Living Perfectly - again
This looks alot like the sermon I put up last week. It is. I decided it really was two sermons in one. So I preached the second half and left people with the question "What is perfection"? This week I explore that question
perfection is found in God’s character
righteousness is when we reflect God’s character
Gate Pa – Epiphany 8 – March 2 2014
Readings:
Hebrew Scripture: Isa
49:8-16
Psalm: 131
Epistle: 1
Cor 4:1-5
Gospel: Matt
6:24-34
What I want to say:
I want to explore what “God’s perfection” might mean,
suggesting it is more about God’s compassion for all creation, mercy, justice
and love. I then want to apply that to today’s readings and suggest that Jesus
offers his followers a way of living perfectly (i.e. with Compassion, mercy,
love justice and love) in a way that challenges the excepted norms.
What I want to
happen:
I want people to rethink their
assumptions around righteousness, holiness and perfection, and to begin to
think about living perfectly in terms of how we treat other people and creation
The Sermon
1. Introduction:
over last few weeks listening to Sermon
On Mount
Last week finished Jesus inviting/commanding
us to “be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly father is perfect.”
invited you think about what God’s
perfection might look life
how
would you describe that
so – how would you describe God’s
perfection (Discuss)
2. Righteousness
as I said last week and in pew
sheet,
righteousness
is one key themes in Matthews Gospel
and in sermon on
mount –if not the key theme
seems
to be used interchangeably with
God’s perfection (in last week’s
reading)
holiness
and
righteousness
these are important words
because how we understand these
terms reveals and shapes
how understand God
how
we really understand what Jesus was about
what
Christianity is really about
3. A Moral Gospel
e.g. Understand God’s perfection to be without guilt or sin
and Righteousness is the state of moral perfection required
by God to enter heaven.
Morally upright;
J morally
good : following religious or moral laws
then point Jesus is provide way for
us – sinner – to have access to perfect and righteous God who cannot abide us
to be near without us paying the price.
Is this good definition of perfect
how
words used were defined
more
importantly – How perfection, righteousness, holiness is defined by Jesus life,
ministry and teaching?
suggest that is it an imperfect
understanding.
4. Perfect Bible Stories
Perfect tense – means completed
teleos – Greek word translate as
perfect also better understood as complete
fits with whole story of Bible
story of our creation and our completion
ð what
would that look like?
J
(NT Wright) The central biblical discussions
of righteousness thus principally concern membership in the covenant and the
behaviour appropriate to that membership.
… these passages depend on a theology in which God is creator and judge
of all the earth, and in which God’s people are to reflect God’s own character.
perfection is found in God’s character
righteousness is when we reflect God’s character
takes us back to plot of bible
some call - moral arch story of bible
moral arch of story of humanity
bringing
humanity and all creation to point where we reflect God’s own character
when we become perfect like God
God is beginning and end, last and first
God as perfection then is God as endpoint
point
of completion
we will be perfect when we reflect God’s character
This is very different way understanding Gospel
not about our moral failure
not about our sinfulness
not about someone having to pay
the price so that we can enter heaven and be with sinless God after we die
this is about God ongoing work leading us, journeying with
us, waiting for us
to be all that God created us to be
Point Jesus life, ministry and teaching
show us
both what character of God is
offer
example what human society might look like if we lived out those characteristics
if we
were perfect as our father in heaven is perfect
Jesus also shows us that end point of life as we currently
live it is death
end point of understanding perfection, righteousness,
holiness as morally upright and without sin is also death
Paul and
Jesus make that clear again and again
Jesus offers us a new way
5. An alternative
two weeks ago I used Rob Bell and Don Golden talking about
describe key characteristics of God
as compassion, mercy, justice and love
suggest God wants people who
will enflesh compassion, mercy justice and love
we might
add – these people will be righteous, holy, perfect
encounter
this understanding
mosaic law
prophets
life, teaching and ministry of
Jesus
what Jesus
meant said that our righteousness needed to exceed that of Pharisees and
scribes
their God was moral judge who determined
who was acceptable and who was not
righteousness
was about obedience to moral code
who
said who was in and who was not
but if we read woes at end
Matthew 23 that book end with Beatitudes Jesus says
(23)
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and
cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy
and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.
be righteous
means to live compassion
be holy is
to live mercy
to be
perfect is to live justice
This
understanding is at heart of understanding Sermon on Mount
6. Conclusion
about enter
Lent
wonder if
one things we need to give up is seeing God as perfect moral judge
sends Jesus offer way into life with God
after death
instead see God’s
perfection in God’s mercy, compassion, justice. love and peace
wonder
what habits
might you need to develop to grow in this understanding of God
what habits
might you need nurture join God developing society built on God’s justice, peace, compassion and
love.
Jesus said –
“In a word, what I'm saying is, Grow up. You're kingdom subjects. Now live like
it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward
others, the way God lives toward you.
Be perfect, therefore, as your
heavenly Father is perfect
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