Reflection on Romans 3:19-28

Romans 3:19-28

¹⁹ Now we know that, whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world may be held accountable to God. ²⁰ For no human will be justified before him by deeds prescribed by the law, for through the law comes the knowledge of sin.

  ²¹ But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been disclosed and is attested by the Law and the Prophets, ²² the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction, ²³ since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; ²⁴ they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, ²⁵ whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over the sins previously committed; ²⁶ it was to demonstrate at the present time his own righteousness, so that he is righteous and he justifies the one who has the faith of Jesus.
  ²⁷ Then what becomes of boasting? It is excluded. Through what kind of law? That of works? No, rather through the law of faith. ²⁸ For we hold that a person is justified by faith apart from works prescribed by the law.

Reflection

“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” (Romans 3:23-24).

She showed up later than the rest of us to summer Bible camp.  And her arrival was noticeable.  We were all in shorts, T-shirts, and old shoes, typical summer camp attire.  But she came wearing black leather pants, a Megadeath graphic T, and knuckle rings with spikes, as if she was expecting to defend herself against us Bible-toting Lutherans at any moment.  Her appearance screamed, “The sinner has arrived!” 

Later, in the week, as we became friends, I learned that the spikes were intentional.  A group of men had seen it appropriate use a 14-year-old girl in unspeakable ways that I had not yet learned about in health class.  In her world there was a price that you had to pay to get through life.  In her case, she paid for protection and friendship with her body.

After sharing the shameful reality of her life with me in private later that week, what she said as she approached our group on that first day made a lot more sense.  You see, she came up to our group and asked commandingly, “So, what do I have to do to get some love from you guys?”

And knowing her background made the camp counselor’s response even more powerful as I looked back on that first day.  “You don’t have to do anything,” the counselor said.  “This is your family for the week, and we love you already.  Come have a seat with your family.”  His words of grace struck her silent for a moment, and with a smile she took a seat next to me.  “I think this week is going to be good,” she whispered in me ear.

There is no camp activity, or lesson plan, or campfire teaching that could convey the reality of “grace as a gift” more powerfully than that simple interaction between potentially disruptive camper and camp counselor (Romans 3:24).  “You don’t have to do anything.”  There was no horrible and shameful thing that she had to do to be part of Christ’s family.  There was nothing that she needed to prove to be worthwhile to us.  At least for one week, she lived a life of friendship and freedom from those who would hurt.  For one week she could simply be the funny and carefree teenage girl that she was created to be.  For one week she got to experience true life and true love.  By Wednesday of that week, the spikes were gone, and the summer shorts had come out.

I wonder if Jesus had her in mind as he went to the cross to redeem us; to claim us from the rotten places that we lose ourselves.  I wonder if he wanted the blood from his hands and feet to drop across her face, drips of pure life; a bath of real love in a dark and confusing world such as her own.  And I wonder if he smiled as faith welled up within her soul, and she finally saw herself not as a tool to be used, but as a beloved child of God with a life and purpose of her own?

“I have done some terrible things,” she whispered in my ear more than once that week, the black lipstick a reflection of what she felt inside.  “It doesn’t matter; you are with God’s family now” I responded.  The reality of God’s grace as a pure gift settling more and more within my own soul. 

I think that most Christians have a point like this in our lives where we come to realize that it is not about us being better and doing better.  It is Satan who whispers, “You are not good enough.  You are rotten.  You have to prove yourself.  Be better.  Do more.  Save yourself, because no one is going to save you.” 

At what point did you realize that it was all a lie?  Was it at Bible camp?  At what point did it finally dawn on you that trying to be great only reveals that you are not all that great?  Was it after you failed the hundredth time?  And, at what point did you finally realize that even though we fail to be faithful to God again and again, that Jesus is faithful to us in a way that we could never be?  We push away.  Jesus draws close.  We fail to trust.  Jesus trusts for us.  We sin.  Jesus washes it away.  Jesus is faithful to us in a way that we could never be.  He is faithful to us all the way to the cross.

“The righteousness of God has been disclosed and is attested by the Law and the Prophets, the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who believe” (Romans 3:21-22).

“It was after my divorce,” the woman admitted.  “I felt like I had tried the best that I could, and it was never good enough.  I could not be good enough for him.  I could not be sorry enough for how I had hurt him.  I could not transform in the ways that he wanted.  I finally realized that I could not be good enough and would never be good enough.  I needed divine intervention!  Actually, I needed someone who would just love me, as messed up as I was.  He never gave that to me, but I found it in Jesus.  His grace found me at my lowest and that was what I needed.”

Martin Luther once said, “A man must completely despair of himself in order to become fit to obtain the grace of Christ.”  So many times, grace comes only when we have failed and realize that we are not enough.

“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, whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith” (Romans 3:23-24).

How many wars have started because people were trying to prove themselves?  How many needless fights have occurred because those involved could not admit to being wrong or worse, could not admit to being weak?  How many lives have been stepped on by the powerful who desperately need to build legacies? 

What if we all realized that we have nothing to prove?  What if we all realized that we are already important to God?  What if we just trusted that Jesus has us held tight in the palm of his hand?  What if we truly let it sink in that grace is a gift, and there is nothing that needs to be done to earn it?

It takes courage to let go of control…to let go of the doing.  It takes courage to trust that Jesus has us covered.  Luther once said that "Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times."

Or maybe faith is not something that you need to drum up courage to embrace.  Maybe, grace simply finds you.  Maybe grace is a camp counselor telling you that you do not have to do anything to be loved by God or loved by God’s people.  “This is your family for the week,” the counselor said, “and we love you already.  Come have a seat with your family.”

Come and find your place with the one who loves you because he wants to.  Come and find your place with the one who justifies you and makes you right and good and whole.  Come and find your rest in God’s grace.  As Martin Luther once said, "We find no rest for our weary bones unless we cling to the word of grace."  Cling to the one who loves you anyway.  Cling to the one who gives you “his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24).

Reflection on Luke 18:1-8

 

Luke 18:1-8 (NRSVue)

18 Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. ² He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. ³ In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my accuser.’ ⁴ For a while he refused, but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, ⁵ yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’ ” ⁶ And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. ⁷ And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? ⁸ I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

Reflection

God listens to prayers.  If there is one thing that the Bible makes abundantly clear, it is that God listens to prayers.  Way back in Egypt, when “the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help,” the Bible says, “Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.” (Exodus 2:23-25). God heard their prayers and acted.

That same truth echoes in Psalm 34:17. It promises that “When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles.” 

God not only listens to your prayers, but also to the prayers of people who may need to be protected against you.  For example, if you have someone’s cloak as collateral for a debt, you are instructed by God that you must return it before the cold of the night comes because, “that is his only covering, and it is his cloak for his body; in what else shall he sleep? And if he cries to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate” (Exodus 22:26-27). 

God hears all of our prayers, especially when we are being treated unfairly, and God acts.  The Bible is clear.

Jesus even tells us this whole parable about a widow who sought out justice.  She wanted things to be made right.  The widow sought the help of a judge who happened to have no respect for anyone.   But the Bible says that she “kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grand me justice against my accuser” (Luke 18:3).  After being ignored again and again, and after persistently asking, again and again for things to be made right, the widow was finally heard. 

The Bible says that it is because of her persistence that justice finally came.  Annoyed at her persistence the judge says, “Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming’” (Luke 18:4-5). 

She made herself the squeaky wheel. 

I have seen many of these squeaky wheels throughout life.  They usually look a lot like parents who are just trying to get the school to recognize that their child needs help with learning.  Or they look like the spouse trying to convince the doctor to keep trying as their loved one slowly slips away toward death.  I have known a couple of nuns who were relentless in their attempts to expose the training of children for guerilla warfare in South America. 

All of them make their requests known again, and again, and again, never stopping; never accepting the status quo; never listening to the voices of those who say, “Just let it go already.”  Jesus teaches the opposite.  Jesus teaches that we do not just let it go already, especially when it comes to prayer.  Jesus teaches that if even a corrupt and faithless judge finally gives in and listens, how much more will God listen to our pleas?

If Jesus were walking around on earth in bodily form today, I am convinced that Jesus could have told a parable about the child who says, “Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom” until the mother finally gives up the important thing that she is doing and answers the child.  Now, if a mom listens to that sort of nerve scraping request, how much more will God listen? 

I would just like to point out that Jesus is truly requesting that you be annoyingly persistent in your prayers.  It is the one time in life when being annoying is appreciated.  There is a certain amount of faith or trust found in the person who annoyingly prays that things be made right over and over and over again.  It is a faith that says, “Even though I did not see you answer the first time I asked, I know that you, O God, will hear and that you will act.” 

I think that is where I fall short in my prayers.  When I pray, I think that I unintentionally picture God as being like the unjust judge in the parable.  You know the unjust judge.  He hears the requests of the widow again and again and again.  She is desperate for things to be made right, but to him, she is like a mosquito.  She is small and annoying, with little power to affect much of anything.  She is easy to brush off as unimportant and of little consequence.  She is a poor widow after all.  What is she going to do?  She has no power in her culture.  She is easy to dismiss, and so he does. 

I think that is how I, unconsciously picture my relationship with God.  I am just an annoying little mosquito to God.  My requests, when considering the enormity of the concerns of the world, seem like nothing.  But, unlike the widow, I tend to ask once and give up, uncertainty covering my prayer with a dark glaze and blinding me to God’s response.

One day, while learning to be a chaplain, I found myself alone in a room with a failing, unresponsive patient on a ventilator, with tubes and lines running everywhere.  “Why was I called up here?” I asked myself.  “What good will any of my prayers do?”  I left the lonely room without saying a word.

When I mentioned to my spiritual mentor that I did not understand why I was called up to that room, there was no family around to whom I could minister, and the patient was almost certainly brain dead so my prayers would literally fall on deaf ears, my mentor, who was a kind but firm nun responded, “Who ever said any of this was about you?  What happens to this patient is up to God, so we pray to God.  We pray over and over again to God precisely because we have no control over any of it.  We pray to God because we believe that God listens.”

One truth that I have learned about praying over and over and over again is that when we actually pray again and again and again, we do not lose heart.  The Bible explicitly says that “Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart” (Luke 18:1-8).  There is something about praying again and again and again that reinforces our trust that God will hear and God will do something. 

How will God respond to my prayer?  I have no idea.  Will God do what I want?  Only God knows.  But, by choosing to leave that room and choosing to not pray, I was embarrassingly revealing that I had actually lost heart.  I had lost faith.  I had lost the trust that God would hear and do something.

And, in a world that seems like it is falling apart and there is nothing that we can do about it; it is easy to lose heart and to lose faith.  In the Bible, right before Jesus tells this parable, he had just talked about the dark days ahead.  He had just talked about the last things, and I imagine that the disciples were just standing there; looking around at each other dumbfounded, wondering, “What is the point of it all?”  This parable is Jesus’ answer to those of us who see the world falling apart, who want it all to be right again, but who cannot possibly see how that is ever going to happen anytime soon.

“Will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them?  I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them,” Jesus promises the disciples (Luke 18:7-8). 

“What happens is up to God, so we pray to God,” the nun instructed me.  “We pray over and over and over again to God precisely because we have no control over any of it.  We pray to God because we believe that God listens.” 

We pray persistently because we trust that God hears. We trust the Lord.

When a pastor friend of mine discovered that he was suffering from a tumor the size of a volleyball in his body, his wife asked all of his closest friends to pray.  But, she quite explicitly stated that she did not want any weak and pathetic prayers.  You see, she knows us pastors all too well.  She knows how we develop these eloquent prayers that sound faithful but lack anything bold.  She knows how pastors are too scared of overpromising and under-delivering.  She did not want any of that weak pastoral garbage.  She wanted bold prayers, asking that things be made right.  She wanted prayers, asking nothing short of a miracle.  She wanted prayers that would lead to the saving of his life and the saving of his family.  He could not leave their two boys.  He could not leave her.  She only wanted the boldest of prayers from us.

So, I prayed.  I prayed for him to be healed.  I prayed for the tumor to disappear.  I prayed that those boys would not grow up without their father. 

Did I know how God would answer those prayers?  Of course not! 

God can answer “Yes,” “No,” “Not Yet,” “Something must be learned first,” or “I have something better.”  God’s answer may not be what we expect.  Even Jesus prayed in the garden of Gethsemane before his death that “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; yet, not my will but yours be done” (Luke 22:42).  God’s answer was “I have something better.”  Resurrection and eternal life for us all was a much better answer, but no one faults Jesus for asking.  When we pray, we do not tie ourselves to the outcomes we envision in our heads, rather praying ties us to God so that we do not loose heart.

Jesus deeply desires that we not be people who have lost heart.  Jesus deeply desires that when the Son of Man comes, he will find trust in his people…a deep trust that the Lord will listen and that the Lord will make things right.

It is true after all.  We have a Lord we can trust!  We have a Lord who will go to any extent to make things right.  We have a Lord who will die on a cross to make this broken world right again.  We have a Lord who cares deeply about justice and grace.  We have a Lord to whom we can pray again and again and again, who will listen and who will act.

Be persistent in your prayers.  Do not lose heart.  Be as annoying as possible for the sake of justice.  It is OK; go ahead; Jesus wants to hear your annoying voice.  Your scratchy, annoying voice is truly music to the ears of the Lord who listens.

Reflection on Luke 17:11-19

Luke 17:11-19

¹¹ On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the region between Samaria and Galilee. ¹² As he entered a village, ten men with a skin disease approached him. Keeping their distance, ¹³ they called out, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” ¹⁴ When he saw them, he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were made clean. ¹⁵ Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. ¹⁶ He prostrated himself at Jesus’s feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan. ¹⁷ Then Jesus asked, “Were not ten made clean? So where are the other nine? ¹⁸ Did none of them return to give glory to God except this foreigner?” ¹⁹ Then he said to him, “Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well.”

Reflection

“One of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice. He prostrated himself at Jesus’s feet and thanked him. And he was a Samaritan” (Luke 17:15-16). 

I think the gratitude of the tenth man with the skin disease stems from an amazing realization that can be summed up in words that go something like: “You healed me too.”  It was the gift of being included by Jesus that seems to have brought about that saving faith of the tenth man who was healed of his skin disease.  

It is the same sort of gift of inclusion that a lonely teenage girl on the side of the dance floor feels when, out of nowhere, someone comes up, takes her hand, and whisks her away to dance.  “Someone cares enough to dance with me too?”  

It is the same sort of gift of inclusion that the homeless veteran feels when someone cares to sit down with a cup of coffee to talk and listen.  “You would waste your time on me too?”  

The tenth healed man had a reason to feel that way.  You find the reason right at the end of verse 16: “He was a Samaritan” (Luke 17:16).  He was the enemy.  He was a part of the very people who rejected Jesus just down the road.  Just day before, the disciples asked Jesus to call fire from the skies down on people like him after a Samaritan village refused them hospitality. 

After the ten suffering men called, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” Jesus ordered them all to “Go and show” themselves “to the priests” (Luke 17:13-14).  There is no doubt that the Samaritan’s heart sunk at these words.  As a Samaritan, he could not step foot in the temple, much less show himself to the priests there.  The other nine could excitedly anticipate the healing that would come.  But as a Samaritan he expected nothing, except to be forgotten.  After-all that is what happens when you are different.  That is what happens when you are a hated Samaritan living in a Jewish world.  

So, imagine the Samaritan’s surprise and he looked down and saw that Jesus had included him in the healing too.  The pealing, grey skin that made him look like a member of the living dead was pink and whole once again.  He too had been noticed by Jesus.  He too had been loved.  He too had the chance to live a normal life.  He had been healed too.

Jesus is like that you know.  When Jesus teaches us: “Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you;” in Luke 6:27, Jesus actually follows his own teachings and loves the enemy as well as those who are not.  

Can I just stop for a moment and consider that simple fact.  It is my experience that most people not only hate their enemies, but they also hate the friends of their enemies.  We like to lump entire groups of people into one category, all of whom we can easily hate and dismiss. We love our friends and hate our enemies.

Jesus is not like us.  His view of life is so different.  “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?  For even sinners love those who love them” (Luke 6:32-33).  Instead, Jesus loves his enemies.  Jesus does not distinguish between the deserving and the undeserving before he sets out to heal.  Jesus healed the Samaritan, even though Samaritans were well known to worship in the wrong way, in the wrong place, and associate with the wrong people.  

It is as if Jesus would be willing to go to the cross for people like that Samaritan man.  It is as if “God so loved the world,” and not just those with the right religion, or the right culture, or the right politics (John 3:16).  It is as if Jesus actually cares that people like this Samaritan be saved.  And it was that sort of unconventional and unexpected love of Jesus that caused a healing faith to well up inside the formerly diseased Samaritan.  Curiously, that faith only welled up in him, not the other nine.

Just to be clear, Jesus loved and healed all ten men with the skin disease.  All ten people, sequestered to the edge of the village because of their illness, are healed after they shout out for Jesus to show mercy.  None of them had to prove anything to Jesus to deserve this healing.  None of them had to demonstrate any incredible amount of faith to be touched by the holy.  

I would also like to note even further that the other nine men listened closely to Jesus’ words and did exactly what Jesus told them to do.  Jesus told them to go and show themselves to the priests, as required by their religion to prove that they were clean, and they went away and did exactly that.  They did nothing wrong.

The only difference that I can see between the nine and the one is that only the Samaritan expected that the gift was not for him.  Only the Samaritan had reason to believe that he would be excluded like every other time.  But, when the Samaritan looked down and saw that he was healed too, he could not help but come back with a heart of gratitude and praise for what Jesus had done.

You cannot manufacture this type of gratitude.  It is like forcing your kids to sit down and write thank you notes for their birthday gifts.  It is the right thing to do, but the actual sense of gratitude might be somewhat lacking as you force them to write pre-scripted words of appreciation.  

The difficulty of showing gratitude does not stop with children though.  I have heard many Christians express how they know they need to be more grateful but somehow fall short.  

Surely, we have all heard about the scientific studies that show how much better our mental health becomes when we show gratitude.  Gratitude decreases pain levels.  It allows for better sleep.  It relieves stress.  It reduces anxiety and depression.  And gratitude can even increase your levels of energy.  But knowing the scientific evidence is different from making it happen. 

How do you make yourself grateful?  You cannot just make yourself feel something that you do not feel; can you?

In order to get at that question, I want to point out one more thing that I noticed about the Samaritan that I saw lacking in the other nine.  Maybe you saw it also.  

The Bible says this: “Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice” (Luke 17:15).  This man was the only one who looked down and saw that he was healed.  This is such a small detail, but it is huge.  

The other nine diseased men simply walked off, as they were told to do.  But it is only the Samaritan who took the time to look and notice what God had done.

Here is the thing.  God is at work and doing things in our lives all the time.  There are a multitude of things that you could notice throughout any single day that God is doing.  There are a multitude of things that could cause you to turn back and praise God.  

For example, those who suffer from acute asthma are so grateful when the God given gift of breath is restored.  But it is only those with acute asthma who even notice the gift of breath.  I do not think about the gift of breath a single time throughout my day.  But there are some who do.  And, because they do, they show gratitude.

Those who have lost legs and arms can tell you how grateful they are to have a prosthetic limb that restores their lives back to something that looks normal.  But it is only those who have lost limbs who look and notice what a gift arms and legs are.  I use my gift of arms and legs all the time, but I cannot think of a single time that I picked up my fork with a nice piece of steak, brought it up to my mouth and thought, “Boy, it’s a good thing I have arms!”

What I am trying to point out is that having your eyes opened to see all that God has done is a gift from Jesus in and of itself.  Because, when you see the gift, gratitude comes.  And gratitude that God has noticed us and done something for us causes us to trust God even more.  The next time the skin disease shows its ugly head, we have faith that God has our back.

In worship we sometimes get to see a young child accepted as a child of God through Holy Baptism.  It is a gift from a loving God that draws the child into a holy family.  Notice that like the ten who here healed, nothing had to be done by the child to be given this beautiful gift of grace.  It is a gift after all.  But we do pray that throughout the years parents, sponsors, and the church itself will be able to help the children to stop, look, and see the gifts that God has given.

So, even though I cannot just get up in the morning and decide to be grateful, we help each other to do it, as a gift.  We help others stop, look, and see all that God has done for them. 

After-all, it is what Jesus does.  Jesus stops and looks.  Jesus sees you, even when you do not feel like you are noticed by anyone, and even when you do not feel worthy of being noticed.  Jesus sees you and gives you healing too.  

I pray that someone help you to truly see the grace that Jesus pours out on you, even today.  And when you are healed by Jesus, and when you are finally able to see it…to see his love, and when gratitude fills your heart, I hope and pray that you hear Jesus’ words spoken as if to you:  "Get up and go on your way; your faith has made you well" (Luke 17:19).

Reflection on Luke 17:5-10

 

Luke 17:5-10

⁵ The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” ⁶ The Lord replied, “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.

⁷ “Who among you would say to your slave who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the field, ‘Come here at once and take your place at the table’? ⁸ Would you not rather say to him, ‘Prepare supper for me; put on your apron and serve me while I eat and drink; later you may eat and drink’? ⁹ Do you thank the slave for doing what was commanded? ¹⁰ So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, ‘We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!’”

 

Reflection

Thinking back to all the times that I have been forgiven, there is one thing that I know is true: forgiveness brings joy.

But you do not need to look at my life to see that.  Just a quick glance at the scriptures will show you that.

There is so much joy the day that the roof of the house is torn open and the paralyzed man is lowered down by ropes to Jesus from above.  This story from Luke 5:18-25, preaches that not only is the man joyous because he is healed that day, but the joy starts with the forgiveness of his sins.  “Friend, your sins are forgiven you,” Jesus tells the man (NRSVue, Luke 5:20).  Forgiveness brings about his healing.  You can almost imagine the huge grin on Jesus’ face as the once paralyzed man skips away in joy with his sleeping mat under his arm as he goes “to his home, glorifying God” (Luke 5:25).  Forgiveness brings joy.

Again, you sense this same type of joy and love found in the words of tender forgiveness spoken to the woman who washes Jesus’ feet with her hair.  The story in Luke 7:36-50 simply describes the woman as a sinner, but she acts with the deeply moving joy and gratitude of one of Jesus’ forgiven.  Jesus even says so.  “I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love” (Luke 7:47).  Forgiveness brings joy.

And, then there is that sinner hanging on the cross with Jesus who refuses to join in on the taunts thrown Jesus’ way.  Instead, he asks that Jesus remember a sinner like him, and Jesus responds in the middle of this bloody scene with surprising words of joy; “Today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43).  Forgiveness brings joy.

There is so much joy to be found in forgiveness.  There is joy found in the amazing freedom of having the weight of your sin lifted from your shoulders.  The Psalmist laments, “for my iniquities have gone over my head; they weigh like a burden too heavy for me” (Psalm 38:4).  It is absolutely true that our mistakes plague us.  I do not know about you, but my mistakes play like a movie over and over again in my mind during the very moment in life when I can do nothing about it, in the middle of the night when everyone is supposed to be asleep!

But listen to how the Psalmist reacts when God draws him up from the desolate pit and grants forgiveness: “[The Lord] put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God” (Psalm 40:3).  Forgiveness brings joy.

Maybe even more important than the joy we get from forgiveness is the joy that Jesus shows in granting that forgiveness.  It is as if forgiveness was the greatest gift that God could think up when considering all the gifts that a heavenly parent could provide the world. Micah 7:18 says that the Lord “does not retain his anger forever because he delights in showing steadfast love” (Micah 7:18).  Forgiveness brings joy.

I know that is a lot to make a simple point, but I do it because it causes me to then wonder: since forgiveness brings so much joy to the one who is given the forgiveness, and even more joy comes to the one who grants the forgiveness, why do we find it so hard to do?

Why is forgiveness so hard?

“Pastor, I just cannot bring myself to talk with him.  I do not even want to see his face.”  Have you ever heard words like that?  Have those words ever been your own?  To forgive means having to face something or someone that brought pain.  I know of no one who enjoys pain.  For example, I know very few people who joyfully skip to the dentist.  I know just as many people who enjoy facing the sorts of pains that require great amounts of forgiveness.

It might be nice to know that we are not alone in our struggle.  Just previous to our gospel reading for today, Jesus let the apostles in on the secret of why forgiveness is so powerful: because it does not end.  Jesus teaches in Luke 17:4: “If the same person sins against you seven times a day, and turns back to you seven times and says, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive.”  Forgiveness is powerful because it is persistent. 

God’s mercy is like a shepherd who leaves 99 sheep in order to find one that is lost, and then rejoices when that lost sheep is found (Luke 15:1-7). Forgiveness brings joy and it is persistent.

God’s mercy is like a woman who sweeps the floor looking for a lost coin and throws a party when that coin is discovered!  (Luke 15:8-10) Forgiveness brings joy and it is persistent.

Forgiveness does not give up.  Forgiveness does not allow anyone to say, “This time around you are a lost cause.”  Forgiveness cannot be defeated by a grave. Forgiveness will go all the way to the cross in order to save the very people who reject God’s idea that “Love never ends” (1 Corinthians 13:8).

Maybe it is exactly the persistence of forgiving love that makes it so incredibly hard.  

I do not know about any of you, but when a two year old throws his dinner plate on the floor for the seventh time that night, and the parent needs to scrub the food out of the carpeting for the seventh time in an hour (What house designer chooses to put carpet in the dining room anyway?)…after the seventh time the parent cannot help but feel like it would be more effective to just say something like, “Fine!  We’re done!  You can eat again sometime tomorrow!”

And if it is hard to forgive a two-year-old who keeps doing the same things over and over again, imagine how hard it is to forgive over and over again an adult who should know better…who should have figured out life by now.  But, no, there are plenty of adults who have not figured out life and they make the same mistakes over and over and over again and need to ask for forgiveness over and over and over again.  The persistence that forgiveness requires is hard.

“Increase our faith!” the disciples cry out.  “Give us more faith so that we can do this!”  “This is hard.”  “This is discouraging!”  “We need more faith!”

Would it not be nice if gaining faith was simply like plugging yourself in to charge all the way up so that you can accomplish the impossible once again?  Would it not be nice if just coming to church once a week were enough to get us going again with no problems or hitches?

We walk around as if faith is something of which you can get more.  We walk around as if faith were a video game power pack that you can just pick up along the journey to keep the game going longer and make you stronger with some timely forgiveness upgrades.  Jesus thinks all this talk of getting more faith ridiculous.

"If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, "Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you” Jesus says (Luke 17:6).

So, how much faith do you need to do the hard work of forgiving over and over and over?  About one point five millimeters worth of faith is all you need (the size of the average mustard seed).

Maybe, faith has nothing to do with the amount that you have.  After-all, according to the original Greek, Jesus actually says, “If you had the faith of a mustard seed.”  Jesus actually never says anything about size or amounts, except that a mustard seed, small as it is, inherently has enough faith to do what it does.  That little thing can push up through the tough dirt, grow into a great bush, and even displace a mulberry tree! 

“If you had the faith of a mustard seed…” 

This has nothing to do with having a certain amount of understanding, or having a certain amount of spiritual strength.  According to Jesus, faith is simply trusting that when Jesus says forgiveness is immensely important to the salvation of the world and that we should just do it, we will trust that Jesus knows what he is talking about and just do it. 

When we go to the coffee shop and order a coffee, we do not say to the barista, “Go ahead and take a break, I can brew this.”  No, we do not do that!  Nor do we gush and gush over the fact that they handed us a cardboard cup full of the hot beverage.  “Thank you so, so much.  My life is so much better with this very expensive yet mediocre tasting miracle.” 

We do not say that!  They are baristas.  Their job is to get the coffee we paid for.  It is simply what they are supposed to do.  Jesus says that forgiveness works in the same way.  Jesus says that “When you have done all that you were ordered to do,” when you forgive someone, say to yourselves, “‘We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!’” (Luke 17:10).  

It appears that as followers of Jesus Christ, we simply forgive, not because we got up the courage to finally do it, not because we feel prepared or even willing to forgive, but because it is simply what followers of Jesus Christ do.  We forgive, period.

This does not mean that we somehow think that forgiveness will absolutely make everything perfectly good and right again.  How many of you have forgiven and it seems to have no effect on the other person? 

Nor does it mean that we will feel ready and willing to love and forgive.  It certainly does not mean that the person deserves to be forgiven.  It simply means that we will forgive because Jesus said told us to do it; just like a slave from ancient times serves dinner without question; or a barista gets your coffee, whether they like you or not.  It is their job.

And so, sisters and brothers in Christ, forgiveness is our job.  As followers of Christ, we forgive because Christ forgave us.  Forgiving is what followers of Christ do.

I saw this happen at a wedding I officiated a few years ago.  The groom, who was a man in his 50s, wanted more than anything for his adult son to be present for this special day.  But the groom also knew that it was unlikely.  He had not always been the best father.  In fact, he had not even seen his son for five years.  The groom knew it was a long shot, but he left a message for his son, asking for forgiveness.

The day of the wedding rehearsal came, and the groom was continually distracted, looking out the window of the church to see if the impossible might become possible.  He kept pacing back and forth while we rehearsed.  I knew the very minute that it happened.  The groom stopped pacing, and tears started to fill his eyes.  Through the window he saw his son getting out of a car and picking up a car seat.  In seconds the son was through the door, hugging his father, and letting the groom hold his grandson for the very first time. 

No one needs a large amount of faith to forgive.  Forgiveness is a gift that is simply done. 

Christ truly believes that forgiveness saves the world.  He staked his life on it.  So, we trust that Jesus knows what he is doing.  And we trust that we carry within our hearts the faith of the mustard seed which can uproot trees. 

Faith says, “We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!" (Luke 17:10).  We forgive because that is what forgiven people do.  

Find the eternal joy that can be found in forgiveness.