Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28
Psalm 14
1 Timothy 1:12-17
Luke 15:1-10
“Growing into . . .”
I’ve never been completely lost—not knowing exactly where I am—but the thought has always scared me. I can’t say the same thing about my spiritual life. Though I’ve always been a part of church, I feel like the pathway to the times in life when I have been closely connected to God hasn’t been straight forward. In my own life, I have struggled and experimented and wandered as I have sought to connect to God in a way that is genuine and true to the person that I believe God has created me to be. In my own life, I have sought redemption from other people’s ideas of who I should be, the lies that I thought were truths.
The basis of Jesus’ message, his life, death and resurrection is the need we have—and have always had—to be redeemed from slavery to sin, affliction and/or painfully lived lives. Redemption from sin may be primary the sin we commit individually—slavery to sin may also include how we are caught up in net of sin that we weave together as friends and family, even as communities and nations.
Slavery to affliction and painfully lived lives often flows out of the systems of sin in which we exist—though the complexity of those systems may be far beyond our comprehension. Diseases, illness, injuries—physical, mental and emotional can enslave us broadly and deeply due to the sin interwoven into the structure of all nations, corporations and in every human system. Families perpetuate sin, so do cultures of communities, companies and industries—all of them in particular, yet very familiar ways.
The heart of the message today is our need for growth out and away from that slavery to sin—wherever it is and wherever it comes from. All of us are sinners—and all of us have been enslaved by it in different degrees. All of us participate in the systems of sin—and all of us help to cause others pain through those systems. We need, all of us need redemption and the freedom that is brought to us in the message of the scripture.
Even the message that is brought to us through the prophet Jeremiah—not the most grace-filled text in our cannon—leaves the people of Israel with a glimmer of hope for themselves and the world in which they lived.
As God brought a word of judgment to the people, as God spoke through the prophet Jeremiah, it seems as if hope is lost.
For my people are foolish,
they do not know me;
they are stupid children,
they have no understanding.
They are skilled in doing evil,
but do not know how to do good.[1]
Jeremiah is witness to God’s utter disgust with them as he looks on in a vision.
I looked on the earth, and lo, it was waste and void;
and to the heavens, and they had no light.
24 I looked on the mountains, and lo, they were quaking,
and all the hills moved to and fro.
25 I looked, and lo, there was no one at all,
and all the birds of the air had fled.
26 I looked, and lo, the fruitful land was a desert,
and all its cities were laid in ruins
before the Lord, before his fierce anger.
27 For thus says the Lord: The whole land shall be a desolation;[2]
God is taking them down—God has decided that the whole system of the nation, Judah, Israel’s remnant, had to be dismantled. Jerusalem, the seat of government and the seat of God’s worship were to be taken away. When God steps away—the place might look the same, yet feel empty. Jeremiah’s vision saw a world of desolation when God’s hot wind of judgment came.
Yet even in all of this—in Jeremiah’s vision of desolation, waste and void, darkness, destruction, fruitful land turned to desert, God’s fierce anger—part of God’s message is that “I will not make a full end.” Desolation is not then end, even if it looks that way. Dry desert and dark skies would be terrorizing.
And God’s anger brought on by the foolishness of God’s people would be a weight of shame and guilt upon their hearts. When we are most honest with ourselves, each one of us have had to acknowledge that at times we were skilled in doing evil, but do not know how to do good. Those times when our hearts are hard and angry—we are in need of the hope that God’s anger end and that God’s love is eternal.
The scriptural thread we follow today continues through the gospel lesson’s assurance that God’s realm is for the lost. The Pharisees appear again in opposition to Jesus’ way of interacting with those in the community. They grumble at his fraternizing with the sinners. So he tells them a parable. A parable is told by Jesus to reveal the truth of God’s reign in our lives, tells us what the reality of God’s existence is about. Just like in the first testament, God’s concern was for the wanderer—the lost and the endangered. Jesus pointed out that if they had had the lost sheep, endangered by its own lack of direction, it would be sought by them because the 99 were safely in the enclosure at home.
The sheep that wandered of its own accord is brought back in great joy—even though it wandered away by choice and endangered the rest of the flock.
The Pauline message this first letter to Timothy continues to remind us through this set of scriptures of how we are redeemed by Jesus Christ from being lost, from being enslaved to sin—our own individual sin and the systems of sin that surround us. We are reminded that Paul was “formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence.” [3] In the life of Paul, we are made aware of God’s tremendous generosity and love, the grace he needed to participate in God’s growing realm. Paul’s life before he met Jesus on the Road to Damascus was one of religious fervor—but after his eyes were opened he could grow in relationship to God rather than growing in anger as he had before.
In his life, we have an example of confession—not to downplay our individual worth in the eyes of God, but to give God glory in our salvation, transformation, and growth. We are called to consider the regrets, harmful actions and shame of our past lives, calling upon Jesus for our salvation and being honest about our continuing need to be reconciling to the immortal, invisible God we worship. Imagine that you are called upon to complete Paul’s confession, “I was formerly . . .” What have you given up to the life that God has called you to live? What can you give up to grow in faith and spiritual relationship to God?
What Paul acknowledged and raised in gratitude was his own growth and transformation—celebrating the new life that was given to him. The example of Paul reminds us that his praise flowed deeply and widely from his gratitude for all that God had done raising him from a life of violence. He raises to God a joyful verse of praise, a joyful Amen or Yes of delight!
What we also learn from Paul’s life is that the depths of our sin our slavery to violence and corrupt systems are why we need God—or from the gospel we learn that we need God because we are lost and we are all lost.
We are called to grow into the life that is most genuine and connect us most truly to God. When we run from God’s path—like Paul—we are lost and confused. When we connect with God, we are connected to the one who is our home. Our connection to God means that wherever we are—we can be growing in faith and growing toward the one who wants what God has created in us.
We are surrounded by the life-giving, love-filled and glorious God drawing us toward the person God knows that we can be. In our gratitude to God’s work through Jesus, our Lord and Savior, we can lift up our whole lives in praise: in our actions, service and compassion.
We can lift Paul’s closing doxology or song of praise sharing in his gratitude—
Deep honor and bright glory
to the King of All Time—
One God, Immortal, Invisible,
ever and always. Oh, yes! And Amen.[4]
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