Jeff Tacklind’s sermon on Luke 23:26-49
Just thinking out loud here…
1. God is love (1 John 4)
2. Love keeps no record of wrongs (1 Cor 13)
3. Therefore, sin, hell, forgiveness and “Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” (Hebrews 9:22)
Nope.
Deut. 30:19-20
19 This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live 20 and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Luke 23
26 As the soldiers led him away, they seized Simon from Cyrene, who was on his way in from the country, and put the cross on him and made him carry it behind Jesus. 27 A large number of people followed him, including women who mourned and wailed for him. 28 Jesus turned and said to them, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children. 29 For the time will come when you will say, ‘Blessed are the childless women, the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’ 30 Then “‘they will say to the mountains, “Fall on us!” and to the hills, “Cover us!”’ 31 For if people do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?”
32 Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. 33 When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. 34 Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.
35 The people stood watching, and the rulers even sneered at him. They said, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is God’s Messiah, the Chosen One.”
36 The soldiers also came up and mocked him. They offered him wine vinegar 37 and said, “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself.”
38 There was a written notice above him, which read: this is the king of the jews.
39 One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”
40 But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? 41 We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.”
42 Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
43 Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
44 It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, 45 for the sun stopped shining. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.46 Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last. 47 The centurion, seeing what had happened, praised God and said, “Surely this was a righteous man.” 48 When all the people who had gathered to witness this sight saw what took place, they beat their breasts and went away. 49 But all those who knew him, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things.
“To know the cross is not merely to know our own sufferings. For the cross is the sign of salvation, and no one is saved by his own sufferings. To know the cross is to know that we are saved by the sufferings of Christ; more, it is to know the love of Christ who underwent suffering and death in order to save us. It is, then, to know Christ. For to know his love is not merely to know the story of his love, but to experience in our spirit that we are loved by him, and that in his love the Father manifests his own love for us, through his Spirit poured forth into our hearts.” Merton
How do we respond?
1. We are responsible for our lives. Not the sins done to us, but the ones we’ve done ourselves. We are accountable. And we are helpless to forgive ourselves. We can make restitution, but in the end, everything leaves a mark of a stain.
2. But God’s response is to offer us a way back. And at the same time, to show us there is more. I think this is why God would create a world where sins can occur, because in the repairing of these things, we get a glimpse of a beauty so much bigger than we can dream up ourselves.
3. God’s answer to our sins is the cross. And as painful a picture as it might be, we see God’s enormous love for all of us. As humanity as a whole. And for each of us as individuals.
4. Sin, hell, forgiveness…God calls sin out for what it is…it is beneath us. Hell itself is an act, I believe, of God’s mercy, where he gives people, in the end, what they ask for. That hell is somehow locked from inside.
5. But forgiveness, sacrificial love, this is where our hope lies. That this broken world is being mended. That there is more to life than just today. That the wrongs I have committed have been ultimately removed.
2 Cor 5:17-19
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling[c] the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Questions:
1. What sins in my life am I clutching too? Where am I choosing darkness over light? Where am I ignoring truth?
2. Where do I need to still experience freedom? Are there sins that have been forgiven that I am refusing to let go of? Are there people I still need to ask forgiveness of?
3. Can I pray with Jesus, “Father forgive them.” Who do I need to forgive? What burdens of unforgiveness am I still carrying?