C, New Year's Eve - Romans 8:28-39 "The Eve of Eternity"

Part 1 — Introduction: Returning to the Normality of Life

After the almighty high of visiting the Bethlehem Inn and seeing the Son of God, the shepherds return to their pastures and flocks, once again melding back into the normality of life. But life now is not the same, having seen the Christ child and hearing that he was sent “for them — for you”.

But one might ask, “Really how different ‘is’ the normality of everyday life?” After all, the sheep still need water and pastures; the shepherds still need to stay with there sheep and protect them and themselves from the night. What if on returning to their flocks, after going to see the Christ child in Bethlehem, they found the flock scattered or destroyed by wild animals! Would this mean that God was no longer with them or for them?

What about as the years pass and the memory of that overwhelming time waned where the angels lit up the night sky and sang ‘Glory to God in the highest’, and was replaced with the real everyday struggles of life just to keep the sheep and family alive; what then of this God who was born for us and laid in a manger?

What about those in Bethlehem two years after the birth of Jesus? Was God really ‘for them and with them’ as Herod’s men systematically march through their homes slaughtering every boy two-years old and under? Where was the peace and goodwill the angels proclaimed in the following days when death marched through the hills of Bethlehem?

In the reality of life, is the struggle to live. Most of the time living can be down-right monotonous, depressing, and deadly! Year after year the same-old same-old, as the seasons come and go, and as life seems to get harder and harder.

It’s not much different for us either! Like the shepherds, our society is returning to normality of life after the Christmas rush. Following the high of Christmas, comes the reality that everything is still the same. The promises made by the advertisers, and consumed by us, are short lived. The happiness and good will promised in the gifts of a consumeristic Christmas leave most in debt, feeling unsatisfied, flat, and unfulfilled. It’s as if our society suffers from a by-polar disorder, falling into the valley of depression after Christmas until the next big commercial thing comes along promising to give you just what you need to make life a little better.

Where is the gift of Immanuel — God with us — in all of this? Perhaps the pressure of a commercial Christmas high, superficially hiding the reality of everyday struggles, makes you ask, “Is God really with me? Has God really chosen me, or is this just another hollow promise like everything else?” As you stand on the eve of a new year, where is your heart in relation to God? As we stumble from the wilderness and troubles of 2006 into the unknown of 2007, are you cynical about God’s plan for you? Are you pessimistic about God’s presence with you? Is God for you, is it worth persevering in the faith, is God preserving me, is the shepherd looking after the flock?

Part 2 — A Marriage Scenario

There is a husband, completely in love with his wife, 100% unquestioningly devoted! However, the wife questions his love at every moment, saying, “You don’t love me! You’re just saying that you do! I’m not worth being loved! I’m unlovable!” The wife’s life is one of doubt and mistrust even though the husband truly loves her. Over time the husband patiently waits for his wife to respond. All he wants is the wife to trust him and see that his love is genuine and freely given. But his wife is so consumed with herself and her selfish affairs that her trust never turns to her husband. And in the wife’s death the husband walks away from her in bitter anger and wrath.

Who is this husband? Who is this wife? Let me start by saying that the husband is no person sitting or standing in this place. There is not one husband, walking the earth today, who can 100% unquestioningly be devoted to his wife! So who is this man? Let’s return to him in a minute!

The wife! Well she can be identified very quickly! She is the one who stumbles from the wilderness and troubles of 2006 into the unknown of 2007. She is cynical about God’s plan for her? She is pessimistic about God’s presence with her? She questions, “Is God really for me, is God with me! In doubt she becomes so consumed with the affairs of her own troubled soul and in doubt ponders, “Is it worth persevering in the faith, is God preserving me, is the shepherd looking after the flock; is my husband looking after me?”

The church is the wife — that’s you and me. We are the bride of Christ — Jesus is the husband. And what a wayward wife we make for the One who loves us and is 100% unquestioningly devoted to us! We were unworthy, but, like the shepherds at Bethlehem who were also unclean, God came to us and sought us, the church, to be his holy bride. Now having been joined in matrimony through the husband’s sacrifice on the cross, we are called to believe the power of this sacrifice and the vows that Jesus makes to us in his word.

Like any marriage there are always tough times to be had! But unlike our human marriages, which suffer from the sins of both parties, the heavenly union between God and his church suffers only because of the bride and her sin. And this sin is exposed by the First Commandment when we worry; and doubt God, his word, and his ways.

Part 3 — The Call to Believe and Trust

However, in this life, we are being called to believe that God is faithful, persistent, and patient; even despite our sin — because in Christ our sin has lost its power on the cross. But, in our sinfulness we are tempted to think that God’s ways and word are not good enough to cleanse us and forgive us from sin, and as the troubles of this life persist and pile up, we begin to believe that God is not for us; that God is not with us anymore; allowing sin back its power once taken by the cross. And having allowed the doubts and mistrust (that God is with us and for us) to go unchecked and unforgiven, this lack of faith ends up becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. So we end up once again becoming rebellious against God and seek to hide from his presence. As you believe, let it be done for you.

But, for us under the cross, what is left if we doubt the faith and the grace which freely flow from the cross; if we mistrust the love of God which comes to us in baptism, in his word, in the forgiveness of sins, and in the body and blood of Christ himself? What is left? Nothing!

Rather than doubt God, his word, and his ways, you and I need ask ourselves, “Why would God forsake me, having gone to such lengths to save me by sending his Son to the cross for me?” Then we need to understand that, “He was born for me, so that he could die for me and save me from my sin and my human nature that yearns to sin. And in doing this he now lives with me, in me, and for me. Together with all others he has called through his word.”

So hear the word of God and don’t hinder the Holy Spirit as he comes to you through it. Let him condemn you of your sin, so that you open your heart to Christ that he can put sin to death where it belongs… on the cross! Then let the Holy Spirit increase faith in you as you hear God’s word written by Saint Paul for the suffering church in Rome and the suffering church today…

28 …we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

31 What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?

36 As it is written: “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:28-39)

So rather than have “nothing” through unbelief, God promises that “nothing” will separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So why then should you or I doubt him and separate ourselves from his gracious action on the cross and the faith giving work of the Holy Spirit?

Part 4 — Conclusion: On the Eve of Eternity

We have come from a year of drought and famine. What does 2007 hold for us… more of the same-old same-old… more drought and famine, maybe flood and rot, or perhaps ever death and destruction… who knows?

But what we do know and are call to believe is that in Christ we have come from a year of living in his eternal presence and today we sit on the eve of another year in God’s eternal presence here in this life and in the next.

If God is for us, who can be against us? As you believe, let it be done for you. Amen.

Listen to this sermon at http://friarpuk.podbean.com/2006/12/31/the-eve-of-eternity-new-years-eve-2006/