Pentecost 2 (A) – Romans 6:12-23
A couple of weeks ago we got an email from Rich Simpson, who is the senior pastor at the Episcopal church. He sent it out to all of the clergy here in Holden; we have a gathering of clergy here in town, and the message he sent us was that the lectionary, the assigned readings of each Sunday for this year, has Romans in it for weeks, starting this week and going through to the end of the summer. And really, it would have started earlier but Easter was so late this year. And he said, “I’m going to focus on Romans in my preaching and study, and I think it would be neat if all of you did too.” So he issued that challenge, and Dan and I talked about it, and we decided to do the same–sort of a one Holden, one scripture summer. So, while we’re not tied to it, for the next about 10 weeks, up through the beginning of September, we’ll be looking at the book of Romans. And I invite you to dwell in it with us too this summer; we’ll certainly be exploring it in worship on Sundays, but it’s worth reading at home too. It’s that book of the Bible that, when Luther first read it, that’s when he got it and said, “Oh, the good news of Jesus Christ really is good news!” So, Romans really is a good book, it’s worth making a part of your life, and I hope you enjoy this journey as much as I’m sure I will.
I want to start by telling a story. And usually when I tell stories in my sermons, they’re my own stories from my own life, or those of people I care for who have invited me to share their stories, but I have to give credit where credit is due today. This is a Garrison Keillor story. And it’s a good one. It’s a fictional story, but you can hear the truth behind it. It goes like this:
One day, a pastor in the midwest somewhere was sitting in her study working on her sermon when there was a knock at the door. And it turned out to be a family–a man, a woman, and an infant. They were driving across the country when the mother had this vision, this sudden sense that they should make God a part of their lives, that they should have their baby baptized. And so she felt driven to stop at the first church they came to, and here they were, and “Could you please baptize our daughter.” So the pastor ran around and made some phone calls, and found someone in the community to be Godparents. (Now, how do you be godparents when you’re not even living in the same town? She said, well, just promise to pray for her as she grows.) And there in the living room of the parsonage, they poured water over the baby’s head, and prayed, and spoke God’s name, and God’s grace was a part of this child’s life. It wasn’t until about twenty minutes after this family had left that the pastor discovered a large sum of money missing from her purse, and some silver heirloom candlesticks, and a gold frame surrounding a picture of her father.
Paul says in today’s lesson, we are slaves. And actually before I go any further, I should qualify that. Paul is writing in a community and time where slavery is accepted and understood to be normal and appropriate. And we I hope hear that with the weight of hundreds of years of oppression of people of color in our country. And the heritage of slavery that is deep and painful and filled with struggle. One where even today, people whose heritage includes slavery are still affected deeply economically and culturally. And one where even though slavery is illegal, Lutheran Social Services still employs a large group of people–lawyers and social workers–to deal with forms of slavery here in Massachusetts. So by using slavery as a metaphor along with Paul, I don’t want to diminish the experience of people for whom slavery really is a part of their lives.
But in a–metaphorical–but very real way, we are slaves. Like that family traveling across the country who has to co-opt God’s grace, who has to twist it, in order to steal enough to keep themselves alive, who are slaves to money and their economic situation. We have things in our lives that keep us enslaved. It may like them be money; money is a bit thing for us. It might be our possessions. I’m genuinely worried that this fall, my landlord will raise my rent–it’s what landlords do–and I’m paid well enough to afford it but it will be a little harder of course. So I’d like to think about moving, looking for a new place to live, but I don’t want to move all those books again, not to mention a washer and dryer. Possessions, the “stuff” that we have, keep us enslaved in the place that we are. It can be as trivial as, well, you’ve heard the phrase, “A slave to fashion.” But there are people who go and buy an entire new wardrobe every season because they have to look just right. We’re enslaved by our illnesses that keep us trapped, that keep us unable to live and survive and thrive. We’re enslaved by the relationships that we have. I heard a story this week of a woman who lived for thirty years under the thumb of her father, just because her father was of a different generation and mindset. But her life was painful and controlled, every inch of it. What is it in your life that enslaves you? There’s something.
There must be something because that’s what Paul is trying to say at the beginning of his letter to the Romans. See, he’s writing to this community of Christians who once were Jewish, and they’re complaining about their neighbors who are Christians but never Jewish, who once were pagan. They’re complaining about them because they don’t quite behave the way that good Christians “should.” They weren’t raised right, with the right tradition and the right family and the right heritage. And Paul says, you’re right, they do act awful strange. They don’t follow the Law, and that’s troubling. And neither do you. And neither do I. By the time that Paul is done, he’s convicted not only them, but his his audience and himself. He says we are all enslaved to sin–sin in whatever form owns us and controls us and runs our lives. And we can’t get away from it. Not on our own.
And so his message is twofold: First he wants to say, “Quit judging your neighbor, because you have enough problems of your own.” But more importantly, he says, “That’s why we need Jesus Christ.” That for Paul is what this is all about. We who are stuck in sin are given Jesus Christ who was God, and by Jesus’ death and resurrection we are made holy and new. And still not free.
Funny to think of it that way in a culture where we are so certain we have freedom, where we’re about to celebrate it in a week, on July 4th, Independence Day, where we talk about how free we are. And yet, we aren’t. No matter where we go, no matter what we do, we may have some choice in our lives, but we are still controlled by some other master.
But the good news is, in our Baptism in Jesus Christ, our owner isn’t sin anymore. It’s God. When we are Baptized, when we become part of this Christian family, we belong to God–not to ourselves, not to the world, not to our pocketbooks, not to our possessions, but to God. And so in our Baptism, we are given the ability to follow a good and holy and righteous master.
Keillor’s story isn’t over. He says that the pastor runs and gets in the car, taking off after the family that robbed her, a foolish thing to do because, well, what’s she going to do if and when finds them, run them off the road? Follow them all the way to Seattle? But she does find them, their car broken down, run out of gas just outside of town. The people are embarrassed and horrified, and return her things, and while she’s able to get her heirlooms back, she gives the money to the people. “You need this more than me,” she says. And she calls back to town, and finds a mechanic that can get them back on the road. And she has the ability to do all of this, these things that seem absurd to the world, only because of who she serves, because of the God that rules over her and gives new life. And only because of the grace that she received, and that she trusts is with this family and this infant who was just baptized.
Because as Paul says, the wages of sin are death. If we follow sin, it leads to our destruction. But in Christ we have life. And so the good news this Sunday is that we don’t have to be worried about what we do, or what we say. We don’t have to worry that we get it all right. We don’t even have to worry when we screw up sometimes. Because we do sin. But at the end of the day, God is the one who stands for us, who cares for us, who loves us, who is directing our lives. And if God is our master, if we are following Jesus Christ, then the path we follow will bring us to newness of life. For those of us who are captive sin, this is radical good news.