Oak Chapel United Methodist Church

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My text this morning is from Paul's letter to the Christians in Galatia, (a Roman province, in modern -day Turkey): Chapter 6, verse 14. "May I never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." Strong words in a strong letter. Galatians was written to believers who had received the faith some years before, probably from Paul himself, but were now in serious danger of backsliding. What had happened was this: some Jewish Christians had come to Galatia from Jerusalem and tried to persuade the believers there that they should add to their Christianity a few Jewish elements, most notably circumcision. Paul hears about it and is appalled. "O, you foolish Galatians," he writes. You have been freed from the law (and all the permutations of the law) - you have been freed from all that religious hocus-pocus by the Gospel of Christ. Would you now return to slavery? Would you voluntarily put the chains back on?

"These people who are misleading you, luring you back to a legalistic religion of rules and rituals, are doing so for one reason: so they can justify their easy version of Christianity and avoid the persecution that comes with really accepting the cross of Christ (Yes, it is easier, and makes you feel more secure, to imagine yourself righteous because you comply with all the rules -- because you don't curse, or drink, or smoke -- than it is to live in the radical freedom Christ makes possible.) These people feel righteous when they convert other people to their way of thinking. They want to count you among their good works, as their converts, like notches on their guns, so they can boast of you to others and before God.

Wouldn't that be a comfortable, easy way to think: do enough good things and you get into heaven. That's what most people believe. Salvation, in that case, is merely a matter of keeping score. So much on the good side of the ledger, so much on the bad, and (presto!) you're either in or you're out. How neat and clean!

But also how burdensome! For, inevitably, legalistic religion generates a million rules, (Today it's circumcision, tomorrow they'll be telling you to eat kosher, and the next day to cut your hair a certain way.), a million rules until we strain under the weight of them. Even worse, legalistic religion leads to self-righteousness. ("I'm better than you because I don't curse, or drink, or smoke." Or "because I laid a lamb on the altar and you only laid a pigeon there." Or "because I don't work on the Sabbath." Or "because I'm circumcised and you're not."

Things to boast about, things that make us feel good about ourselves, "things of the world," Paul called them, "of the flesh." To Paul, religious pride - boasting about our good deeds, or about our prayer life, or about our Bible reading, or our giving - was offensive. It was no better than boasting about our money, or about our bloodlines, or about our position in the world. And it was way off the mark. These things are given to us by the grace of God. So, in regard to all this worldly pride, to all this "feel good" stuff, Paul says, "… I never boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." And now listen to this: "… by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world." Nothing that used to count counts any more. Circumcision or non-circumcision, take your pick! Decide for yourselves what you will eat.

There's a different drummer out there for me. Christ has made me totally new, and different from most other people. He bore me again, by the Spirit this time. And I will never again become entangled in these meaningless disputes about worldly things. Because worldly things don't last - not even religious worldly things - tongues fail (as he says in another place), prophecies fail, knowledge fails. Only three things last: faith, hope and love. And I'm going to focus on these.

The mistake is to think that, if we eliminate the rules (Paul called religious rules "the law."), faith will be easier. Just the opposite is true. Rule-religion is check-off religion. I've done this, this, and this - I must be saved. You remember the rich man who came to Jesus and asked how he could get to heaven. And Jesus said, "You know the commandments." And the man said, "I've done them, every one, since the day I was born." "I can check them off for you right here, Master, if you like. I haven't killed. I've honored my parents. I've not committed adultery." Jesus stopped him. "You're close. Just one more thing. Give everything away." And the man threw in the towel. Rules are fine, the Ten Commandments are just as true today as they were thousands of years ago, but it's where your heart is that really counts - and this man's heart was with his money..

There is a film that has just been released in the video stores called Pay It Forward. Pretty good flick. (Fine acting: Kevin Spacy, Helen Hunt, and little Haley Joel Osment. How could it not be good?) But it was the movie's theme, from which the title comes, that intrigued me. It goes like this: someone does someone else a favor, a very big, life-changing favor, and the recipient (rather than trying to pay it back) pays it forward. He or she does a favor, a very big, life-changing favor, for three other people, and so on. If people would just live like that, what a huge impact it would have on the world.

That's how Paul saw Christian ethics. God has done us a favor, an enormous favor. It has changed our lives forever. We didn't deserve it, and we can't pay it back. So we pay it forward, by lavishing on others the same sacrificial, undeserved love he lavished on us. And their lives will, of course, be changed (not because they begin obeying rules, but because everything they do and say is now a response to unmerited love). What an impact that could have on the world. Paul was already seeing it.

As a young nun Mother Theresa approached the Mother Superior of her convent and asked if she could start an orphanage. "How much money do you have?" "I have two pennies." "Theresa, you know you can't start an orphanage with two pennies." "But with two pennies and God I can do it." God empowers us. By the cross of Christ, Paul said, "the world is crucified to me, and I to the world." In the world's eyes, two pennies is nothing. In the world's eyes, orphans are nothing. But the world is no longer germane. It's was crucified to us when it crucified Jesus. Come, bring the two pennies and let us see what God can do with them. Not bad! Not bad!

A cartoon in the New York Times shows a stodgy, older couple. The woman is staring at the man, looking a little puzzled, and he is saying, "Certainly I like ballet, but not to watch." But the nature of ballet is to be watched! We might imagine someone saying, "Certainly I like the Christian faith, but not to live." That makes no sense, for the nature of the Christian faith is to be lived. It's not a conglomeration of rules and regulations to be pondered and debated in monasteries and seminaries. It is not a series of obligations, like circumcision, confession, holy communion. (Wouldn't that be easy, if that were all there was to it.) But, it is a mission. It demands not lip service but life service. It is not an easy life to live, for there are no maps or street sign directing us, as "the law" used to direct us. Christian living is something of the heart. It is a lifetime of gratitude and of giving. The world is crucified to us, and us to the world, and we are lost - "lost," as the hymn writer said, "in wonder, love and grace."