ON THE PATH: SALVATION

A Sermon by Bill McDonald from Matthew 1:18-21

September 30, 2007

Matthew 1

¹⁸Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. ¹⁹Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. ²⁰But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. ²¹She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Preachers talk funny. We use strange words and odd phrases. We have been talking for five Sundays about some of those odd words as steps on the path to salvation.

Conviction which means being convinced of your own sin rather than being judged guilty.

Confession which has to do with facing your sin by sharing it with God.

Repentance which means that you regret your sin and don’t want to keep doing it.

Forgiveness which everybody understands but few can accept.

And finally today the most misunderstood word of the five: Salvation. It has been used in so many ludicrous ways that it almost embarrasses us to discuss it.

You have seen those barns with salvation slogans painted on the side or top: Christ Is the Answer or Jesus Saves. You know, the ones where teenagers sneak over during the night and paint the words “at First National Bank” below that slogan. Or maybe it’s the bankers doing that, I don’t know! Once in a truck stop bathroom I saw a memorable conversation written on the wall of a stall. Someone had started it by writing, “Christ is the answer.” The next person had written under that, “What was that question again?” Obviously offended, the next reader had inscribed, “The question is where will you spend eternity—heaven or hell?” The next visitor had penned, “Does it matter?” The next scribbled a warning, “If it doesn’t matter now, it will matter latter!” But spelled “later” with two T’s. Probably a teacher commented next, “You misspelled the word ‘later.’” And finally someone had written, “Hell is full of poor spellers!”

We mainline Christians hesitate to get seriously involved in a discussion of salvation because so many churches and preachers who use the term seem to be intent on turning the church into a circus--midget gospel singers, six year old evangelists, Christian clowns, weightlifting witnesses, and even a stripper who strips for Jesus and then gives her testimony to her audience. I don’t make ‘em up, folks; I just report ‘em. Thinking people want nothing to do with any of that. So we toss out the baby with the bath water. We toss out the truth with the sham. I will venture to say that Jesus is not a party to all that “performance preaching.” He is only what he is and he is all that he is. Dorothy Sayer says that God has suffered three great humiliations. The first humiliation was the Incarnation, when God had to take on the confines of a human body. The second humiliation was the cross when God suffered the shame of death by public execution. And the third humiliation, Sayer suggests, is the church.

That may be true for many churches and in some way is probably true for all churches. But don’t overlook the fact that the church also contains the truth. It is like what Mark Twain said when asked what he thought about Richard Wagner’s opera music, Twain said, “It’s not nearly as bad as it sounds.” The church isn’t nearly as bad as it sometimes looks or acts, because it still carries the truth which is that Jesus does make a difference in your life—Jesus does save. So don’t hold it against Jesus if you have been turned off by some church’s shenanigans. Look for the truth in him yourself. Jesus offers salvation—but from what?

Let me share three quick ideas about salvation (in stories naturally) and then you work out the rest. First story, in 1983 the church I served in Austin, Texas, decided it needed to get out ahead of the curve and computerize the church. As normal as that may sound today, that was cutting edge technology 24 years ago. A computer committee was formed mainly from a bunch of IBM execs in the church and a meeting was set with a software expert to decide how we could do this. I sat in on that meeting and listened for 45 minutes about bits, bytes, RAMS and mice. I could understand most of the words they were using—but none of the meanings. They were speaking English but it made no sense to me at all. I had never taken computer classes, never used a computer, never even sat down in front of one. I was totally lost. The conversation around me was fast and furious and impassioned and enthusiastic—but nothing about it made any sense to me.

Nowadays, to understand the nature of sin, I think back to that meeting. The concept of being lost in sin is just like what I was feeling that day: nothing makes sense in life. You are trying as hard as you can but there is no satisfaction, no harmony, no progress. You don’t know what you are supposed to do or how you are supposed to act. You just feel empty, as if you are wandering aimlessly. Lost. After I took a computer course at Austin Community College and, after working with computers for about six months, the technological world began to make sense. As we pursue faith, Jesus educates us to life so that life begins to make sense. He saves us from being lost, adrift, confused. He gives us direction: this is how to live, how to act, what to reach for, this is your purpose. Jesus saves.

Story two, I grew up in Memphis, Tennessee, very prejudiced racially from a young age. An African-American neighborhood began just behind the fence in my backyard. My brother and I engaged in BB gun battles and rock-throwing wars with the kids from over that fence, never knowing the names of any of them, never stopping to think that perhaps one of them could have become a best friend. Even after I got into high school, prejudice clung to me and I made impassioned speeches against integrating our church camp. I was filled with anger, hatred, bitterness, fear and suspicion. I didn’t like being that way, but that was what my prejudice was bringing me. It was tearing me up inside. But then, when I was a senior in high school, Christ opened my eyes to my sin. He did it through a local youth minister whom I greatly admired. All Jerry had to say to me was, “Bill, how can you be a Christian and yet hate some of God’s created children?” (A question that we need to be asking ourselves in this current day and time.) Jerry was so obviously right that it opened a crack in my hardened heart big enough for Christ to slip through. And suddenly I understood. And my bitterness and hatred just dropped away, falling like the scales from the eyes of the blind man that Jesus healed in the scriptures. My sin was gone; I was saved from having to live with it and saved from having to be judged for it eventually.

If we choose to follow where Jesus leads, to do as he does, then our sins will just fall away. Listen to his spirit speaking to you; let him save you from your sins. Jesus saves.

Final story, Jose Nassar from Brazil played center for the University of Texas basketball team several years ago. He said that the difference between playing basketball in Brazil and in the U.S. was that if you beat the home team in Brazil, you could bet that their fans were going to be waiting for you at your bus, ready to administer a different kind of beating. We would call that uncivilized behavior—a good athlete doing his best in a fair contest but needing to fear for his safety afterward. But look at how we interact with each other and with other nations. Are we civilized? It appears that there are still uncivilized pockets of humanity in every country. Many of us see Western civilization as a shining beacon of hope, holding forth concern for the welfare of all people. Yet when someone asked Mahatma Ghandi what he thought of Western civilization, he said, “I think it would be a good idea.” What causes some parts of the world to be humane and ethical and others not? Perhaps there are many reasons, but I would offer one: where people understand Jesus and act out of his principles, then that society is elevated to a higher plane. Jesus can save humanity from itself. Jesus can make a difference in the quality of our lives, in the fabric of our societies, and in the history of our world. It’s not just a cliché; Christ is the answer; Jesus saves.

The angel told Joseph that he was to name the child, “Jesus,” God’s chosen name, which means, “God will save!” “She will bear a Son and you are to name him Jesus for he will save his people from their sins.” From the cradle to the cross, from the temple to the tomb, from the river to the resurrection, his purpose has always been the same—to live up to his name—to save. And it still is. Jesus saves.