Sermon manuscript:
I’d like to begin today by talking about lovelessness. There
is a kind of lovelessness that is irrational and there is a kind that is
rational. Irrational lovelenssness just doesn’t make sense. Rational
lovelessness makes sense. Irrational lovelessness is when people do things that
are mean for no good reason. Rational lovelessness is when people do things
that will make them get ahead of others.
Both kinds of lovelessness are real problems for us human
beings. I think we’d like to believe that, by and large, we’re alright. If
there is any lovelessness, then it’s of the rational kind. We’re mean in order
to get ourselves or our team ahead. But that’s not true. It’s not hard to find
meanness just for meanness’s sake. If you could be a fly on the wall of an
elementary, middle, or high school classroom, you wouldn’t have to wait too
long to observe meanness. There’s no good reason for this meanness. It seems to
be done just for the pleasure of it.
Meanness can also be found in a lot of families’ homes. Fathers
and mothers can be mean to their children. Perhaps they themselves were treated
meanly by their parents and so they hardly know anything different. Sometimes
children can be mean to their parents. They just want to hurt them. Siblings
can be mean. Husbands can be mean to wives. Wives can be mean to husbands.
If we were required to give an answer for ourselves for why
we are so mean we might say that we were somehow hurt by them at some point in
the past. This is a condition that always exists, by the way, if two or more
people live together long enough. So with the justification of having been hurt
at some point in the past, whenever the opportunity arises to get back at them
we make sure we don’t let that opportunity pass.
This is an evil spirit. Whether it is literally and
explicitly demonic, I wouldn’t want to say, but it certainly fits the pattern
of the devil and the demons. They are mean. They hurt for no good reason. One
of the things that Jesus did as he moved about was he cast out evil spirits. We
should not assume that we are somehow immune from having an evil spirit. A lot
of folks figure that since we live in modern times there’s no such thing as
evil spirits. Now we call these phenomena psychopathy and sociopathy, so no
evil spirits around here! But the older way of speaking has something to it. It
does a better job of explaining, for example, how it is that the victims of
abuse can very easily end up being abusers themselves. The unclean spirit got
passed on.
Jesus is the one who can truly get rid of evil spirits. The
demons are subject to him because he is God. There’s nothing more fundamental
to Jesus’s work than bringing about a change from lovelessness to love. As John
says, “God is love.”
Lovelessness, meanness, is the opposite of God. God could have just
destroyed us, which is what the demon of the man in the synagogue was afraid
of, but instead of destroying us God redeems us and sets us free.
There is something old that used to be said at a Christian
baptism, which very nearly made it into our hymnal (but some thought it to be
too medieval). It was an exorcism said just before the baptism. It said:
“Depart, O unclean spirit, and make room for the Holy Spirit.” Thankfully the
hymnal committee wasn’t too modern to get rid of the renunciation of the devil.
At baptism we renounce the devil. We renounce all his works. We renounce all
his ways. We renounce our old Lord and believe in our new Lord—the Lord Jesus
Christ, who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, now
and forever. Our Lord Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil, which
certainly includes irrational lovelessness—this meanness whose existence is
hard to explain.
A more rational lovelessness can be much harder for people
be ashamed of. Meanness is straight forward. When sin grows up it puts away
these childish ways. Lovelessness learns logic and wraps itself up in fine
sounding words. Instead of a loveless action being a loveless action it becomes
a shrewd way to do business. Or it’s done to teach them a lesson. Through lying
to one’s self disobeying the authorities is not disobeying the authorities.
Adultery is not adultery. Stealing is not stealing. Gossiping is not gossiping.
Coveting is not coveting. All these sins, you see, are not actually sins. They
might be manifestations of great wisdom, or even, (God forbid!), the
manifestation of deep piety. I’ve already mentioned that sheer meanness is
devilish. You know what else is devilish? Lying.
It’s hard to know which of the two kinds of lovelessness is
worse. We tend to think that random acts of meanness are worse, perhaps because
we don’t understand them, but does having a rationale make the evil any less
evil? Adam was led astray not just by the meanness of disobeying God, but also
by the rationale that was supposed to make it acceptable.
People kind of pride themselves on not being psychopaths or
sociopaths, like the ones on 48 hours or Dateline, who do evil things without
hardly any reasons at all. Respectable people aren’t like that. But this is
foolish. What credit is it to anyone to break God’s commandments with impunity because
they can dream up some reason for doing it. Psychopaths, sociopaths, as well as
the more sophisticated sinners all need to get thrown into the same pot. We are
all sinners, the Bible says. We are all liars, the Bible says. If we are not
set free from our bondage to evil spirits, then we will never be free. We will
never love.
Love is a word that gets used so much that we all think that
we know what it means. How could anybody not know what the word means? But if
you think of how loveless we are by nature, then you will see how this
assumption is mistaken. How can creatures who are loveless know what love is?
To know what love is, we have to be taught by God. God is love.
The apostle Paul has been inspired by God. He teaches about
love in our epistle reading today. I’d like to go through what he teaches so
that we may be benefited by it. I want to give you a word of advice before we
get into it. When you hear what Paul says you must be careful that you only
judge yourself. If you don’t want to judge yourself, then you might as well
leave, because it won’t do you a scrap of good to be thinking of other people’s
lovelessness while ignoring your own. We each will be judged by God for our own
actions. Nobody is excused because somebody else is worse. You are responsible
for your own actions, so don’t waste your time puffing yourself up in
comparison to somebody else.
Paul says, “Love is patient.” This word means that we
should not be easily provoked. It is a sin to be angry. Anger is the sinful
root of the fifth commandment.
“Love is kind.” This word means that a person is mild
rather than harsh. There is an affection behind their actions rather than
judgment and a disregard.
“Love does not
envy.” Literally this says, “Love is not zealous.” Zeal is not always a bad
thing. It is a bad thing when it is done for one’s own personal advancement and
hates it when anybody else is better than one’s self.
“Love does not brag.” Bragging is a way to get ahead
in life. If you don’t toot your own horn, nobody else is going to do it for
you. Everybody else is too busy tooting for themselves already. But someone who
believes in God knows that God sees, judges, rewards, and punishes. We do not
need to make our own case by bragging.
“Love is not arrogant.” The old King James says,
“Love is not puffed up.” That’s an exact translation. Puffing one’s self up,
thinking you are really something, is not love—except, of course, love for
one’s self, which comes perfectly naturally to us sinners.
“Love does not behave indecently.” Literally this
says, “Love does not reject the scheme of things.” The way things are set up is
a scheme. Love does not require everything to revolve around one’s self and
one’s own thoughts and desires. Love joins with the others so as not to bring
about discord.
“Love does not seek one’s own.” Here, again, seeking
one’s own can seem like the only way to get ahead in life. Nobody gives it to
you, you have to take it. But Paul means what he says, even if people think he
is stupid. Love isn’t zealous for one’s self, but for others.
“Love is not irritable.” The word here means “to
sharpen, to make sharp,” as you would with a sword. So this is saying that love
doesn’t have those little needling words and actions that are purposely done to
annoy somebody else. They irritate. But they do not go so far or are so blatant
that you can be charged with any serious crime. Another way you could put this
is that love does not push the other’s buttons.
“Love does not keep a record of wrongs.” How prone we
are to do this, and how poisonous this record of wrongs is for any and every
relationship! Why does any relationship get destroyed? Isn’t it precisely
because we tally up a good long list of why they are such bad people that not
only is it allowable to write them off, it is positively the right thing to do?
These damned records of wrongs are the documentation for every unhappy
marriage, every divorce, every ended friendship. Whenever you start making a
mental list of how much other people stink, realize that this does not come
from the Holy Spirit, but from an evil spirit.
“Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices in the
truth.” This shows that love is not merely utilitarian. There is a kind of
love that is extremely pragmatic. There is a kind of love that is nice,
non-judgmental, and wouldn’t hurt a fly. But the goal is only to look good in
the eyes of our fellow human beings. It is a shallow love that won’t risk
hurting someone in order to help them.
“Love bears all things.” This means that love will
take a lickin’ and keep on tickin’.
“Love believes all things.” This means that love is
gullible. It’s willing to be hurt.
“Love hopes all things.” This means that love is not
cynical. It doesn’t say, “They will never change,” so not only is it allowable
to write them off, but it is positively the right thing to do.
“Love endures all things.” This means that love
doesn’t quit.
In fact, “Love never comes to an end.” Love can’t
come to an end. How could it? God is love. At this point in the reading Paul
goes on to speak about heaven. Heaven is where we will no longer know in part,
but will be fully known. Heaven is when we will no longer have to puzzle things
out as in a mirror, but will see God, who is love, face to face. Heaven is where
love will be all in all. Love never ends.
Since love never ends, I hope you can begin to see through
those lies that we tell ourselves in order to justify our lovelessness. We make
all those excuses for why we can’t possibly keep God’s commandments because,
you see, otherwise we will be left behind. We can’t be naïve, or gullible, or a
so-called doormat. That would be a waste. Not so. The opposite is in fact the
case.
What good will it do you to have a charmed life for 70 years,
or, by reason of strength, 80—always seeing to your own happiness first, and
only willing to suffer for others if it is beneficial for one’s self? What are
70 or 80 years compared to eternity? Love never ends. God is love.
Paul says that when he was a child he spoke like a child, he
thought like a child, he reasoned like a child, when he became a man he gave up
childish ways. So also we have been born loveless. We are selfish. Nobody had
to teach us how to lie or manipulate. This is how we were as a child. A lot of
people think that growing up means you just get shrewder and shrewder, meaner
and meaner, richer and richer, better and better. I suppose you can do that if
you are training yourself for going to hell. There you will be taught by the
true master how to get ahead in life.
As Christians we should put away these childish, selfish
ways. Maturity is not cynicism and becoming worldly wise. Maturity is becoming
like a child. Jesus points to the child as the one who is great in the kingdom
of heaven. “Unless we turn and become like little children,” Jesus says,
“we will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.” Why? Because
otherwise we don’t belong in heaven. With lovelessness, and tireless training
in lovelessness, the sinner will go to hell, which is where he belongs.
Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil. He came to set
us free from evil spirits. He came to open us up so that we can love. This is
the work that God has begun in you with your baptism. Remain in Jesus’s word.
Then you will be his disciple instead of the devil’s disciple. Then you will
know the truth and the truth shall set you free. Being set free allows us to
love others and not just ourselves.
No comments:
Post a Comment