Romans 12:9-21; Exodus 3:1-15
Bethel KUMC 8/31/08
Rev. Marc Sherrod, ThD
After the first 11 chapters of rather thick theological writing on critical topics such as sin, the wrath of God, baptism, grace, salvation, divine righteousness, and Israel’s place in Christian eschatology, chapters 12-16 of the Romans epistle thrust the reader back into the world of everyday joys and sorrows and the challenge of rubbing elbows with people you may not like but, nonetheless, are supposed to love; the place where faith gets practiced and the Christian life receives its stiffest tests and the missionary seeks to win converts to Christ within the testy, contested religious terrain in and around First Century Rome.
If you were to attempt a quick genealogy of orthodox theology, fingering the pulse of the bloodline back through figures like the brothers Reinhold and H. Richard Niebuhr and the Puritan pastor Jonathan Edwards here in America, John Calvin in the late 16th century Geneva, St. Augustine in the North Africa of the 3rd, then it would finally be back to the Apostle Paul, there to find the heart of orthodox Christian theology and the church’s teachings about the cross and the meaning of the death of Jesus – the gospels tell the story but Paul is the one who turns its meaning over and over again in his mind.
Paul has finished writing his letters to his various missionary churches – the church in Thessalonica, Galatia, Philippi, Corinth, among others, by the year 60, about the time the first Gospel, the Gospel of Mark, was first being preserved in written form. So, his theological reflections on the message of Jesus actually predate the church’s earliest narratives about the life and ministry of Jesus. And within Paul’s corpus, it’s the first 12 chapters of Romans that have marked the enduring features of Christian theology.
Paul, a Jewish mystic, felt the call to reform Judaism based on the teachings of the rabbi Jesus, having had that famous encounter with the risen Jesus on the road to Damascus. Gentiles, that is, anyone not Jewish, became his primary missionary audience, particularly the God-fearers or seekers whom he often conversed with in the synagogues, engaging in discussion and argument, and whom Paul now tries to convince should “cross over” from pagan religious practices into the fellowship of the church.
Few would argue with the statement that Paul’s stature is second only to Jesus in the formation of the Church. In fact, it’s hard to imagine the enterprise of Christian theology without coming to terms with his reflections on the “gospel as the power of God for salvation,” and Romans, the last letter he wrote, is his magnum opus on that subject.
With much of the population illiterate, and, more critically, scarce writing materials and with scrolls and codicii (book-like pages of text) owned mostly only by the wealthy few, Paul’s letters were customarily read out loud when the congregation would gather in the tight quarters of a house church. We think there may have been 2000 Christians, at most, scattered across the Roman empire in Paul’s day, with 10-20 being a typical number who gathered in the small apartment above a leather-making or butcher’s shop, for instance, run by one of the members.
I, who have a hard time following Paul’s polemic in Romans with the hard copy in front of me and a highlighter in hand, can scarcely imagine trying to follow his theological reasoning aurally, (i.e. with the ears alone, although first century folk were far better at that than we). So, for the diligent reader, it’s the proverbial “breath of fresh air,” finally, to reach chapter 12 and his transition from theology to ethics, from weighty, complex thoughts and allusions to the intricacies of the Hebrew scriptures and interpretation to an actual “to do” list for those who have been baptized, joined the church, and now need guidance about how to live the life of faith. Finally, something I can understand!
Chapter 12 begins with that resounding summons to “offer our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship,” continues with an affirmation of diversity within the body, providing examples of key spiritual gifts, then into our short paragraph offering guidelines for Christian conduct, then concluding with another paragraph on several complex ethical issues of the day including examples of the proper Christian response to persecution, or to the desire for revenge, or the need to treat others well even if you’ve been treated badly.
Whatever ability we have to live the Christian life is, of course, a response to grace, as Paul wants to make clear early in this chapter 12. Because of that grace, each one has a spiritual gift, but not all have received the same gift. The mix of gifts, not to mention, egos, in the church, means we need pretty much constant encouragement and exhortation to be doing what we’re supposed to be doing, and that’ what Paul offers in the second half of Romans 12.
It’s hard to know where to begin, because there’s really not a phrase that doesn’t strike home. Close your eyes, put your finger on a word or two, and you have a topic sentence for how you should live your life as a Christian. But, sometimes, things get hidden even though they are in plain sight, so it doesn’t hurt to be reminded of the obvious:
“Let love be genuine,” he writes. Of course, love should never be pretentious, self-serving, hypocritical.
“show mutual affection,” says Paul. Obviously, baptism makes everyone equal, a radical concept in his day or any day; and so, belonging with other believers in community is about all being the same even if one has a three-car garage while another has to sneak by the food pantry at the end of the month;
“Be patient in suffering,” he counsels. Definitely, the assurance of Christ’s salvation translates into a willingness to endure illness or disappointment or grief with steadfast faith, despite pain or sorrow.
Sure, Christians should give when others have a need, be a people of hope not despair, and welcome strangers and newcomers with the welcome of Christ. Take a word or phrase from any verse here, and what devout Christian could argue?
Jesus summarized his own ethic based on one of Judaism’s most ancient of commandments: “love your neighbor as you love yourself;” and the history of Christianity could be written as a history of trying to motivate people to live these words, or as the popular catch-phrase now goes, “don’t just talk the talk but walk the walk.” Paul would have us understand that the expectations of being baptized into Christ are pretty plain: love, serve, honor the other, rejoice in hope, be patient, persevere when the going gets tough, contribute money or goods to those in need, show hospitality, which meant especially being open to receive into fellowship people quite different from yourself.
Now, the difficult thing is of course, that each one has to discern the “how” part, for himself, herself, always the hardest part, how, how do I to build my bridge across that gap between belief and practice, the difference between what happens on Sunday and the rest of the week.
I read about one person who describes the dilemma in this way: “On Sunday morning I walk into a world that is the way God meant it to be. People are considerate of one another. Strangers are welcomed. We pray for justice and peace. Our sins are forgiven. We all face in one direction, and we worship the same God. When it’s over, I get in my car to drive home feeling so full of love its unbelievable, but by the time I’ve gone twenty minutes down the road, it has begun to wear off. By Monday morning, it’s all gone, and I’ve got another whole week to wait until Sunday rolls around” (Taylor, Vocation, p.23)
Sure, the church and the staff and the leaders can offer programs and ministries and groups and activities and trips and meetings and readings and worthy causes, but it really does boil down to what you’ve decided you are going to do with your own baptism, your own faith, your own post-Sunday morning life. In another letter, Paul writes: “work out your salvation with fear and trembling,” which may put us on the slippery slope towards a religion of works righteousness instead of grace alone, but which should also remind us that we’ve got a lot of work to do, and neither right belief nor Sunday morning, in and of themselves, will finally get us there.
I once read that a certain dictionary gave this definition of the word Christian: “A Christian is someone who is nice.” Now, I ask you, is that the best we can offer, to this world, to this community, to one another, to be seen as nice people? A word my dictionary defines as “pleasant,” “agreeable,” “satisfactory,” “good-natured,” “polite.” Sure, but . . . isn’t there more?
I also suspect we have somehow managed to reduce the outward mark of being a Christian to its lowest common denominator, which is church-going, and we have failed to see how much being a Christian can, at best, only but start when we gather here, that we need a vocabulary full of verbs to give faith life.
This holiday weekend does not, like other holidays such as Christmas and Easter, have its roots in any religious observance, but Labor Day should remind all of us that we have work to do. The word many would only dare whisper is the word that really sets us free to do what scripture asks, and that is the word “vocation.” Another word for the same thing is “calling,” which each of us has by virtue of our baptism.
I suspect you’d rather keep the word “calling” attached to the word “minister” and as a colloquial equivalent of the professional who earns a living doing church work while the lay person, on the other hand, has a regular job or keeps house or does something that is not “full-time church work.” The distinction has its benefits, no doubt, although, truth is, and this is one of the most radical aspects of the gospel in our tradition, I am no less called than you; whether you might wish to put the minister on a pedestal or beneath your foot, we all share the same Christian vocation, the same daily summons to respond to God’s active presence in the life of our world by practicing our faith, by heeding our destiny.
While we are enamored by the Church’s many conversion stories featuring the hero who finally sees the light, becomes a monk, minister or missionary and lives happily ever after, none of us escapes the call because each one has been summoned to participate in the work of God.
You may not agree or think of yourself as having a calling or a religious vocation; chances are, you agree with the woman who listened to a speech on the ministry of the laity as God’s best hope for the world and said, “I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be that important” (Taylor, 24)
Like many of those who sit beside her in church, she hears the invitation to ministry as an requirement to do more – to lead the stewardship drive, cook supper for the homeless or teach VBS. Or she hears the invitation to ministry s an invitation to be more – to be more generous, more loving. But maybe her ministry might involve being just who she already is and doing just what she already does, with one profound difference: namely that she understands herself to be God’s person in and for the world.”
God has called us, and not just those with the word “minister” after our names.
Here’s a few lines from a World Council of Churches 1980 statement on the ecumenical ministry of all Christians from the “Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry” paper, which reads:
Living in communion with God, all members of the Church are called
To confess their faith and to give account of their hope. They are to
Identify with the joys and sufferings of all peple as they seek to witness to
Caring love. They are to struggle with the oppressed toward that freedom
And dignity promised with the coming Kingdom. This mission needs to
Be carried out in varying political, social and cultural contexts, seeking
Relevant forms of witness and service in each situation. In so doing,
Bringing a foretaste of the joy and glory of God’s kingdom.
In his book “Telling Secrets,” part of his spiritual autobiography, Frederic Beuchner, an ordained minister, is reflecting on his desire to shed the idea that somehow his ordination makes him a Christian and gives him a calling in the sense that others are not and do not have. He writes:
I believe [I am called] together with other Christians and would-be Christians,
To consider the lilies of the field, to consider the least of these my brethren,
To consider the dead sparrow by the roadside. Maybe prerequisite to all those, they (meaning all of us) are called upon to consider themselves – what they love and what they fear, what they are ashamed of, what makes them sick to their stomach, what rejoices their hearts. I believe that ministers and everyone are called to consider Jesus of Nazareth in whom God himself showed how crucial human life is by actually living one and hallowed human death by actually dying one and who lives and dies still with us and for us and in spite of us. I believe we are called to see that the day-to-day lives of all of us – the things that happened long ago, the things that happened only this morning – are also hallowed and crucial and part of a great drama in which souls are lost and souls are saved, including our own (p.38).
So, “let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lag in zeal; be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers.
Amen.
