Saint Luke's Lutheran Church

Someone once quipped that there are two kinds of people in the world - those who divide the world into two kinds of people and those who do not. I'm not going to be that global, but I will go out on this limb and say that there are two kinds of people in the church, two kinds of people here this morning: the self-righteous and the self-conscious. The self-righteous are those who think of themselves as basically good people. They see themselves as responsible, law-abiding citizens and faithful members of the church. When they look at other people, they consider themselves as good as the next guy, and in fact if the truth be told, they consider themselves better than some of the other people they know or read about in the newspapers. When they look at themselves, they focus first and foremost on the good things that they have done.

The self-conscious are just the opposite. They think of themselves as basically sinful people. Very much aware of their own faults and shortcomings, they wonder how God could possibly love and accept them. When they look around at the "good people" in the church, they consider themselves far less pious, less righteous, less faithful. When they look at themselves, they focus first and foremost on the bad things they have said or done or thought.

Now, some of you will immediately see yourselves as being either more self-righteous or more self-conscious. Others of you will find yourselves in the middle - sometimes feeling more self-righteous and other times feeling more self-conscious. But all of us have likely found ourselves somewhere along this spectrum at some point in our lives. .

In our second lesson for today, Paul describes himself as started out solidly in the self-righteous camp. His religious pedigree is impeccable. He was a full blooded Hebrew and a member of the prestigious tribe of Benjamin. He was raised by pious Jewish parents who had him circumcised when he was eight days old. He was educated and trained as a Pharisee, studying under the famous rabbi Gamaliel. In fact, Paul was a rising star among the Pharisees, a golden boy whose drive and determination set him apart the crowd. His obedience to the Jewish laws was blameless, and he demonstrated his devotion to God by vigorously defending Judaism against a radical, new group of people who claimed that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ.

Then one day as Paul was going to Damascus to arrest some of these Christians and bring them back to Jerusalem for prosecution, he was knocked to the ground by a flash of light from heaven, and the voice of Jesus said, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" In the aftermath of that event, Saul not only changed his name to Paul but went on to realize that everything, everything on which he had been relying - his Jewish ancestry and heritage, his education, his obedience to the law - all of it was as worthless as a pile of garbage compared to the righteousness that was his in Christ Jesus.

While Paul is an outstanding example of the self-righteous, Martin Luther is an outstanding example of the self-conscious. Luther also had an experience while traveling, when a flash of lightning threw him to the ground and left him so terrified that he left law school and entered a monastery. As a monk, Luther was painfully aware of his sinfulness. Tormented by his every sinful thought or deed, Luther tried to find acceptance with God a deeply religious life of devotion and discipline.

Monks were required to go to confession every week, but that was not enough for Luther. He was so tortured by guilt that he spent hours in confession every day. In fact, he spent so much time confessing his sins that Johann von Staupitz, his mentor and confessor, grew impatient and weary hearing Luther's endless litany of every little sin. One day Staupitz scolded Luther, saying, "Look here, if you expect Christ to forgive you, come in here with something to forgive - like murder, blasphemy, or adultery -- instead of all these little transgressions. God is not angry with you. You are angry with God. Get over it. Don't you know that God calls you to hope, not despair?"

In fact, it is even said that Staupitz once made fun of Luther, saying, "Luther spends so much time in the confessional that I can't imagine how he has time to do anything that needs confessing."

To both the self-righteous and the self-conscious, Paul has the same thing to say, "Forget what lies behind and press on to the goal that lies ahead." To the self-righteous this means: Forget about your own righteousness. It's worthless. No matter how righteous you are, you still fall far short of the glory of God. That old way of thinking, however, continues to rear its ugly head within the church. People still think that they need to clean up their act and become a good person before they can be a Christian; before God will accept them. But who could ever meet God's standards? Who could ever measure up? Who could ever know for sure that they are saved?

Paul knew all about that old way of thinking. He went down that road as far and as fast as anyone possibly could. But he came to realize that this road takes you into a boxed canyon, down a dead-end street. We can never be good enough on our own to satisfy a holy and righteous God. But the good news is that we don't have to. The good news is that we don't have to justify ourselves because God has already done that. There is no need for self-righteousness because God has given us the righteousness of Christ - and it is all the righteousness we need.

"Forget what lies behind and press on to the goal that lies ahead." To the self-conscious that means: Forget about your sins. God forgives your sins. Don't worry about your guilt. Jesus has paid the price for what you have done wrong. That old way of thinking, however, continues to rear its ugly head within the church. People still think that they need to do something to make up for past mistakes before God will forgive them.

Luther knew all about that old way of thinking. He went down that road as far as anyone could possibly go, but it was also a boxed canyon, a dead-end street. We can never do enough to make up for our sins. But the good news is that we don't have to. Jesus died for our sins and through faith in him we are forgiven. There is no need for us to grovel in our guilt because God has removed our sins from us as far as the east is from the west.

So there is no need for any of us to be either self-righteous or self-conscious. Both of these attitudes are irrelevant and unnecessary. In Christ Jesus, God offers us another way. In this other way there is no need for self-righteousness. But that does not mean that there is no room for righteousness. In fact, Paul says, it is precisely because he has the righteousness that comes from God through faith that he wants to know Christ more deeply and become more Christ like in the way in which he lives his life. This Paul compares to running a race. In running a race, it is important to keep your eye on the goal. I remember hearing about a runner who had the lead in an important race. As he neared the finish line, he was out in front by four or five yards. But then he started to wonder and worry about who was behind him. So he turned around to look, and in that split second, he lost his momentum and the next runner was able to pass him up. He lost the race because he lost his focus, because he looked back when he should have looked ahead.

There are lots of things in our lives, lots of things in our world, that can turn our heads and cause us to look away from the goal to which God is calling us. Our goal is not perfection - we don't have to be perfect. Our goal is simply to stay the course, to keep on growing in our Christian faith. Our goal is to know Christ more intimately and to trust him more deeply. As we grow in our Christian maturity, we come to the point where we can say with Paul that "it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me." So let us also run the race with perseverance - forgetting what lies behind and pressing on toward the prize which is already ours, through Christ Jesus. Amen.