3^rd Sunday after Pentecost (Lectionary 9) “Not Religion, but Faith”

Matthew 7.21-21

1 June 2008

I’d like to tell you a story out of my family archives. It was relayed to me by my great-aunt Minnie, and it is about her grandparents, my great-great-grandparents. They lived in Sweden some 150 years ago. They were middle-class people, quite comfortable in terms of material goods. But the grandfather began to drink and gamble, and when he died at the age of 40, they were deeply in debt. After his death all their property was repossessed except one small house. The creditors even took every stick of furniture, leaving only the cradle in which my great-grandmother, then a child of about 3, slept.

Life was very difficult for that family after that, but the widow was befriended by a young man in his 20’s, a neighbor, who gave them strength and support. Before long the widow fell in love with this young man, twenty years her junior, and the children loved him as well.

Unfortunately, as is too often the case, all the good Christian townspeople began to gossip about this budding romance. Remarks like that can be hateful and harmful. My Aunt Minnie, who was not a particularly emotional person, began to cry as she told me this story about these grandparents she had never even met. Her grandmother, it seems, began to hear these terrible rumors and stories, and she told her young man what people were saying about them. He replied very gently, “Let them say what they will. We must just be sure that our Christian faith can be seen in our lives.” Eventually they married, in spite of the age difference and the gossip, and they were devoted to one another for the rest of their lives.

I think this little story illustrates something in our gospel lesson today. This lesson comes at the send of the Sermon on the Mount, and we hear Jesus insist that true Christians are not those who say, “Lord, Lord,” but those who hear his commandments and do them—those, in other words, whose faith is carried out in their lives. He had in mind the Pharisees, who stressed the importance of piety and religion. Those people, Jesus said, are like a man who builds his house on sand. They think that their piety is going to save them. Perhaps they are like the townspeople in Aunt Minnie’s story—good church people, very religious, who are absolutely outraged at what they think is the scandalous behavior of this widow and her young beau. But Jesus says that kind of piety is no good. What is important, he says, is that people hear the commandments of God, and do them. The young man who expressed his love and concern for a family in need was doing the will of God; the pious townsfolk who could do nothing but condemn and criticize were not. The Christian faith could be seen in the young man’s life; the pious townsfolk may have been very religious, but there was little of the gospel in their lives.

Jesus, you know, was not very easy on religion. In his estimation, the religious people of his day were hypocrites. That’s why he spent his time with people who were not respectable, people who were known to be sinners and outcasts. He warned that the religious people were in for a surprise when judgment day rolled around: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven. They will say to me, ‘Lord, look at all the religious things we have done. We prophesied in your name, we cast out demons in your name, we did great things in your name.’ But I will say to them, ‘Depart from me, you evil-doers.’” And of course so many of Jesus’ parables make the same point—many who think they are good, religious people will finally stand condemned because their so-called religion never showed up in their day to day lives.

This is a warning that all of us who are active in the church need to hear again and again. So often we fall into the trap of thinking that our religion satisfies what Christ demands. We go to church, sing hymns, give money, volunteer—all, of course, very good things to do. But what Christ wants is our lives. Sometimes we are like the Pharisees who say, “Here, Lord, take my money, my time, take anything—but just don’t make me really change. Don’t make me obey those commandments about loving my enemy, forgiving those who hurt me. Let me off the hook on those things, Lord; I’ll support the church, try to be a good person. But just don’t ask me for everything.”

We Lutherans could take a lesson from Martin Luther. Luther tried so hard to be good, to be religious—until one day he realized that all his religiousness wouldn’t save him, and that no matter how good he was, he couldn’t buy salvation. He wanted God to accept him, but no matter how much he did, he just couldn’t find any peace. What was it that God wanted of him?

It was so simple, and it still is. What God wanted was not religion but faith. What God wanted was not a big pile of religious activities, but simple trust. Paul tells us this so clearly in today’s second lesson: “There is no distinction. Since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, they are now justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” Put it another way: What God wanted was for Luther to stop trying to prove that he was so religious, to recognize instead that he was just a sinful man, like everyone else, and to accept the gift that God offered in Jesus Christ. And Luther did. He came to see God’s salvation as a gift, given to those who believe and trust in him.

Someone told me once about a conversation she was having with someone at work. She was talking about something going on at her church, and her co-worker said, “My, you’re certainly religious, aren’t you?” “No,” she replied, “I’m a Christian.” That’s what it’s all about, you see. A religious person is someone who really works at the problem of getting close to God, who attends church, who tries to do everything that is necessary, who prides himself on how devout he is. A Christian is someone who says, “Lord, I’m not very good. But you are good, and I know you care for me. Please help me.” A religious person knows all about God, all about what God requires, all about what God wants. A Christian’s hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness, and she believes with all her heart that Christ has done all this that I may be his own, live under him in his kingdom, and serve him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness. A religious person builds a magnificent house on a pile of sand. A Christian builds on the rock, on Christ the solid rock.