Sermon: Trinity 26 - 2018

18 November 2018

Text: Matt 25:31-46 (2 Pet 3:3-14)

In the name of + Jesus.  Amen.

“We are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells,” says St. Peter.  The old heavens and earth, created perfect by God, have been corrupted by our sin.  The result is chaos, conflict, pain, suffering, and death.  Every single bad thing in this world can be laid at the feet of this reality: we are sinners in rebellion against God’s perfect will.  We have allowed Satan’s question: “Did God actually say?” to live rent-free in our minds.  And were it not for our Lord’s coming, His death on the cross, the full atonement for our sins, the grace of the full pardon that we receive in His name – our universe, that is, the heavens and the earth, would be without hope, just grinding along in increasing dysfunction, until one day, it all just falls apart.

But, dear friends, we are not waiting for the world to come apart at the seams.  No indeed!  “We are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.”  Yes, the old universe will “pass away with a roar” and “be burned up and dissolved,” but only so that, through the Lord’s coming, they may be refashioned in a new beginning in which God will recreate the heavens and the earth, again, “in which righteousness dwells.”

And we long for this righteousness, dear friends.  For a world in which righteousness dwells is a world without pain, sorrow, suffering, or death.  For it will be a world without sin, without the diabolical question that isn’t really a question: “Did God actually say?”  This “world in which righteousness dwells” will be a homecoming, a return to Eden, a recapitulation of Paradise.  It will be as glorious as life was before the Fall.  

But, of course, we’re not there yet.  We await the Lord’s return.  And while we wait, the Lord bids us to be prepared, to wait expectantly, to wait wisely.  We wait with joy, and we wait yearning for that righteousness which will dwell in our new earth.

And so St. Peter asks, while you are waiting, “What sort of people ought you to be?”  Does it make any sense that while we wait and yearn for righteousness, we spurn righteousness and seek to lead ungodly lives?  Or as St. Paul put it, should we sin all the more so that “grace may abound?”  St. Peter comes out and says that we ought “to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God.”  And “since you are waiting,” he says that we should “be diligent to be found by Him without spot or blemish, and at peace.”

Of course, we will not actually be “without spot or blemish” not at perfect “peace” until the old heaven and earth pass away, until our own sinful flesh is remade by God Himself, but we should at least see that this is the goal.  We should be striving in this direction.

But aren’t we saved by grace alone, through faith, apart from works?  Of course!  That is the Word of God.  But what happens now that we have received this immeasurable gift?  Does the gift somehow change us?  Does the gift somehow reorient our minds?  Does the gift manifest itself in our lives?  How could it not, dear brothers and sisters?  Of course, we are still sinners who sin in “thought, word, and deed,” and of course, we are still trapped in our mortal, sinful flesh, and of course, the devil and the world still conspire against us.  But we are also redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, and we are indeed waiting for the consummation of His kingdom, holding fast to His promise.  This Good News changes us, even as the Holy Spirit comes to us and brings about our growth, our love for holiness, our increasing desire to dwell in this coming eternal and perfect world, and to be found by our beloved Lord “without spot or blemish.”

But what does this even look like as we wait, dear brothers and sisters?  For we still live in our sinful flesh in a sinful world?  How can this kind of righteousness – even when it is a gift of grace – actually be lived out in the fallen world?

Our Lord tells us that when He returns, there will be two kinds of people: the sheep and the goats.  The sheep will hear these words: “Come, you who are blessed by My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”  They will hear the Lord recounting those times when He was hungry, thirsty, a stranger, naked, sick, and in prison, and the “righteous” came to Him in His need and was given food, drink, welcoming, clothing, and visitation.  The sheep were too busy doing good works, that he had no recollection of doing them.

The righteous person does good works without thought of buying his way into the new heaven and the new earth.  He just acts out of love, the love of Christ.  And that is why Jesus says that whatever good works we do to our neighbor, we are actually doing to Christ.

The sheep are not redeemed as a reward for doing these works.  Indeed, the kingdom was prepared for them “from the foundation of the world.”  But these good works are a confirmation of the saving grace of God.  The one who does these true good works doesn’t even think about it.  But, dear friends, our neighbors need these acts of love for our Lord.  Our neighbors are hungry, thirsty, alone, in need, suffering, and bound by chains of various kinds.  Love impels us to help.  Love seeks no reward, but is rewarded nevertheless.  Our good works do not save us, but they do save our neighbor from suffering.  

Our good works matter.  And while they are not necessary for salvation, our Lutheran confessions bluntly declare that “good works are necessary.”  For this is what it means to yearn for the new heavens and the new earth.  We desire that restored Paradise to the point where we begin (though imperfectly) to live it even before it gets here.  We don’t wait in despair or passivity, but rather, we wait in victory and in expectation!

But what about the goats?  The goats will be denied the new heavens and new earth, and instead will be cast into the “eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”  For in despising their neighbors, they despise Christ.  And in despising Christ, they spurned His gift of Paradise.  For they rejected the way of love: the way of the cross.  And in rejecting the love of the cross, they rejected the grace of the cross.

And so we see how it is that we are saved by grace alone, and yet it is equally true what we say in the Athanasian Creed: “Those who have done good will enter into eternal life, and those who have done evil into eternal fire.”

And so, what we do matters: not as the price of admission to the new heaven and the new earth, but rather as a picture of the love that Christ has given us and how that love has transformed us – even when we ourselves are ignorant of it.  This is why St. Paul urges the Christians at Rome to “Let love be genuine.  Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good.  Love one another with brotherly affection.  Outdo one another in showing honor.”  He exhorts us and encourages us in our love for our brothers and sisters in Christ, in love for our neighbors, and as our Lord Jesus Christ has bid us, to love even our enemies.  

And knowing that these are the works of the Spirit in us, and not works for which we can take credit, we would do well to pray for the Holy Spirit to come to us and instill in us a zeal and fervency, a burning desire for the “new heavens” and the “new earth in which righteousness dwells” even here while we wait.  And indeed, dear brothers and sisters, we wait in hope, even in joy, even in the midst of the darkness of sin and the assaults of the devil.  For we know how this all ends.  God did “actually say.”  The Lord Jesus did actually come into our broken world to heal us.  He did actually pardon us on the cross.  He has actually saved us by grace alone.  And the Spirit continues to implant in us a love of righteousness and a desire to actually serve our neighbor in gratitude for this free gift.  

Indeed, we are waiting, dear friends, “waiting for a new heaven and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.”  Amen.

In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.