Seriously?!

7th Sunday after Epiphany, 2/20/22 Romans 12:14-21 Seriously?! I. Live in grace. II. Live in peace. I’ve noticed the encouragements for more than a decade, and you probably have, too. Bullying is a huge problem in our nation’s schools and one way of addressing this issue is for teachers and school administrators to encourage their students daily to be nice. The flip side to that encouragement is to stop saying and doing things that are mean to other students. I’ve seen similar encouragements on vehicle bumper stickers, such as, “Mean people stink,” or a variation of it. People don’t like to hear about incidents of people speaking vicious, hurtful, and abusive words, or, worse, when physical violence occurs. There’s no place for that and people rightly condemn it. It’s easy to offer such encouragements when you’re viewing such behavior from 2,500 feet in the air. But, when you’re the victim directly, then it becomes another matter. It isn’t long before children who grew up with the daily encouragement to be nice assume the grown-up default for relationships with others. “I will be nice to people who are nice to me, but if they are mean to me, if they take advantage of me, if they harm me, well, then, that’s a completely different matter.” In this morning’s Gospel, we heard Jesus offer an entirely different encouragement. In fact, it’s not simply his encouragement, it’s his expectation—his expectation of his followers, his believers, the people he calls his own. St. Paul’s words before us from Romans 12 echo those expectations. And those expectations are not only to be nice to people who are nice to you, but even to people who are mean to you. Those expectations are to love not only those who love you, but even those who hate you. In fact, Jesus calls on us to offer our help to those who would do us harm. To the people of this world, those expectations are absolutely absurd. But Jesus wasn’t speaking these words to the world, he was speaking them to us. And while we rightly hear those expectations and nod our heads in agreement as we sit comfortably in our church pew, let’s be honest; when we’re the victims of mean words and actions, our response to these words before us is, “Seriously?! My Lord and Savior seriously expects me to respond in this way?” Indeed, he does. He is serious. So, let’s take a deeper look at these words from our God and, in doing so, discover and receive the power to do what our Lord expects from us. Part I. What Paul offers us here in these eight verses of Romans are what most people in our world would consider to be principles to live by. So, I decided to Google “principles to live by” and, no surprise, there were pages upon pages of web site links. One site offered seven principles to live by. The next one offered eighteen. I scrolled down a little and found one that offered 50. One even went so far as to offer 101 principles to live by. Seriously?! 101 principles to live by?! In the first half of our text, Paul lists only four, but they really boil down to one. Are you paying attention? In this first half of our text, Paul doesn’t use the word “grace,” but that’s what he’s talking about. Paul’s first encouragement is for us to live in grace. But just what does that mean? It means that we understand, know, and believe, that each minute of our lives we are living in God’s grace. God’s grace is his undeserved favor. Every moment of our lives our God is favoring us. He’s being kind, loving, and forgiving towards us. But how can that be when my life is difficult or painful? Because, in his grace, our God is not treating us as our sins deserve. Right now, according to God’s justice, we should be the objects of his righteous condemnation and eternal punishment. But that’s not the case. Instead, he is kind, loving, and forgiving towards us. And the supreme act of his love for us is seen in the cross of Christ. That’s how much he loves you! As we know each day that’s how our God treats us, we have the power and the example to “bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.” The sinful default when we’re victims of persecution or of being wronged by someone is to curse them or to wish evil on them. Our Lord calls on us to bless them, and we can do that when we know we live in God’s grace. Next, he calls on us to “rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn.” At first, that sounds rather easy to do. But think about it. In those moments when your life is difficult or painful or when you’re slaving away and not seeing much benefit, and you hear or see the blessings others are enjoying, it’s difficult to rejoice with them. The default is to be filled with self-pity and to despise them from their blessings. So, how can we do what our Lord expects? By realizing that each moment of our lives we’re being blessed with the astounding grace of God. He is kind, loving, and forgiving towards us. Thirdly, Paul urges us to live in harmony with one another. That sounds fine on paper, but how do you live in harmony with people who think, feel, speak, and act exactly the opposite of you? By recalling that you both live under the grace of God. My sins have separated me from God, but through my Savior, he has brought me into harmony with him. And that harmony transcends everything else as I live with my fellow Christians. Finally, Paul encourages us to live humbly, to “be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.” We know that humility is a virtue. But, again, that’s easy on paper. But when we know that our ways or position is superior to theirs, the default is to look down on them and to despise them. How can we avoid that? By recalling that we live in God’s grace, that we daily offend him and yet, he loves us and has made us his children by faith in Jesus. Bless those who persecute you? Rejoice with others? Live in harmony? Be humble? Seriously?! Indeed, seriously. Live in grace. Again, it’s easy right now to assure your Lord and Savior that you will cheerfully do what he expects of you, even blessing those who persecute you, but, when we’re really facing persecution and abuse, when others are maligning us, when they insist that their ways of doing something are right when I know mine is, when they’re not living in harmony with me, then we conclude that Jesus simply can’t be serious about what he expects. Then his expectations conveniently get pushed aside and my reality becomes the only consideration. The problem is, that reality has nothing to do with living in grace. Living in grace recalls that Jesus always blessed the ones who persecuted him, forgave them, and died for them. He was always loving to those who thought they were superior to him, and then he died for them. He also loved you and me perfectly. His death on the cross was the death I deserved, that you deserved. He redeemed us and made us his own. And he rose again to empower us to live for him out of love for him, as he expects. Part II. If you wanted to describe life in our society today, what words would you use? I’m sure peaceful wouldn’t be one of them. We’re watching and listening in trepidation over the military buildup on Russia’s border with Ukraine. An invasion seems imminent. And closer to home, things aren’t so peaceful either. We live in a polarized, not peaceful, society. So, what’s wrong? What’s at the root of the unrest and aggression? People don’t know the peace of God. The peace of God is knowing that our God has nothing against us. It’s the peace of knowing that our sins are forgiven, that we are members of God’s eternal kingdom, that our God has destined us to live in bliss with him eternally. It’s the peace of believing that I can do nothing to attain that peace. Jesus has done it all for me. In this second half our text, Paul urges us to live in that peace. He states, “Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay,’ says the Lord. On the contrary: ‘If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.’ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” When you live in the peace of God, there’s no room for vengeance in your life. You have the promise of God that he will deal justly with all who oppose you. And that frees you and me to live in love towards others, even our enemies. Knowing that we have peace with God empowers us to do what our enemies need us to do in order to win them over instead of rolling them over. When that’s our goal and purpose, then we can also live at peace with everyone, as far as it is possible. At the end of the day, as I pray for the Lord to bless my sleep that night, if I can remind him that I have tried my best to live at peace with others, even those who oppose me, then I know that Jesus knows my intentions and my heart, and I have his promise to bless my efforts, even if my best efforts are tainted with sin, as they inevitably are. I have God’s peace! I live in God’s peace. If someone observed your life, would they see and hear that you live in peace? Would they immediately see and hear your connection to Christ? Let’s admit it. Too often they wouldn’t. We’ve heard and pondered and applied our Lord’s expectations of us here in Romans 12. And he’s serious about them, but none of us get it right all of the time, maybe not even half of the time. But that’s the sinful cord that binds us to each other. And the other cord that connects us to each other is our love and trust in Jesus. His love forgives our less than perfect efforts to live in peace and empowers us to be at peace once again. As you strive to live for Christ each day, know that you have his forgiveness, his power, and his blessing. So, seriously, let’s get out there and live in grace and live in peace! Amen.