What Gospel do I live?

Brad Sullivan

Proper 26, Year C
Sunday, October 31st, 2010
Emmanuel, Houston
Isaiah 1:10-18
Psalm 32:1-8
Romans 16
Luke 19:1-10

Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow. Come now, let us argue it out, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be like snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.

I love this passage from Isaiah, and the many similar passages throughout scripture. “Y’all are being really, really religious,” God says, “but you’re also being pretty rotten to one another; if you really my blessing in your life, then you need to go out and bless others.” Isaiah’s message sounds both harsh and full of hope and promise. God was angry with the people’s missdeeds, and he deeply wanted them to turn around and was more than ready to bless them once they did. Through Isaiah, God was seeking to save the lost.

That sounds a lot like what Jesus said about Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus was basically the passage of Isaiah lived out in story form in one person’s life. To be fair, there’s a lot we don’t know about Zacchaeus. We don’t know if he did follow any of the religious practices of Israel, but we do know he was cheating people out of their money. As a chief tax collector, of a corrupt tax system, he was collecting more than he was supposed to and pocketing the extra. He was doing evil, was unjust, taking from the oppressed, the orphan, and the widow, and everyone else. Then, somehow he heard about Jesus. We don’t know how, but he went into the crowd that day and climbed the tree in order to see who Jesus was, so he had apparently heard something about him.

So then he meets Jesus, and here again, we don’t really know what happened. It’s not entirely clear if they went on to Zacchaeus’ house and had a little chat about the words of Isaiah or if this encounter took place right there before Jesus said much of anything. What is clear, however, is that Zacchaeus met Jesus and was transformed by him.

Zacchaeus had previously defrauded people…perhaps he was caught up in “me, me”, thinking that the way to be secure and well in life was to get lots of money, building up security for himself at the expense of others. When he encountered Jesus, however, he found that his money was not what he really wanted. He gave over half of it away immediately. He had found something far greater in which to put his trust, his security, and his faith, than himself and his money.

Now, put your faith in God rather than in yourself and in your riches was hardly a new message. The religious establishment at the time, however, had apparently been unsuccessful at imparting this truth to Zacchaeus. He learned the truth of putting trust and security in God rather than in ourselves through an encounter with Jesus. Sometimes even today, our religious establishments, don’t do the best job of showing Jesus to people.

Sometimes people see the religious establishment, the buildings, the ceremonies, the organization, and because that’s all they see, they don’t see the life of the Gospel. I realize that’s an interesting topic for a stewardship sermon: the shortcomings of the religious establishment. How’s that for a rallying cry? “Give to the church. It often comes up short.”

Fortunately, I don’t really feel that by contributing to our lives here at Emmanuel, that we are primarily giving to a religious establishment. The organizational structure of the Episcopal Church is part of that to which we are contributing in our financial giving, and that structure is a good thing. We’re not a lone congregation, but part of a worldwide communion, and the religious establishment, the structure of the Episcopal church helps hold our worldwide common life together.

Primarily, however, in our financial giving to our common life here at Emmanuel, we aren’t giving to huge religious establishment, but to our common life here at Emmanuel. We’re contributing to our common life here at Emmanuel as a community of people who have been or are seeking to be transformed by Jesus. We’re a part of this larger household of God, seeking and sharing a common life in the Gospel. That’s why I contribute to our life together here and so that through our common life together we can live out the gospel beyond these walls so the Zacchaeuses of the world might also need to encounter Jesus.

Our challenge is that while we are a part of the religious establishment, in our lives beyond here, we show people the life of the Gospel which is at the core of the establishment. Beyond our religious practices, where do we each tend to fall? In they way we live our lives day by day, are we showing forth the Gospel? Are we waiting for the religious establishment to show people Jesus, or are we being Jesus for others? For a lot of folks, in order to be transformed, the establishment just ain’t gonna cut it. Some folks need a personal encounter. So, our question for the week to ask ourselves is, am I helping people encounter Jesus. Put another way, “If I was the only Gospel people ever heard, what is the Gospel they would know?” Amen.