A Plea

I usually come at you with witty remarks and clever little anecdotes meant to tickle your funnybone and gently coax you down the yellow brick road of righteousness. Today all I have is a simple plea.

First as this is not a full transcription of my talk for right now I will post this and maybe if I have time I'll write the first part later.

the outline essentially went like this:
First I want to map out a little history.
Romans 1-4 what is essentially that happens in this part of Romans.
(essentially it is the part where Paul outlines that all have fallen and it is by faith in which you are saved)
Why was this passage so important to martin luther?
(because he had a huge holiness hangup and needed to readily see this grace by faith in order for his being to be set free... also he was the one who coined sola-fide)
So follow history and we can see how people have been preoccupied with the mental ascent of faith.
now lets look at the real reason Paul is writing this:
Romans 14 :
because two factions (jew and gentile) were at odds with each other. What Paul was saying here is that Jesus has leveled the playing field. What he was saying was that because ALL have fallen and it is by faith alone in which you are saved. YOU MUST coexist and not bicker and argue different types of food and who can eat what. Essentially you're all at fault. AND ALL NEED GRACE.

It is here where I came in:


We have been a self centered religion. Allowing ourselves to be pleased with our mental ascent at faith in Jesus. Yet sheer belief in the Son of God is a fleeting mental bump.

True faith is more accurately defined as it is simply stated in 2 corinthians 1:18-20
But as surely as God is faithful, our message to you is not "Yes" and "No." 19For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by me and Silas[b] and Timothy, was not "Yes" and "No," but in him it has always been "Yes." 20For no matter how many promises God has made, they are "Yes" in Christ. And so through him the "Amen" is spoken by us to the glory of God.

In other words, faith is saying “yes” to God’s Yes in Christ. Not a mental assent to the sheer proposition of “do you believe?” But the “hearing” of the gospel as an act of obedience. Faith is not a human accomplishment. Like you would carefully formulate a theorem of the facts to be proven… and thus believed. Faith is truly a grateful acknowledgement of being embraced by the Yes of God’s grace towards us.

He has given us grace. We all are equal in our relationship to sin and death. We are all equal in our relationship to their brothers: flesh and law. An yet we have a God who’s mercy has conquered all of them through the death and resurrection of His Son. You are justified by your faith in Jesus. That’s not the end of the book though, faith is you being eternally grateful for the mercy you’ve been given. The thing is…there’s more to the story. If we choose to stop at Romans 4, we miss a vision that Paul has for us. And it’s an amazing hope.

The hope is this: That our faith would propel us into life with the Spirit; which is God’s power in Christ. This Spirit pushes every believer into the future horizon of God’s coming glory. The Spirit conveys the dynamic character of Christian life as a life of pilgrimage; moving closer and closer towards this hope of glory. This Spirit by definition is never separated from its activity in the human body. This is why Paul in Romans 12 writes: 1Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual[a] act of worship.

You aren’t a dead sacrifice, burning on the alter. Yet many times that’s where we end up. “I believe in Jesus Christ… and?” “And I’m just taking a break right now.” “I believe in Jesus Christ… and?” “and I’m not really happy with church because there is too much drama.” “I believe in Jesus Christ… and?” “and what? It’s my faith alone.” Dead… and Burning?

…offer your bodies as living sacrifices, This is the hope that Paul has for us. If you are taking a break because you’ve burned out, not going to church because of the politics, or just happy sitting in the pew on Sunday, you’ve only read part of the story. It’s a great part of the story. It’s a story of faith. It’s a story of love. And it’s a story of an eternal future. But its time to turn the page and begin truly living. Because Paul at this point begins writing about a hope that he has that one day the church will be working together to bless the world. Working together to bless itself. That the people involved will not become the consumers of faith, a show, or righteousness. But rather be proactive in their response to the Mercy and Love they’ve been given by God. That because of their understanding of the love of God. They would begin acting like His children.

Paul’s hope is that we would utilize this Spirit to do the things we’ve been called to do. Thus making the church into a vibrant body.
4In this way we are like the various parts of a human body. Each part gets its meaning from the body as a whole, not the other way around. 5The body we're talking about is Christ's body of chosen people. Each of us finds our meaning and function as a part of his body. But as a chopped-off finger or cut-off toe we wouldn't amount to much, would we? So since we find ourselves fashioned into all these excellently formed and marvelously functioning parts in Christ's body, 6let's just go ahead and be what we were made to be, without enviously or pridefully comparing ourselves with each other, or trying to be something we aren't.

What I’m saying to you today is we can be a part of something incredible. Maybe some of us have been hurt, bruised, or angered by other parts of this body. So here you sit saying… I love Jesus, but do even try to get me to do anything. Our pain, our reaction to the cancer of overgrowth, or our sheer apathy is killing us…and killing you. As a body, utilize me today to motivate you towards becoming who you are meant to be; who you truly are. If you preach, preach; if you help, help; if you teach, teach; 8if you give encouraging guidance, encourage; if you're in charge, don't manipulate, but lead; if you're called to give aid to people in distress, keep your eyes open and be quick to respond; if you work with the disadvantaged, don't let yourself get irritated with them or depressed by them. Keep a smile on your face. 9Love from the center of who you are; don't fake it. …10Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle.

What if the church were one? What if we all fit together like a puzzle whose picture painted the story of God’s love for each one of us. What if that picture told the world about the love of God. This dream of the God of hope filling you (all) with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

We can work together to make this body run. And you all have a job. I may not know what that is. Maybe even you don’t know what it is. However, there maybe someone in here whose job is to point out what you’re good at. And you’ll be far better at it than any of us. You just need some exercise.

We can’t pull our own weight anymore. We learned that with Jesus. And now we need to realize it for His church. His heart is in us. His thoughts are in us. It is now time for his actions to be ours.

I ask you, plead with you, beseech you. Very much like Paul did to the Roman church. Not a command. It is the language of grace. There is no thunder from mount Sinai when I ask: “by the mercy of God, get up from those chairs, and contribute your beautiful selves to this amazing hope of having a church that’s alive, and an amazing representation of God’s love.