Preached on the Ninth Sunday After Trinity
The Gospels are a special form of literature, written primarily for the purpose of evangelism. In them the story of Jesus is preserved for the world, that we might know Him, and through Him be reconciled to God. They are also repositories of the sayings of Jesus, the teaching that He gave while He was with us, which is so very important for the life of the Church. There are times in the Gospels when the writers seem to pause from their narrative to simply include sayings of Jesus that don’t necessarily fit their narrative. We have such a situation in Luke 17:1-10, which you will find in your programme. These verses are found after the story of the lost son, or the prodigal son, and before the story of the ten lepers, of which only one returned to thank Jesus for his healing. People try to see how verse 1 of chapter 17 could have followed the story of the lost son, but we cannot be sure that it does.
What we wind up with, though, is a wonderful passage that brings together three of the most important graces of the Christian life. You will see how I have provided these for you: forgiveness, faith, and humility. So that we may see how important these graces are for us, and that we might seek the Lord to have them increased in our lives, I want us to go through these verses, considering them from three viewpoints: 1) our own spiritual lives, 2) the Church’s mission, and 3) how they relate to live and mission of Jesus Himself. What we will do is go through the 3 parts of this passage, looking at each from all three viewpoints as we go.
We read in verses 1&2:
1: Then said he unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come! 2: It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.
What is Jesus talking about here? He’s talking about people who do things that trouble our faith. These can be violent, someone can threaten us because of our faith, or they can be non-violent, such as setting bad examples which cause us to question our faith or tempt us to do something we know is wrong. Because we live in a fallen world among sinners, even in the Church, Jesus says that such things are bound to occur to us. He is an utter realist. We cannot avoid being offended by people in this life. Jesus warns offenders of their danger, because He is so jealous for His disciples, his little ones. However, we recognise that we all have the potential of doing something that may harm someone else’s faith and it is a real warning to us as well to be careful to not do such a thing.
As an example of how we might offend another disciple, we need look no further than the very issue of forgiveness itself. If we allow ourselves to become bitter, we may discourage others who have been mistreated from forgiving people as they ought. They might think, “Well, if she can keep a grudge, I should be able to keep a grudge, too, especially since what happened to me was so bad!” Now, we would never want to encourage anyone to hold a grudge or to do anything so harmful. Therefore, we must watch out how we live, and Jesus goes on to talk about this.
3: Take heed to yourselves: If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him; and if he repent, forgive him. 4: And if he trespass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I repent; thou shalt forgive him.
While our emphasis on this passage is forgiveness, let us not miss the duty to rebuke. This is something that we tend to shy away from. We are so sentimental and so prone to avoid any confrontation with anyone about anything that we must fail at times to do our duty here. Jesus surely does not refer to those irritations that other people bring to us because of their idiosyncrasies or mistakes that they make. He speaks of people who trespass against us, which I take to mean, they really do something sinful. If a brother has a sinful habit that is offending people, he needs to be confronted about it for his own sake, not to mention for the sake of our relationship with them. It’s something we have to do, though it is very unpleasant. This is especially so for pastors who see members in the Church doing sinful things that are hurting people. Something has to be said and it is their job to do it. It is wrong for people to complain if the pastor confronts someone; he is just doing his job.
But let us go on. Jesus, by saying we are to forgive seven times in a day, means that we are not to put a limit on our forgiveness. If someone needs forgiveness, we are to give it. Forgiveness is one of the key things being a Christian is all about. It is utter hypocrisy for a Christian to not forgive someone if they ask to be forgiven. It’s a denial of our faith: we believe, as we confess in the Creed, in the forgiveness of sins. It’s something God does and it’s something we are to do as well.
Bitterness ruins our souls; it cuts us off from our fellowship with God and imperils us. Jesus said (Matthew 6): 14: For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: 15: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. Forgiveness is not an option with us, and it is a way to maintain spiritual health.
It is also critical for the Church’s mission. We represent Christ and His kingdom on this earth, and He is, if anything, a forgiving God. For us to proclaim a message of forgiveness to the world, and yet to be unforgiving ourselves, is to cut the legs out from under our preaching. It is not only hypocrisy, it clouds the sincerity and truth of our message. If we are going to proclaim a message of forgiveness to this world, which needs it so badly, we must do so as forgiving people.
But the most important reason we are to forgive is connected to the forgiveness we ourselves have received in Christ, which I’ve already mentioned, but I will speak more on now. At the Last Supper, Jesus spoke of His blood as the founding of the New Covenant. Giving the cup to his disciples, He said, For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. The prophet Jeremiah said that the new covenant which God would establish with His people would be a covenant in which the promise was made by God that he would remember our sins and iniquities no more. They would be forgiven; forgotten. Forgiveness of sins is what the work of Jesus on the Cross was all about. Just think: Jesus tells us to be forgiving of the things that people do against us, and then He went to the Cross, praying for the forgiveness of those who crucified Him, and died on the Cross so that God might forgive, not only the sins committed against us, but the sins of the whole world and of all time committed against Him. It is precisely because Jesus suffered and bled and died that you and I have received forgiveness and are made the children of God. Christianity is all about forgiveness. Jesus’ mission was all about forgiveness. So it is that the New Testament tells us repeatedly, we are to follow Jesus’ example and forgive people, motivated by the fact of our own forgiveness of sins by God through Jesus. Brothers and sisters, let us seek grace to banish all bitterness from our lives and forgive; otherwise we are no real Christians at all.
Let us now move on to verses 5-6: 5: And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith. 6: And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you.
Christian faith is not in a subjective experience of inspiration or believing, which is the common idea of faith in the world today. It is trust in the living God. It is a gift from God; an ability to trust in God for all the things we need, now and in eternity, which He has given us in Jesus. It is the hand which receives the gifts God promises us in His Word. It is by this kind of faith that the Christian lives and exercises his graces.
It may be that the disciples, upon hearing of how forgiving they were to be, looked inside themselves and did not find the strength of faith to do such a thing. We can understand that, because we do not find it in ourselves either. The Christian life, from our perspective, is impossible. Indeed, Jesus Himself has told us that apart from Him we can do nothing. But with faith, we can do His will. We can go to God in prayer and ask Him to keep His promise to us to help us to do everything He tells us to do. This the disciples do. They go to Jesus. They tell Him about how inadequate they feel. They ask Him to increase their faith, because they think they will not be able to do otherwise.
But Jesus’ answer is very interesting and very encouraging. He tells his disciples that the amount of faith they have is not the point. Their ability to do something as impossible and miraculous as to pluck up a sycamine tree and plant it in the sea is not based on how great their faith is, but on the greatness of God. If one has a modicum of faith, as small as the mustard seed is among the seeds of the plant world, if that faith is in God, they will find that they are able to do things they never thought they could do. Why? Because God is faithful.
Sometimes we do our duty as Christians and it seems easy because, frankly, we live by sight and by our feelings more than we should. Yes, we are doing things by faith, we are not doubting God, but they are things which we think and feel are not that hard to do. But there are times when God calls us to do something that to our sight and feelings is absolutely impossible and then we realise how important faith is.
Take for example when God called upon Abraham and Sarah to have a child when they were past age. That was about as impossible as anything could be for them. But what does the Bible say about it? In Hebrews 11, we read: 11: Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.
It happened. They did it. Why? Because they had such a strong faith? Was it the greatness of their faith? No. Sarah, in fact, laughed at the idea. It was not the quantity of Sarah’s faith here that is mentioned, but the quality. Her faith may have been as small as a mustard seed in this matter, but it was real faith and it was in the right place: it was in the faithfulness of God; the God who does the impossible.
What is there in your life that is impossible right now? Everything? God knows it is impossible. Put your faith in Him, and you will find, through His faithfulness, you will be able to do what is before you. He is faithful.
Indeed, we all share in an impossibility: the salvation of the world. We are called, as the Church, to bring the nations to Christ. A biblically informed mind realises that, from the human standpoint, this is nonsense! But Christ does not send us into the world to do something on our own. He sends us saying, “Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” He is here and with our faith in Him, we can successfully work with Him to build His kingdom.
Another thing to consider to encourage our faith is that this one who is with us, and will never leave us, is also a man who lived by faith. Never forget the humanity of Jesus and all that it means. When He was here, how did He do the impossible things He did to establish His covenant and kingdom? He did it by faith in His heavenly Father. He had to pray, too, just like we do. He had to go to God and ask Him to keep His promises as well. This one who goes with us knows very well the difficulties of living by faith, and so He, by His Spirit, reminds us of the promises and through the means of grace which He has ordained, strengthens us to have faith in God and to step out and act. As we do, we will see what wonderful things God is willing to do for us and through us.
But as God uses us, just because we trust and obey Him, that does not mean we have a reason to get a big head about it. Jesus also knows how tempted we are by pride. Having just told His disciples about the mighty things they can do by faith, he then reminds them of their true place before God lest they think too highly of themselves. Let us read the last section of this passage:
7: But which of you, having a servant plowing or feeding cattle, will say unto him by and by, when he is come from the field, Go and sit down to meat? 8: And will not rather say unto him, Make ready wherewith I may sup, and gird thyself, and serve me, till I have eaten and drunken; and afterward thou shalt eat and drink? 9: Doth he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I trow not. 10: So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.
Whatever we may do for the Lord, from forgiving someone who has offended us – again – to leading someone to Christ, which is the most amazing of all, when the day is done, we have only done what we were supposed to do. We haven’t done anything to merit God’s favour with us. We haven’t done anything to put Him in our debt. We haven’t done anything to change the essential nature of our identity, which is that we are unworthy sinners, saved by grace. Humility is our proper condition of mind.
One of the things that absolutely bugs me the most it seems is a habit of self-regard that notices when I’ve done something well. It is like a horsefly buzzing around my head – worse at some times than others – which is absolutely infuriating. Don’t you hate horseflies! How in the world this self-regard grew in my life, noticing myself and commending myself to myself, I don’t know, but it is absolutely insane! Plus, it’s probably wrong 99% of the time! It’s a kind of pride, of course. Whether you have the same problem or whether pride manifests itself in you in other ways, it has absolutely no place in our thinking. We do nothing good but by God’s grace and mercy and when it is all said and done, we have nothing to do but to take the place of humility, and give God the glory for it all.
Prideful self-regard is especially ugly in a church. A church that is proud of itself, because of her heritage, her building, her liturgy, her choir – whatever it may be – is simply ugly. Pride is totally contrary to the definition of the
As I close, let us consider this passage about humility as it relates to Christ. Here is an amazing irony! Jesus is our Master, we are His servants. There is no question about that. But the quality of one’s servitude depends on the quality of the master. What kind of Master do we have?
Are we not absolutely flabbergasted, in light of all we have considered, to hear Jesus say these words in the 22nd chapter of St. Luke: 27 For who is the greater, one who reclines at table or one who serves? Is it not the one who reclines at table? But I am among you as the one who serves. Our Master is pleased to be our servant! What does that mean to our own service for Him?
Why are you and I forgiven by God today? Why do we have faith? How has Christ won His crown and won our hearts? It is because He came to this earth to serve us. He saw us in need and He left the glory of heaven to serve us in our need. Jesus says in Matthew 20: 27: And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant: 28: Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many. The word “minister” in the AV is the same Greek word as serve – to be a slave – as is in Luke 22, read above. No one has ever served as He has served. What an honour to serve Him who has so served us – who served us in being born of Mary, in living all those years, and then served us on the Cross and in the grave and who continues to serve us, even to this very day, on His throne, ordering all things for our good, until the time when He will raise us up to share His glory. Who are we? We are nothing but His servants. To be nothing but His servants is our glory. What a Master we have! He that glories – he that brags about anything – let Him glory in the LORD!
Brothers and sisters, Christ continues ready to serve us in our need, by giving us forgiving hearts, believing hearts, and humble hearts. He invites us to His table to do so. Let us seek His grace to give up our bitterness, our unbelief, and our pride and receive that new life He bought for us with His blood, and rose to give us even this very evening. Amen.
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