Well, this is the last time you are going to hear from
Eugene Peterson and myself for some time. Let's make it worthwhile...
Our scripture this morning is found in Romans 12:1. I’m
going to read it now:
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your
bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which
is your spiritual worship.
As mentioned before, the Lord's Table is - Biblically - an
extension of the Passover meal. They are both parallel and intersecting events.
Both are meals that occur before a mighty, epoch-changing, redemptive act of
God. As much as the redemption of Israel by God through Moses defined the
Israelites and Judaism; that is but a starting point for the complete redemption
and salvation accomplished by Christ.
Sacrifice is central to salvation.
Sacrifice is God's way of dealing with sin. All of the
other self-help projects and movement that we have, or ever will, create -
while having some value - will never be enough. All of those can, in ways, make
the world better.
But none can accomplish salvation. That comes from God. And God's way of
salvation is sacrifice.
Now there was, back in Paul’s day, several religious and
philosophic schools out there that resisted the need for sacrifice – or even
salvation, for that matter. In their thinking, there was the “spiritual” world
and the physical world. The spiritual realm was about ideals; it was wonderful,
pure, and more real. But the physical world was about the flesh. It was evil,
corrupt, maybe even an illusion. The thought that God, who is spiritual, would
become flesh in Christ was not merely hard to understand; it was religiously
offensive! That God would deal directly with the physical world … well, it just
‘wasn’t done.’ Such a notion was contrary to what they thought, knew what was
true, and … ewe! … it was Bad Form, impolite, nonsense. Crazy talk!
Yet the Bible tells a very different thing about how God
works in the world. God is neither repulsed by nor intimidated by the physical
world. After all, he created it – and it was good. But – as we know – things
went wrong.
The world now needs fixing – and we need saving. We
are in grievous mortal peril, we are lost, and we feel the clammy fingers of
death around our throats. We need to be saved!
And God’s way of salvation is sacrifice.
Notice that sacrifice always involves "stuff,”
“things” - physical material: flour, grain, lambs, goats, incense and
structures to put them on, like 'altars.' Leviticus is the Operator's Manual
for righteous sacrifice. And sacrifice involves stuff: physical things – even
the flesh of animals. Physical
sacrifice impacts spiritual realities. That is completely contrary to the
spirit of the age that Paul lived in.
We are, by the way, to bring our best "stuff" to be
sacrificed. Why? Partly to remind us that the best we can do is not good
enough. God has to take it and do something with it. That's part of the anticipation of sacrifice: what will God
do with it? Exercising this faith that God can leverage these small things into
a great salvation is part of Biblical worship.
But, until Christ came, all of that sacrifice was
temporary, transitory, not permanent. Until Jesus became sin for us, having
died once for all; sacrifice taught us that salvation was an uncertain thing.
We had to trust that God would be pleased with the fragrant aroma of our
best stuff being burned up before a priest. Now Christ's sacrifice completes
that lesson: all of the sacrifice that we might attempt is useless. It was always about God doing salvation, and it still is!
Sacrifice always involved stuff and in Christ's sacrifice,
it was his physical, bodily death through the shedding of his innocent blood.
Again, stuff: wood, nails, thorns, body, blood.
No; sacrifice is not an obsolete concept. If worship is
rightly defined as the presentation of God's truth and our response to it, then Romans 12:1
helps us see the continuing role of sacrifice even after Jesus' death. Paul
implores us to offer ourselves as living sacrifices. Now that's a twist! No
longer do we offer our best. No; now we offer our-selves. Not as an
atonement for our sins - because Christ has already completed that. But as a
reasonable response to that truth. We sing, "Take
my life and let it be, consecrated, Lord to thee."
Of course, you know the problem with living sacrifices,
don't you? Right? Well, they keep standing up and walking off the altar! In the
paradox of our salvation in Christ, we are both crucified with Christ and no longer
live; yet I now live because Christ who lives in me.
Sacrifice, salvation, and stuff.
That is why Jesus has us remember our salvation using stuff: bread and
wine. Without the concrete physical stuff, it becomes easy to drift off into the
spirit of our age – which is not unlike Paul’s time. We can drift into a
‘Jesus-as-Great-Example’ gospel. Sure, that is true, as far as it goes; but it
does not go nearly far enough. Jesus is more than merely a great example.
We can also drift into a spirituality of ideas about Jesus
rather than receiving the very life of Jesus. God does not want us to be merely
“spiritual” people; he also wants us to live out our ‘spirituality’ in our
physical, every-day life in this world. The bread and cup - these physical
symbols - remind us of the sacrifice that is just as real as the stuff that God
used to secure our salvation.
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