|
INJ
St Luke 6:36-42
'As Your Father is Merciful'
Divine Service
The Sixth Sunday after Trinity Sunday | June 15, 2008
Dear Saints,
“Like father, like son.” That good for Father's Day, and there's a lot of other sayings like this. My favorite is: “The nut doesn't fall from the tree.” Or when you have a new baby, people look closely at them so they can say things like, “She has her father's eyes” or “He looks like his dad.” If these are compliments or not depends, on course, on the face of the Father.
This all has something to do with the way God created fathers and mothers in the first few days of creation. These give birth according to their kind. There is similarity between parent and child. Ducks have little baby ducklings, fish have little baby fish, and people have little baby girls or boys. Like father, like son.
This is how we got our sinfulness and our devil and our death, we inherited it. It has been passed down from father to son (and daughter), from Adam to you. “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned--” [Romans 5:12] You're a sinner because your father was a sinner, and his father, and his, back beyond all family trees, back to Noah, and to Adam.
This is the teaching of original sin. I teach the catechism students that original sin is not the sin that no one had thought of yet, but the sin of Adam in the garden that has infected all humanity, even (as we read in the Epistle lesson) all of the creation.
And for this same reason you are dying. When we inherit sin, we inherit death. The nut doesn't fall far from the tree.
But, dear Christians, you have been born again, born from above. This is the gift that baptism gives. When the Father, Son and Holy Spirit put their name on You are a members of a new family, you are begotten of His mercy, you have a Father who is in heaven. “Now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” [Galatians 3:25-27] “Behold what manner of love the Father has given unto us that we should be called the children of God.” [1 John 3:1]
We are all Children of the heavenly Father, and what Jesus is talking about in today's Gospel text, especially the first verse, is that the nut doesn't fall far from the tree, or at least it shouldn't. “Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.” [Luke 6:36] Like Father, like children.
And how are we to be like our Father? There are, after all, a lot of things that we can say about God, that He is powerful and all knowing and holy and glorious and strong. But the text doesn't say any of these things. Jesus doesn't command, “Be powerful as your Father is powerful,” or, “be wise as your heavenly Father is wise” or, “Be good as your Father is good.” No, Jesus goes to the very heart of who our Father is, and says, “Be merciful, as your Father is merciful.” Mercy. This is who God is. He delights in showing mercy and love and kindness and generosity.
Do you know what your heavenly Father is like? This tells us, He is merciful. He loves and gives and holds nothing back. We must see this, for this is the center of everything that we believe and pray and trust, the Lord is merciful.
Now Christians are not the only ones who talk about the Lord's mercy. There is a phrase repeated in the Quran that says that Allah is “oft-forgiving, most-merciful.” I was wondering if this was to be understood in the same way that we understand the Lord's mercy, so I talked to our friends Dr Naeem and Deacon Nazami about this teaching of Islam, and what they confess about original sin and forgiveness. We shouldn't be surprised that it is different than our teaching. Islam says that Adam and Eve did sin in the garden, but that Allah simply made the decision to forgave them, and their corruption was not passed down through the ages.
Now the big difference is that there is forgiveness without atonement. There is absolution without blood. The forgiveness is a decision of Allah, and it could have just as well been the decision to destroy them.
In the Scriptures we see something different. God's mercy is not a choice, it is a sacrifice. Mercy costs. It costs blood and life, even the very life of our Lord Jesus. His blood is His grace. His suffering is His love. His agony is our forgiveness. His death is our life. His cross is His mercy.
The water that bleaches your robes white is red with Jesus blood. That's the kind of mercy that we're talking about. The Holy Trinity doesn't remain unaffected by your salvation.
And this is the kind of mercy that we're talking about, the kind of mercy that the Lord has shown each one of us. While we were His enemies Christ suffered and died for us so that He could have us as His own dear children and saints and friends. Our Father did not look to see if we deserved His mercy, our if we would be thankful for it. He wasn't waiting to see if we'd be nice to Him first or any of this. There were and are no conditions to His love, and no limits, and no end.
You were begotten in His mercy and love, now live in His mercy and love. Show others His mercy and love. This is not really about what we are to do, but about who we are. We are the children of the heavenly Father, brothers and sisters of the Jesus who went quietly to the cross. He is the vine and we are the branches; we have His sap, His blood running through us. Jesus has declared us to be His holy ones, and good trees produce good fruit.
So Jesus outlines the good fruit of merciful children of the merciful Father. “Judge not, condemn not, forgive and give. This is how the Father shows You mercy, this is how you show mercy to your neighbor. Is there any time that the Father has held back His love for you? Has His forgiveness ever failed? Then you what you are supposed to do and how you are to live with your neighbors. “Be merciful as your Father is merciful.” And this applies not just to ourselves as individuals, but as families and even as a congregation. We ask a good question when we say, “How can our family show forth the Lord's mercy?” or “How could our congregation, Hope Lutheran Church, show forth the Lord's mercy to those around us?” We pray that we nuts wouldn't fall far from our Father's tree, the cross of Jesus.
“But pastor,” you say, “I'm not merciful, not like I ought to be, not like Jesus is.” This is true as well. Praise God that our lovelessness does not stop His mercy. He knows we need help, and He gives it. He even puts before us the meal of His mercy, in which He feeds us with His cross, His mercy, His love and forgiveness and compassion in His broken body and spilt blood. Here He sets us free from worry and free to love and forgive our neighbor. His mercy, over and over again, give us all that we need to be merciful.
May God grant us His Holy Spirit, that we would see clearly His great mercy and love for us. Amen.
And the peace of God which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
+ + +
Pastor Bryan Wolfmueller
Hope Lutheran Church | Aurora, CO
