If
anything, it seems that the Scriptures are determined to boast about the
weaknesses of the people of God, for when we are weak, then we are strong. Same
thing here. Moses lists the accomplishments and mountains of glory that Cain’s
descendants were able to climb. At the least you might think that Moses should
edit that out and be silent about it, but he doesn’t. Cain’s descendants were
richer, smarter, and better looking than Seth’s descendants. The voices that
Cain’s descendants listened to seemed to offer much better prospects for
advancement and happiness and practicality than the Sethites’ “calling on the
name of the Lord.”
Here’s the thing, though: God’s people have never been at
home in the business of salesmanship or propaganda. So much that passes for
salesmanship and propaganda is lying and manipulation. The commercials that you
see on TV lie to you and manipulate you. They tell you that if you follow them,
and buy their product, you will be rich or beautiful or smart or whatever else.
That is to say, if you follow them you will be happy. That is to say, if you
follow them, you will be blessed—for that is the old fashioned word for “happiness.”
God’s people have never had any business trying to shoehorn people into calling
on the name of the Lord. Instead, there is to be open testimony to the truth.
And this testimony doesn’t always produce faith. Paul openly admits this. He
says that the word of Jesus’s cross is foolishness to those who are perishing.
The Cainites are so busy feathering their own nests, following this technique
and that technique. They know what’s what, but they can’t understand how
somebody dying on a cross helps anybody.
This distain for the usefulness of the Gospel is apparent in
our times. In the light of the plague that has befallen us there is a lot of
talk about what is “essential.” For many people—even most people—hearing the
voice of the Good Shepherd is about as essential as a Lion’s club meeting or a
support group. It is thought to have no power. Where the real power is supposed
to be located is the in press conferences and scientific studies. These things
have their place, just like your doctor’s advice for how to stay healthy, but
Jesus’s call to follow him, to call on the name of the Lord, is above and beyond
all other promises of happiness, of blessedness.
How so? Jesus tells us: “I am the Good Shepherd. The Good
Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. All these other voices and leaders
will quit when it is no longer advantageous to themselves. They refuse to
suffer for the good of anybody besides themselves. Not so with me. I am the Good
Shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I
know the Father; and I lay my life down for the sheep.”
Jesus, the Son of God, was under no compulsion to suffer and
die under the wrath of God for the sins of the world. It wasn’t like he was
trapped in a bad situation with no way out. He could have called down legions
of angels to fight for him, but it was by his death that we poor sinners are
set free from the curse of the Law that calls for our death. It was by Jesus’s
resurrection that a happy life together with the Creator of the universe was
promised for us, for atonement has been made for sin. This is the promise made
all the way back in the Garden when God said that he would send his Son, born
of the woman, born under the Law, to redeem us who are under the Law, so that
we would receive adoption as sons. The serpent’s head was crushed by Jesus on
the cross.and we were set free from our bondage to him to become children of
God.
Therefore, Jesus says, “Follow me, and you will be blessed.
Follow me, and you will make your way through the wilderness of this world to
the promised land of your inheritance that is flowing with milk and honey.”
Your relationship with your God and your Creator is much more important than
what is offered to you from all the other voices that are telling you to follow
them. When this Shepherd knows you and you know this Shepherd, then even if you
should walk through the valley of the shadow of death, you need not fear any
evil, for he is with you. His rod and his staff comfort you. So if you are able
to walk through the valley of the shadow of death together with this Good
Shepherd, then what are all these other trials and tribulations in comparison
to that? What is the loss of wealth or health, if, in his good time, all things
are set right by his almighty power? Walk with God. Take up your cross and
follow him. In time you will find that you have walked in the way that Enoch
trod.
What shall we say, then, about all these other voices? What
shall we say about the concerns of agriculture, metallurgy, the arts and
sciences? Does following the voice of the Good Shepherd not allow us to handle
or touch such things? One group of Christians who takes a stand like that are
the Amish. They have separated themselves by placing limits on what is godly to
pursue or not pursue. While it seems as though this should make them immune
from the idolatry of believing that we can fix everything ourselves, I’m not so
sure that that is how it turns out in practice. The source of unbelief, the
source of idolatry, is not in anything material. It comes from the devil and
resides in the hearts and minds of sinners. God has not given us any commandments
that say we can’t pursue agriculture, metallurgy, arts, and sciences. We should
not make laws where God has not made laws.
That being said, it is important for us to notice the
difference between the descendants of Cain and the descendants of Seth. The
descendants of Cain were living only for this world. They poured their heart
and soul into being the most glorious creatures that they could make of
themselves. They wanted with all their heart to be rich and famous. They were
seeking after a kind of immortality, but not an immortality that is life
together with their Creator God. The immortality that they were seeking after
was to be remembered fondly by their descendants, to have their life
celebrated, and, for the most ambitious among them, to be written into the
history books.
The descendants of Seth were not totally different from the
descendants of Cain. They also had to make their way through this world. They
had to sew and reap and gather into barns. They were married and being given in
marriage. They bought and sold and fixed problems. But they did not have the
same perspective. They did not look at the things of this world or their own
glory and success as the most important things. They valued calling on the name
of the Lord as their highest ambition. They were more eager to please God than
they were to make a buck. They knew that their time on this earth was
temporary. They saw themselves as strangers here; heaven was their home.
This should be our perspective too. We should think of
ourselves as though we are living in a hotel instead of a permanent home. You
stay in a hotel for some time, but when it’s time to check out, your heart
isn’t wrapped up in the hotel room. You don’t weep when you have to check out.
That is how we should be in this world. Our heart should not be wrapped up in
glory or progress or any of the false gods that promise us blessing. Our hearts
should be wrapped up in our Creator God. He has redeemed us to set us free from
all the evil that so mercilessly afflicts us in this life. Not only will we be
set free from getting old, from disasters, from diseases, from disappointments;
we will also be set free from our own evil hearts and minds. Instead, we will
be filled with love for God and for our neighbor. There is so much in us that
is dreadfully unattractive and evil. We are being set free from that to follow
the pattern set by our Lord Jesus.
It is a tragedy, a very deep tragedy, when people are taken
in by the voices that promise them blessing to the exclusion of the voice of
our Good Shepherd. The voices of the false gods are judgmental and harsh and
demanding. They require every fiber of your being in order to achieve success.
And what are you left with in the end? Even if you should end up becoming the
best athlete, the richest businessman, the famous actor or actress, the
powerful politician—what are you left with after following these voices with
all your heart? You end up moldering in a grave somewhere, which is bad enough.
What’s worse is that by unbelief you will be alienated from God—his enemy,
because you did not believe in the only begotten Son whom he has sent.
The Good Shepherd is different. Instead of you serving him,
he serves you. He leads you into good pasture and peaceful waters. He calms
you. He gives you a place in the house of the Lord forever by laying down his
life for you.
Jesus is a good God. Follow him, and you will be blessed
forever.
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