SIN: THE TROUBLE WE’RE IN

Genesis 4:1-16; Romans 3: 10-26

Dr. James Forbes, Senior Minister of the Riverside Church in New York City, once preached a sermon called “Finding and Fixing the Fatal Flaw.” It was not the sense of alliteration which his title possessed that made it memorable: it was the topic-which was human sinfulness-and the congregation that made it most memorable: he was preaching to the graduating class of New York Theological Seminary’s program at Sing Sing Prison. There was both gravity and hope in his message to those who truly wanted to bring good news to captives. There were those within earshot paying the price for (and, in some ways, hoping that they might one day get free from) the terrible burden that their actions wrought. Inmates start to get black and white understandings of sin along with lessons on taking responsibility for their actions. Some who start to be changed by Christ even dare to pray for amazing grace and unforgettable forgiveness. In our world there are those who sin which includes everyone. But there are also those who put what they think is sin in the spotlight of condemnation. In Jesus’ day Pharisees did it enough that Jesus targeted them. In our day the sick hate group that they have the nerve to call a church that stands and claps at the funerals of fallen soldiers is one such twisted group that tries to condemn others. It has happened over the years. For example, back in the 1980s, Donald Wildmon and his American Family Association used to send out unsolicited newsletters to me and other pastors that told which shows had violent or sexual story lines or crude language. He condemned those programs in his newsletter that ran for pages covering all the words and actions deemed offensive. His style was “in your face” but he had a point: the standards that movies and television had until the 1960s had gone out the window and were replaced by a rather loose rating system still in place today. But since the 1980s, the potentially offensive and even harmful scenes on cable television today could fill volumes, coming across our airwaves to wide eyed kids and seemingly savvy teenagers whose knowledge of drug use, violence, and sexual acts far surpasses their maturity to make good decisions regarding them. What is on our airwaves has not just pushed the envelope: it has torn it wide open. Without youth equipped to discern and absorb the good stuff, and discern and push away the bad stuff, our society will keep spiraling into the excesses that brought down the Greek and Roman Empires in earlier days. Author Annie Dillard, in her book PILGRIM AT TINKER CREEK, tells about an Eskimo hunter asking a local missionary priest this question: “If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?” “No,” said the priest, “not if you did not know.” To which the hunter replied “Then why did you tell me?” One only has to look at William Golding’s book LORD OF THE FLIES, about a group of stranded boys who made the rules by which they lived and were tortured and killed by their own lawlessness, to realize the answer to “Why.” One only has to look at Genesis chapter 3 and 4 and beyond, when humans first learned right from wrong but had not yet received commandments or consequences for choosing the latter instead of the former, to understand that without rules for living, one’s life runs like a train without tracks, getting bogged down, heading pell-mell down hillsides, and tearing apart the men, women, and children who are in its path. Without knowledge and correction, there is murder, rape, anarchy, looting, and piracy. Again, it began to be described in Genesis and was recaptured in Paul’s masterpiece that we call his Letter to the Romans. The trouble we’re in is not the knowledge of sin: it’s the trampling on the right choices and setting course for the wrong ones. Now I know this topic—sin—stereotypically belongs to the church: some may even feel that the church is out of touch with the world because “sin” seems to be the “Johnny one note” of our musical keyboard. Well let’s lighten up for just a moment. Humorist Garrison Keillor once said “I’m not sure I’m in favor of repentance. Sinners are the ones who get the work done. A strong sense of personal guilt is what makes people willing to serve on committees.” Keillor loves to describe his beloved Minnesota “Lutherans,” but he described guilt as heavily felt by the Catholics, the Methodists and, of course, the Presbyterians, and the Baptists! American Baptist minister Keith Russell recalled “As a young person, I was very clear about the nature of sin. Sin, as described in my Iowa Baptist upbringing, was a series of behaviors to be avoided. It was both simple and clear: Do not smoke, drink, dance, swear, or gamble….It was exceedingly clear in my appropriation of the faith that sin was personal….Evil was a set of behaviors to be exposed and changed.” Now let’s get serious again: like John the Baptist ages ago, it is the church, it is the preacher, and it is the congregation who holds each other accountable, who simply must be the voice crying in the wilderness of our lost society to prepare the way of the Lord; to make straight the crooked paths. But where to draw the perimeter lines around living like Christ or living against him has to be measured by the only rule of faith and practice God has left us: the Bible, and, more specifically, the New Testament. It is most interesting that the word for “sin” in Greek is hamartia, but Jesus uses it in Matthew’s gospel only a few times and in Mark only twice. So sinning is mildly addressed, certainly not because people didn’t do it, but because everyone was, and is, a sinner. The gospel and letters of John say it frequently and so does Paul in his letters. So what was Jesus’ great focus? It was on another word-skandalizo- which was to cause one to stumble or to sin. It is one thing to take responsibility for one’s own sinful actions. It is another to push, seduce, or entice someone to fall: on that topic and toward those people Jesus showed no mercy. Toward the tempter in Genesis 2, toward the Satan character in Matthew chapter 4, toward the Pharisees in numerous places Jesus had cutting comments; it was toward those who encouraged others to sin. Sinners, it seems, can be forgiven through their remorse, repentance, and restitution. But to those who entice someone into stealing, adultery, excessive gambling, lying, or scheming to get what someone else has, Jesus has eyes and a heart filled with condemnation. This is where the bride-the church-joins her husband- Jesus Christ-in united outrage: on casting out those who, with delight, make others stumble; and, working to save those who are lost and following wolves in sheep’s clothing. What do such people sound like? “Come on; I know a store where you can take stuff and no one will stop you.” “Come on, no one will miss just a few dollars out of the drawer.” “Come on, whose going to find out what we do in a motel behind closed doors?” Come on, every tries this at our age.” “Come on, I can show you a way to bring that girl (insert a worse word here) down so you can be the winner instead!” The light of truth shines itself into the dark corners where such despicable persons lurk. You see, the other word that Jesus says a lot in Matthew is poneros, which means evil, although the NIV Bible translates it as “wicked” or “sinful” and the NRSV uses the word “evil” for another word, kakos, that simply means “wrong” such as in 1 Thess. 5:15. Scholar Judith Wray says “While none of our translations is necessarily inaccurate, the nuances implied in the Greek text are often lost in the theology of the translators.” Such is why Presbyterian ministers learn both the Greek and Hebrew languages: to not go first to an English translation of God’s Word, but to the original language and it’s meaning. While Paul was convinced of our sinfulness and described it as “missing the mark” as I described to the children with a target, Jesus himself spent much more time condemning the laws and lawmakers of his day who were so busy calling others sinners and making people sin that they could not see the egregiousness of their own actions. That’s when Jesus said the humorous retort “How can you see the splinter in the eye of another with such a log stuck in your own eye?”

So in the Advent season, the preacher- whether it is James Forbes or John the Baptist or someone else- is swift to remind all sinners who have possibly forgotten their own state of misery, that there can be deliverance to the captives: those who are held captive by sin, by glitter, by money, by threats, by walls, or by government. The preacher, like James or John, dips deeply into the well of Isaiah, for example, with words like: “For unto us a child is born; unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder!” It should be shouted from the rooftops; it should be enacted in branches of the legislature; it should be offered in halls of incarceration and on the street corners of corruption. Jesus coming into people’s lives giving us not only the power, but also the mandate, “to do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with your God.” And our mandate is to tell the world, the whole world, about Jesus Christ, who came to save us from our sins. But first we tell the world about sin and the trouble we’re in, so no one can claim ignorance of it as they do it. May the coming birth of this child empower you and me to, like the angel that holy night, proclaim the good news to the lowly and the powerful of our world, and tell them to come and hear what all the commotion, that occurs every December around the world, is all about.

Jeffrey A. Sumner December 9, 2007