SERMON “A Gospel of Rejection?” audio link http://dl.dropbox.com/u/23575548/110814Romans11.mp3
(Psalm 19.14) May the words of my lips and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, oh Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. Amen.
Romans chapters 9-11 is full of very hard teaching. In this segment of Scripture the apostle Paul talks about the way his own people, the Jews, have departed from the covenant God made with them. He confesses with tears that his own kinsmen have rejected God’s mercy and have condemned themselves to separation from God. Some theologians, many theologians, actually, have taken this portion of Scripture to be a passage which teaches that God has actively chosen some people for salvation and has also actively chosen some people for condemnation. This doctrine is called “double predestination.” It views some as predestined for heaven and some as predestined for hell.
Did God then reject his people? In Romans 11.1 we see Paul’s answer. God has in no way rejected his people, the nation of Israel. Our Lord has always known all about his grace and mercy. He has always known his intention of coming in the person of Jesus Christ, God the Son, and giving his life as an atoning sacrifice for the sin of the world. This plan, this gospel of salvation, was established from the foundation of the world. Jesus is the Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of the world, coming to die for the sins of the world. This is the message our Lord has given us in Scripture. It is the good news of God for the whole world. And it flies in the face of that doctrine of double predestination which our Calvinist friends hold. They would say that the good news of salvation is emphasized by the fact that there is also news of condemnation. Through understanding of the reality of God’s judgment against unrepentant sinners we gain an understanding of the enormity of God’s grace shed upon those who believe. This may be a useful tool, but it’s awfully hard to find a way for Scripture to justify it. We look for a God who has rejected his people and we don’t find it. In fact, God never rejects any of his people who look to him in faith. He rejects those who try to work their own salvation. He rejects those who depend on their own righteousness rather than Christ’s righteousness. But that’s the message he’s given us all along. Salvation is of the Lord. It is not of ourselves. There’s no gospel in saying that God has chosen to reject some. No, the gospel of rejection is no gospel at all. It only limits what Jesus has done for us, rather than embracing the full biblical claim for the work of Christ.
So who’s doing the rejection? Because we do confess that not all people are saved. We confess that there are some who will be condemned to eternal torment. We confess that some people are going to die without knowing and believing Jesus, and that their eternal state will be very very bad indeed. Who in our epistle lesson today is doing the rejecting, though? It is not God. On the contrary, in verse 15 of Romans 11, it is Israel doing the rejection. Sinful man is busy rejecting the gospel. Even these people who have been blessed by God over and over again throughout all their history are ready to reject God, to try to work out their own salvation, to depend on their own righteousness. They have rejected God’s salvation and chosen their own version of salvation. This is their condemnation. And in their condemnation, they have not only rejected the gospel of Christ, they also try to make others reject our Lord and Savior. You’ll remember from your readings if you’re following the daily lectionary, that throughout the book of Acts it was the Jews persecuting the Christians. The Roman government really wasn’t doing anything against Christians, but the Jews were.
What does this rejection do? Oddly enough, we find that where Christ’s people face opposition the body of Christ grows and flourishes. Where we have to stand up for our faith and defend the claims of Christ we grow bold in the faith and realize that our Lord is in fact exactly who he claims to be, the savior of the world, victorious over death, hell and the grave. You might think of opposition to Christ being sort of like pruning of a bush. Surely you’ve done this. If you’re like me you haven’t done it quite as regularly as would be best, but I bet you’ve experienced what happens when you trim most bushes. They grow back thicker than before. Where you cut the end off of a branch it forks into more branches. If you want the shrubs in your yard to be nice and bushy you need to trim them frequently. It seems backwards, but it works. The same thing happens with Christians. Do you want to learn how to defend your faith? Go somewhere that makes you defend it. Do you want to learn to pray? Come before the Lord in situations where you realize your prayers are what will make a difference. Do you want to see the Lord working in your community? Ask him to do his will regardless of the cost to you. As we learn to trust in our Lord, to consider our neighbor’s needs as more important than ours, to love our neighbor as ourselves, and to confess our sins to one another, praying for each other, then we will learn what our Lord and Savior would do in our communities. Then we will see how we can be God’s hand extended to bring knowledge of his redeeming love to our neighbor.
What if we are rejected? Does that matter? Or do we see that Jesus is simply being rejected again, just as we reject him over and over again? Maybe we see that we are just the kind of people Paul claims the Jews are, people who reject the grace of God and try to work out salvation on our own terms. Maybe we see that we “who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy” (Romans 11.30, ESV). Maybe we see that there is a sort of a gospel of rejection after all, but that the one who is rejected is Jesus, who is rejected and forsaken by God the Father on account of our sin which he bears on his shoulders. Maybe there is a gospel of rejection as we see that Jesus was rejected so we would be accepted. Maybe there is a gospel of rejection as we see that our sin is rejected and is put to death on the cross of Christ. And as we see Jesus being rejected again and again we begin to step up and defend him before our neighbors. As we see Jesus cast out of our society we realize that the very people who are rejecting him are those for whom he died. As we see that our Lord has called all people to himself, despite their rejection of him, we decide that we will follow Jesus no matter the cost, for he has come to us at the cost of his life.
Our God has not rejected his people. There is only one predestination. There are not two. And God’s call, his destiny for you and for me is this. Salvation is in Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, who has given himself as the perfect Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. What do we do? We believe. We look to him as the sufficient sacrifice. We look to him as the savior. We simply believe that Jesus has given his life as an atonement for our sin. And in that belief we walk in this world, being salt and light, loving our neighbor as ourselves, bearing with us the Christ who is life and salvation.
What if we are rejected? Then it is our Savior who is rejected, not us. Is it serious? Certainly it is, for those who reject the message of the gospel reject Jesus himself. They have rejected life and salvation. It is indeed a matter of life and death. Yet it does not harm us in any way. When people reject Jesus they do not change anything he has done. They don’t change who he is. They condemn themselves. May the Lord have mercy on us and on our neighbors, calling our community to believe and receive the life and salvation in Christ.
Our Lord, make us your faithful servants. Show yourself to our community through our testimony. Draw people to you in faith. Grant us persistence to bring the message of the gospel over and over again. And in all things let us look to you, the author and finisher of our salvation. Amen.
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