Scripture: Romans 4:13-17, Mark 8:34-38
Since the coming of Jesus Christ, faith has been the
most important aspect in our relationship with Almighty God. The problem for most people, though, is that
faith must be defined and evaluated only by the Lord, and not by our own
wishes and desires! In Matthew 28:17-20, the passage that we know as the Great
Commission, believers are given an order to do three things – 1) to go into the
world to “make disciples of all nations” – for there is no longer any
limitation on who is allowed to come to the way of the Lord, 2) to ensure that all
disciples are baptized in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy
Spirit – that a commitment and dedication must be made by each and every person
to follow fully in the way of Jesus, and 3) to teach and encourage each
other in obedience of all that the Lord has told us – that the words of Jesus,
and those that are reinforced by the Holy Spirit, are the only truths that we
should ever hold tightly to for the rest of our life (John 14:25-27).
At Mount Sinai, God gave Moses Ten Commandments,
without a lot of explanation, and the people were called to follow them. But we tend to like the details of any
directive, to be sure that we know what the command actually means for our
lives. So Israel’s “learned leadership” took
it upon themselves to add some details of their own, to ensure that their
understanding of God’s will would be followed to the “letter of the law”! Unfortunately, human wisdom and understanding
isn’t all that dependable (Isaiah 55:8-9),
and Israel would be led astray by those human “additions” to God’s word.
The way of faith in Christ can be so easily
perverted when we take on the authority to explain or clarify what Jesus meant
when He taught us about the way of faith in Him. Of course, this doesn’t mean that everyone
should be left to their own desires and understanding of the Lord’s
teaching. It should be the Church’s
responsibility to ensure that everything that is taught is in line with God’s
will and word for our lives. But how often does the Church actually fail
to live up to her responsibility?
So today, on this second Sunday of Advent 2023, we
will see what two of the Church’s earliest evangelists had to say about the
Lord’s teaching, and how it fits with the divine will of God.
Read Romans 4:13-17
Paul begins this passage with
the thought that the law of Torah has little to do with our faith in God and
our acceptance of His way. And he
emphasizes this with the idea that righteousness comes through a faith that
parallels the depth of faith that Abram exhibited, and not by simple adherence
to a set of laws that have been modified and clarified into insignificance
through human intervention.
Why is this understanding so
important? The apostle readily proclaims
that the law can never bring with it a promise of any value – it only promises
punishment for failure to adhere to its ways. These thoughts indicate a major change in Paul’s
understanding of what God desires for our lives. In the
life he lived prior to meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:1-19),
the law was all that he would ever depend on, and faith in Christ was little
more than heresy! But now, the conflict
between law and faith had taken on a whole new posture in his life.
As Paul continues in his letter,
he reminds us that the Lord’s promise of eternal life comes to us by faith, and
has little to do with what we do beyond faith. Of course, a life in faith does involve
trusting in those things that Jesus has taught – faith, grace, and promise are
all closely tied together. Faith is our
trust, believe and love of all that Christ has done on our behalf; grace is from
God, and defines the depth to which we are loved by and through the divine
nature of Jesus Christ; and promise is what we receive when grace and faith become
one in Christian unity.
In the 17th chapter of
Genesis (17:1-5), we read that the Lord God Jehovah promised Abram “I
am God Almighty; walk before me faithfully and be blameless. 2 Then
I will make My covenant between Me and you and will greatly increase your
numbers. 3 Abram
fell facedown, and God said to Him, 4 “As for Me,
this is My covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations.”
Did you notice? God made His promise to Abram when the man
agreed – not with words, but within his heart - that he would do his very best
to walk faithfully with his Lord God. Our
Lord Jesus does that for us, too! When
we, in heart and Spirit, commit our humble life in faithful obedience to the
Divine, He will promise His glory and life to us in that very moment. Our Faith, God’s Grace, then Promise through the
unity we have with each other.
Read Mark 8:34-38
Mark tells the crowd, as well as the multitude of
followers who have come to Christ throughout the ages and beyond, that it all
hinges upon our discipleship with Him.
And who is a disciple? It is one
who follows the Teacher, and learns His ways faithfully, living what they have
learned, and then shares what they have learned – not so much with the Teacher,
but with those who have yet to hear the Master’s call on their own lives. But one caution - in no way does discipleship
promise that following Jesus will be easy and successful - for Mark, as well as
both Matthew and Luke, readily proclaim that discipleship will also bring with
it the world’s animosity, and fear, and denial, and accusations, and lies, and
very possibly, their own cross. And with
each and every attack from the world, Satan will be right there, offering his
own brand of promise - that if we leave Jesus and follow him, that he will provide
for our needs and protect us from all harm.
Of course, it will be a lie, which is always the way of Darkness
– one deceitful and destructive lie after another!
How far are we willing to go in our walk with
Jesus? As far as His love for us took
Him? Or is the way of the Lord just too
steep, too difficult, too different for us to even try? If you still aren’t convinced of the wisdom
in following Jesus’ way, compare what a lifelong walk with the Lord will bring
you, versus what rejecting God and picking up on the world’s offer of a much
simpler walk with them. The list will be
drastically revealing! It might even look
something like this:
Light instead of darkness; hope instead of betrayal;
truth instead of lies; the glory of heaven instead of the Earth’s ignorance;
divine love instead of worldly hatred; eternal life instead of death by
judgment; Godly unity instead of solitary debasement; the infinite blessing of
Jesus instead of the fear and limitation that holds the world in its grasp.
Do you see any difference? And we have to choose between the two – will
it be the eternal hope of God, or the condemnation of this world. Let me leave you with the words of Mark’s
final verse one more time:
“If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this
adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of
them when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.”
It appears that there is one more comparison - would you prefer the love of Christ, or His shame at
the Judgment – which will it be for you?
