- Boasting!
- We Australians don’t go in for boasting
- We don’t like to boast and dislike people who boast.
- Yet today I want to boast and I want you all to join with me in my boasting.
- I don’t want to boast about myself because I don’t have much to boast of with you, let alone with God.
- I don’t want to boast about Luther or the Lutheran Church on this celebration of the Reformation, even though we can quite rightly be proud of our heritage
- No, I want to boast about the good things that the risen Lord Jesus offers to all believers: his presence with us in the divine service and his gifts to those who are justified before God the Father through faith in him.
- My message is: Let anyone who boasts boast in the Lord.
- These days many of us are ashamed to admit that they are Christians, let alone Lutherans.
- That’s never been fashionable and has always been countercultural.
- But bad has become worse because the reputation of the church tarnished by sex abuse and child abuse
- Yet we do have three wonderful things to boast about, three things that far outweigh all this, three things that are amazingly true.
- We have three blessings that we all too often take for granted because we don’t pay attention to the presence of Jesus and what he promises to do for us.
- We have three good reasons to boast because of what Jesus gives us every Sunday.
- Well what then do we have to boast about?
- Boast 1: Since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Jesus Christ.
- Most people aren’t at peace with themselves and others and God: unsettled and uneasy, anxious and restless.
- They feel that they don’t do what they should do and aren’t as good as they should be.
- When they think about God or hear about him, they feel guilty because they have broken His commandments and ashamed because they aren’t good enough for Him.
- They sense that they are living on borrowed time
- They fear that a day of reckoning will come when they will have to settle their accounts and pay their debts.
- They realise that they face spiritual bankruptcy.
- So they avoid God and live with an uneasy conscience.
- But that’s not your situation.
- You can come to church each Sunday to confess your sins to God the Father.
- You can receive the absolution, God’s final sentence that you guilty but pardoned.
- So later in this letter St Paul rightly claims: There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
- This means that you can now approach God the Father with a clear conscience.
- You don’t have to fear His disapproval and rejection.
- You know that God is as pleased with you as He is with Jesus
- Since you have a good conscience through your faith in Jesus, you now have peace with God the Father.
- So you can truly boast: since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
- Boast 2: Since we are justified by faith we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand.
- The Israelites had limited access to God’s presence and grace at the temple in Jerusalem.
- Ordinary people approached God at the altar for burnt offering where they presented their offerings, said their prayers, and received His blessing there.
- The priests approached God in the Holy Place each morning and evening where they stood in for the whole nation before Him, presented the daily sacrifice, and obtained God’s grace, His acceptance of His people.
- The high priest entered the Holy of Holies once a year when he dealt with the sins of the whole nation and so cleansed the people from the guilt of their sin.
- But that access was occasional and partial because it depended on the repeated presentation of sacrifices.
- We have unlimited access to God’s gracious presence through Jesus for ourselves and others.
- Jesus has brought heaven down to earth for us and now ushers us earthlings into God’s presence as we hear His word and receive His body and blood.
- He assures us that his Heavenly Father is well-pleased with us
- Since God is pleased with us, we are in a state of grace.
- God is so pleased with us that He pours out his Holy Spirit on us and showers His heavenly blessings on us in our life here on earth as a foretaste of life with Him in heaven.
- We stand together with Jesus before God and share in his status as God’s Son.
- He regards us as if we were Jesus and treats us like him.
- So we come to church to receive all the good things that belong to Jesus: Holy Spirit, his life, his love, his blessings
- Since everything that belongs to Jesus belongs to us, it is available on request to us.
- We can pray for whatever He has promised to give us and be sure that we will hear our prayer.
- We can even use our access to God’s grace to pray for others and the whole world: our unique contribution
- Boast 3: Since we are justified by faith we boast in the hope of sharing the glory of God.
- We have the hope for something better than the best that we have ever had, a sure and certain hope even in our troubles, because God has poured His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, the Spirit that Jesus gives us.
- More than anything else we all long to be loved
- We want our parents and children, spouse and friends to love us.
- But we are all limited in our capacity to love and be loved.
- So we are all too oftendisappointed in love: cut losses, diminish expectations, and give up hope of ever being really loved.
- Yet through your faith in Jesus and your union with Him, you have a heavenly Father who loves you far more lavishly than even the people closest to you.
- God the Father loves each of you as dearly as He loves His Son.
- You are just as dear and precious to Him as Jesus.
- He showed His love for you by sacrificing Him on the cross for you
- He loved you to death, the death of His Son.
- But He has not just done this for you long ago in the dim and distant past.
- He lavishes His love on you by giving each of you His Holy Spirit though Jesus: first fruit of the Spirit
- He pours out His Spirit on you and in you like a never-ending river each Sunday as you hear His word and receive Christ’s body and blood.
- He does not withhold Himself from you but opens His heart to you when you trust in Him.
- By loving you so lavishly, He opens your heart to receive more and more love from Him and learn to love as he loves us.
- Jesus joins you in your troubles to show how much he values you and increase your faith in him.
- He sticks with you through thick and thin.
- He uses your troubles to make you better lovers, people who are able to receive His love and pass it on to others.
- He uses your troubles to produce patient endurance, a godly character, and a hopeful heart.
- So because God persists in loving us, even when we are unfaithful, ungracious and loveless, we have hope for ourselves and others and the whole world.
- We need not give up on ourselves and others, because we have the hope of the glory of God
- We are sure that no matter what good things we have experienced, the best is yet to come.
- The best is yet to come from Him in this life and in the life to come as we pass from darkness into His lovely light, the glory of His radiant presence that glorifies us with His brightness.
- So we boast in the hope of sharing the glory of God, because God’s love has poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
- So dear fellow people of faith, you have much to boast of, because the risen Lord Jesus meets you when you come to meet with him here today.
- You are in a state of grace, a place where you have access to God’s heavenly gifts for yourself and others here on earth.
- You have God’s peace, His grace, and the hope of sharing in His glory.
- You are far more privileged than you can ever imagine.
- You have so much to receive and so much to pass on to others.
- You have so much to hope for, so much to look forward to for yourself and others.
- That’s why you have good reason to boast today and every day of your life.
- So be proud of Jesus and boast in him.
- To him be the glory now and always. Amen
