Sunday
03/06/16 Freeville/Homer Avenue UMC’s
Sermon Title: “He loves and cares for all people”
(“Why Jesus is the Savior” series: Part 4 of 6)
Old Testament
Lesson: Psalm 32
New Testament
Scripture: 2 Corinthians 5:16-21
Gospel Lesson:
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
Friends, brothers and sisters, welcome once again on this the
Fourth Sunday in this season of Holy Lent, and this One Great Hour of Sharing
Sunday. This is the Fourth Sunday in this holy season that we are called to prepare
our hearts, our minds, and our souls for the coming crucifixion and death of
Jesus Christ. This holy season is one in which we are called to examine
ourselves, to see where we are distant and or separated from God. What sins,
what barriers, what things are in our lives that separate us from the living God?
In this season of Holy Lent, and always, God calls us to grow closer to him, through
prayer, through service, through loving others, through reading scripture, through
fasting, and through repentance, to allow God to remove those things in our
lives that separate us from him. We must be willing to acknowledge those things
in ourselves and in our lives that separate us from God, and we must be willing
to work on changing ourselves into all that God has called us to be.
Holy Lent is a time that through the power of God, we can
grow closer to him, and become more like his son Jesus Christ. Through the
sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit, in this season and always, we can become
more holy, more like God, more like Jesus Christ.
This Sunday is also one of the five giving Sundays that we annually
have in the United Methodist Church. Each of these giving Sundays are designed
around taking a special offering for different ministries that occur in the
United Methodist Church. The special giving offering that we have this week, is
that of One Great Hour of Sharing. This is a giving Sunday that I feel
particularly passionate about, as the One Great Hour of Sharing Sunday helps to
fund UMCOR. UMCOR, is the United Methodist Committee on Relief. Whenever
natural disasters occur, whether they be hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes,
tsunamis, forest fires, and etc., the people of UMCOR respond. The people of
UMCOR who are mostly volunteers work quickly to get boots on the ground and
needed resources to help our brothers and sisters in need. This response to crises
and natural disasters, is part of Jesus Christ’s call on our lives to feed the
hungry, cloth the naked, and love our neighbors. When we give to this special
giving Sunday of One Great Hour of Sharing, we are saving lives, serving God,
and bringing the hope of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the world. For me then,
I believe in the mission of UMCOR, as they work collaboratively with sister
relief agencies, like Catholic relief services. I give to this offering every
year, because I believe that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the hope of the
world, and that I need to live it in every way that I can.
With this said, if you want to make your checks out to the church,
and put One Great Hour of Sharing on the memo line, or put any money in an
envelope and indicate on the envelope that it is for One Great Hour of Sharing
that would be great. We will then make sure that these funds get to our
conference office in Syracuse, and then to UMCOR, as they will then be able to
continue to bring the life, light, and love of Jesus Christ to the world.
This morning, as many of you know, I have been preaching a
six-week sermon series on why the Christian Church for centuries has in the majority
argued that Jesus is the Christ. When I say that Jesus is the Christ, I mean
that the Christian Church for centuries has largely argued that Jesus was the
messiah. That he was and is the second person of the Holy Trinity, of God the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. That Jesus Christ was fully God and fully
human on earth, and that he died an atoning death on a Roman Cross for our
sins. That in him and through him all things are possible.
Yet,
these faith claims about Jesus Christ are major claims. Within this, in
addition to our creedal statements like the Nicene Creed and the Apostle’s
Creed, along with centuries of tradition, and shared beliefs about Jesus
Christ, what do the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John say about
Jesus? Do these gospels claim that Jesus was the Christ, the Messiah, God on
earth? Or do they say something else?
Well
in this sermon series, I am making the claim that yes these gospels do make the
claim that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, God on earth. I am making this
claim around the reality that if anything in the four gospels of Matthew, Mark,
Luke, and John is true, that this is strong argument that Jesus was more than
just a man, more than just a person like you and I. Jesus must have been the
Christ, the Messiah.
Every
week of this sermon series, I have been taking our gospel lectionary readings
and attempting to show how and why the historic Christian Church believed that
Jesus was the Christ was the Messiah.
In the
first week of this six-part series, I preached that Jesus is the Christ, the
Messiah, because “he outsmarted and resisted the devil.” If the story of Jesus
being in the wilderness for forty-days and resisting the devil is true on any
level, then he must be the messiah, as no human person could endure that.
In
the second week of this six-week preaching series, I spoke about Jesus “throws
out demons and heals people”. If Jesus was able to do any of this, then this is
certainly a strong indication that Jesus was indeed the Christ, the Messiah.
Last
week, I talked about how Jesus “spoke with power and truth”. For the things
that are recorded that Jesus said were powerfully piercing, and were holy. It
would seem then that only Messiah could say the things that he said. For he
spoke God’s words, as he must have been God on earth.
This
week, my message is called, “He loves and cares for all people.” For if we have
a loving and a forgiving God, which I believe we do, then Jesus displaying this
love and compassion for all people, is a sign that he is indeed the savior, the
Messiah.
The
gospel of Luke reading from this morning begins with some Pharisees and some
legal experts complaining that Jesus welcomes and eats with sinners (Lk. 15:1-2,
CEB). Some might say, why would Jesus do this? Why would he go among people
that were social outcasts? The reason my sisters and brothers, is that Jesus “loves
and cares for all people.” He loved and cared for the lepers, he loved and
cared for the woman at the well, he loved and cared for blind beggars, and he
loved the unlovable. To me, this sounds like the messiah, the Christ.
After
Jesus gets criticized for welcoming and eating with sinners in this gospel reading,
Jesus tells the famous parable of the prodigal son (Lk. 15:1-3, CEB). This
parable, the parable of prodigal son, to me gets to the very heart of God, of
Jesus Christ. Many of us know this parable inside and out. For me, it is one of
my favorites, and I often get emotional in telling the story.
In
getting into the substance of this parable, I wonder, how many of us here have
done anything wrong? How many of us here, have disrespected or mistreated our
parents? How many of us, have ever thought that we were beyond forgiveness and
God’s love?
In
this parable, a man who has a decent amount of wealth, servants, a nice house,
and many possessions, had two sons (Lk. 15:11b, CEB). The younger son asked his
father for his half of his earthly inheritance early (Lk. 15:12, CEB). This
means that the son took half of his father’s wealth. Upon being given this half
of his father’s wealth, the young son went off, partied, lived extravagantly,
and spent it all (Lk. 15:13, CEB).
After
the son had spent everything, a severe food shortage occurred, and the young
son was only able to find a job feeding pigs (Lk. 15:14-16, CEB). The young
son, soon realized that he had hit rock bottom, and that even his father’s
servants were now living better than he was (Lk. 15:17-20, CEB). He was lonely,
broken, and hurting. At this point, this young son was then determined to go
home to his father and tell him, “Father I have sinned against heaven and
against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son. Take me on as one your
hired hands” (Lk. 15:18b-19, CEB). The son thinks that he had lost the love of
his father.
The
gospel goes on to say, that the young son began the journey home, and he was likely
tired, raged, and skinny from malnutrition (Lk. 15:21, CEB). Yet from a distance
off, the son’s father saw him, and ran to him, and his son said to his father,
as he said that he would, “Father I have sinned against heaven and against you.
I no longer deserve to be called your son” (Lk. 15:20b-21, CEB). Yet the son’s
father was not angry with his young son, nor was he unhappy to see him. The father
of the young son called forth to his servants to bring “the best robe and put
it on him! Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet! Fetch the fatted
calf and slaughter it. We must celebrate with feasting because this son of mine
was dead and he has come back to life. He was lost and is found! (Lk. 15:22-24,
CEB).
Now
brothers and sisters, Jesus Christ came to “love and care for all people.” I
wonder how many prodigal sons and daughters that he ministered to. I wonder how
many of us have been prodigal sons and daughters? Yet Jesus came to seek and
save the lost. Like the prodigal son, we can be forgiven no matter what we have
done.
Here
is the other part of this parable or story, the older brother. The older
brother, who stayed at home while the young son went off lived wildly, came
back to his dad’s house to see the great party going on for the younger son
(Lk. 15:25-28, CEB). The older son was angry, because of the sins of his
younger brother (Lk. 15:28-28, CEB). The older brother told the father, that he
had never taken anything from him, yet the younger son took so much, and blew
it all (Lk. 15:29-30, CEB). Yet the father tells his oldest son in ending this
morning’s gospel reading, “Son, you are always with me, and everything I have
is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad because this brother of yours was
dead and is alive. He was lost and is found” (Lk. 15:31-32, CEB). It would seem
that whether we are close to the father, or far from the father, he still wants
to love us, and forgive us.
My
brothers and sisters, if Jesus is the Christ, if he is truly the Messiah, then
why would he “welcome sinners and eat with them,” as this gospel reading begins
with (Lk. 15:2b, CEB)? The answer is because those people were lost, but now
they are found. They were blind, but now they see. Jesus Christ came to earth
so that he could seek out and save the lost, to die for us. That no matter who
we are, or what we have done, we can be forgiven.
Some
of us might say, but pastor, my earthly dad, or my earthly mom would never do
that. Yet God, Jesus Christ, will run to us, if we let him. He will run to us,
embrace us, and forgive us, if we but got to him. For Jesus Christ, the messiah
came to “love and care for all people”.
In
this parable, Jesus Christ is saying, this is what the love of God is like.
This is why the mission of the United Methodist Church is “to make disciples of
Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world”. If we have been forgiven,
taken in by Jesus Christ, the one who “loves and care for all people,” then we
need to bring people to Jesus Christ. We need to bring people to Christ, so
that like the prodigal son, they may be forgiven, be filled with hope and love,
and know that God loves them so much.
In
this season of Holy Lent, while we examine and grow ourselves closer to God,
let also seek to share the “Good News” of Jesus Christ with others, as Jesus
Christ “loves and cares for all people”. Brothers and sisters, I leave you with
a quote from Saint Francis of Assisi who said, “We have been called to heal
wounds, to unite what is fallen apart, and to bring home those who have lost
their way.” Let us in this season of Holy Lent and always, bring people to
Jesus Christ. Praise be to God. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment