4th Sunday after Trinity + Luke 6:36-42 + June 24, 2018
Grace
and peace be unto you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
The
Scriptures teach us faith and love. When the Scriptures speak of what we are to
believe about Christ, His work, the benefits He earns and gives to us, they teach
us faith. When the Scriptures teach us how we are to behave toward our fellow
man, they teach us love. Today’s Gospel lesson teaches love. Jesus commands His
disciples to refrain from maliciously judging their neighbor and frivolously
condemning them. Instead, those who trust in Christ are to forgive their
neighbor and give to them in good measure. The text isn’t speaking to us about
faith, what we are to believe. Many today misuse Christ’s words as if they were
about faith, as if Jesus were saying that we can’t judge doctrines as true or
false, but we must let everyone believe however they want. The same Christ
tells us in Matthew
7:15, “Beware of false prophets”
who teach things contrary to Christ but use Christ’s name to do so. Christ’s
apostle us, “Test the spirits, whether
they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world”
(1 John 4:1). St. Paul writes in Romans
16:17, “Note those who
cause divisions and offenses, contrary to the doctrine which you learned, and
avoid them.” In matters of faith, of what we are to believe, we are to hold
fast to Christ’s teaching as it is written in the Scriptures. This means
judging false doctrine and avoiding false teachers and their churches. Today’s
text does not deal with faith but love.
“Judge not, and you shall not be judged.
Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned.” Jesus teaches His disciples
that they are not maliciously judge and condemn their neighbors when their neighbor
annoys them or sins against them. This is what the Old Adam in each us does.
Judging and condemning is the default setting of our sinful nature. Turn on the
television news and you see men and women judge and condemn each other. It is
one thing to disagree with someone else. But too often we see things devolve
into insults, ad hominem attacks, and name calling. It’s not just the news
though. If we’re honest with ourselves, by the Holy Spirit’s aid, we see that judging
and condemning our neighbors is our natural tendency. To this attitude of the
Old Adam, which rushes to judge our neighbor’s actions and condemn their
motivations, Jesus simply says, “Judge
not. Condemn not.” This should remind us of Luther’s explanation of the
Eighth Commandment. “We should fear and love God that we
may not deceitfully belie, betray, slander, or defame our neighbor, but defend
him, think and speak well of him, and put the best construction on everything.”
Those who follow Christ will strive against the sinful nature so as to not
slander and defame their neighbor. And not just simply refraining from sin, we
are commanded to defend our neighbor, speak well of him, and explain everything
in the kindest way.
Christ goes on. “Forgive,
and you will be forgiven.” When your neighbor does sin against you, you are
to be ready to forgive them from the heart. St. John says in 1 John 4:19, “We love Him because He first loved us.”
The same goes for our neighbor. We are to be ready to forgive our neighbor when
they sin against us and slight us because God has forgiven us first. This is not
just for when our neighbor sins against us accidently and unintentionally.
Those sins are easy to overlook and forgive. Christ does not distinguish
between which sins we are to be willing to forgive. He only commands us to
forgive. Luther, explaining the 5th Petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our trespasses and we forgive
those who trespass against us,” writes, “We daily sin much, and indeed deserve
nothing but punishment. So will we verily, on our part, also heartily forgive
and also readily do good to those who sin against us.” Our old Adam wants
to return evil for evil. But the Holy Spirit, who dwells in our hearts by
faith, works to suppress our nature’s desire for vengeance and retribution, so
that we forgive our neighbor from the heart.
The third good
work Christ commands is generosity. “Give,
and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and
running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you
use, it will be measured back to you.” Christ commands us to be generous to
our neighbor in need. Paul tells us in Galatians 6:10 that our generosity
should begin with those of the household of faith, our brothers and sisters in
Christ. But that does
not limit us to only give to Christians. When a need arises and we have the
means to help, we ought to do so, and do it cheerfully, “for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7). Our old Adam
in us, our sinful nature, only wants to horde wealth and time, no matter how
much or how little we have. But Christ commands us to avoid giving grudgingly or
because we “have to,” but because He has commanded us to be merciful to each
other just as our Father in heaven has been merciful.
And
that’s the chief teaching of today’s text. Love must proceed from faith in God’s
mercy toward us. The good works Christ commands, the works of love: not
judging, putting the best construction on things, forgiving and giving, all of
these can be done apart from faith in Christ. They are outward works that even
unbelievers can do. But Christ doesn’t want just the outward work. He says in
Hosea 6:6, “I desire mercy and not
sacrifice,” that is, He desires the right disposition of the heart, not
just the outward working of the work. Before you can truly do the works Jesus
teaches us, you must first be merciful, and being merciful is a disposition of
the heart. That can only come from believing God’s mercy toward you. How is
your heavenly Father merciful? He shows you His mercy by judging and condemning
Christ on the cross instead of you. Christ has taken your full condemnation.
The Father has no condemnation for those who flee to Christ for mercy. He shows you His mercy by daily and richly
forgiving all your sins through the gospel. He shows you His mercy by
generously giving you your daily bread, all that you need to support this body
and life, and by giving it to you in good measure. If you are daily
contemplating the mercy the Father has toward you in Christ then you will be
merciful toward your neighbors as well.
When
we judge and condemn our neighbors, we are no better than blind men leading other
blind men into a pit. When we try to haughtily correct our neighbor it is often
as comical as if a man with a 2x4 stuck in his eye was trying to remove a speck
of sawdust from his neighbor’s eye. Rather we should daily confess our sins and
faults to God, receive the absolution that Christ won on the cross for us, and
then humbly approach our neighbor if it is necessary. This is what Jesus means
when He tells us to first remove the plank from our eye. Then we will see
clearly to help our brother out of his sin, and there are certainly times for
that. God the Father has dealt with us in mercy and all His mercy is found in
Christ Jesus. His mercy for you in Christ continues every day. By the grace of
God, m ay we consider the gravity of our sins and grow in our gratitude and appreciation
of God’s mercy that He shows us in Christ our Lord. May we also, by His Spirit,
grow in love and mercy toward our neighbor, so that we do not hastily and maliciously
judge and condemn each other, but love and forgive one another as God in Christ
has loved and forgiven us.
May
the peace of God which surpasses all human understanding guard your hearts and
minds through faith in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.