The God Who Is God

Isaiah 45:1-7

        Dear friends in Christ, we Christians of the 21st century have a challenge on our hands. We are called to give witness to the truth to a culture which rarely recognizes anything as being dependably true. We are called to give witness to the truth to a culture which does not recognize the truth, and we are called to give witness to the exclusiveness of salvation which is ours alone through Jesus Christ crucified and risen, and this we do to a culture that generally sees all religions as valid and true and equal. Indeed, since the events of 9/11, we have seen interfaith worship services which again underscore our culture’s misunderstanding that all religions speak equally, that all gods are considered equally valid, that in fact all of them are just fine and dandy as long as none of them make any exclusive claims to be true. This is the new American Civil Religion. It is a religion which is, of course, a false religion. It is a religion that isn’t wrong because of what it believes, but rather because it believes anything and everything.

        Dear friends in Christ, this Old Testament reading that we heard just a few moments ago flies in the face of such a warped and deficient theology. Listen to the words. They are plain. They are clear. And they are simple. I am the Lord, and there is no other. Apart from me, there is no God.

        It isn’t just that people worship false gods. It’s that they worship false, non-existent ones. There is only One, and His name is clear. He tells us that He is One, that He is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And so how can we meet the challenge? How can we meet the challenge of sharing our faith which is so entirely counter-cultural? And how can we do so in a way that is both respectful and winsome?

        First I would suggest to us, that as we read this text, one thing that cannot happen is that we would permit our faith, this Christian faith, to be homogenized into the American Civil Religion in any possible way. Indeed, theologians of every age have found opportunity to make the theology of the Christian faith more palatable to those of their particular culture.

        In the Age of Enlightenment, theologians gladly bowed down at the altar of human reason, and gladly paid homage to that reason, which then informed scriptures. There was something called "higher criticism", a method of Biblical interpretation which placed human reason above the plain meaning of the text, and then and there the authority of the text was literally destroyed. We still see the ramifications of that to this very day.

        In the Age of Romanticism the philosophy of pietism and the theology of pietism came about, as did that of existentialism. Pietism rested on subjective experience of God, and the subjective relationship with God. It had some strong points, but really had a deficiency as well. And so now, one’s faith was based not on the objective actions of God, but rather on our subjective perceptions of him. Or else you fell into the despair of existentialism which simply said, "the game is rigged and there is no way out".

        And then along came, of course, the Postmodern Times, the time in which you and I find ourselves. And there, even the centrality of Jesus Christ has been sacrificed by theologians and whole denominations who still call the name Christian but give homage to the American Civil Religion, to such an extent that many mainstream denominations have reformed and reformulated their thoughts on how one spreads the faith; that evangelism should no longer have as its object the conversion of those who do not know Christ, but to simply point to the things we have in common. And the only thing we have in common with other faiths is the Law. And by works of the Law, no one can be saved.

        Dear friends, every age has known its detractors of the faith, and every age has had orthodox Christians, who stood against the prevailing culture and gave clear witness to the faith which is ours in Christ Jesus, and to His atonement on the cross, and to His resurrection from the dead.

        They did so, striking a balance between being a part of their culture and, at the same time being part of a religion that is, at its very core, counter-cultural, in each and every culture. We read Paul, as he sits at the Areopagus on Mars Hill, and we find him taking advantage of the culture in which he found himself. In Acts chapter 17 we read, Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I see that in every way you are very religious. For I have walked around and carefully looked at your objects of worship. I even found an altar with this inscription, ‘to an unknown god’. Now what you worship as something unknown, I am going to proclaim to you. And he does.

        He used the setting in which he found himself, which incidentally was not at all setting of worship, it was simply a theological discourse in the public square. And what is more, he had somehow used that to his advantage.

        He said, Look at this inscription to an unknown god. Certainly you are a religious people. Goodness sakes, couldn’t we say that about our culture? Indeed, it is very popular now in our culture to say, "I’m not religious, but I’m very spiritual." And Lutherans sometimes scratch their heads and go "huh?" And sometimes the rest of the world does too. Because "spiritual" means you just think about spiritual things, and you try to connect with something that is spiritual regardless of what it may be, and so people are free to make their choices, how they act out their spirituality. Somehow, had it been possible for God to teleport St. Paul to this day and age, I am certain that there would have been many folk who would have said, "you know, you would get a lot further with your gospel if you would just join in worship with others of different faiths, and therefore gain some credibility that indeed your message may be heard." But he would do no such thing.

        Dear friends, the Roman Empire, in its last 300 years before the coming of Constantine, was not a Christian empire by any means. In fact, there was a cult of worship. It was the religion of the state, a "civil religion", if you will. And it was, in fact, required of all Roman citizens from time to time, and they really didn’t have to meet at all. All they had to do was come once a year, and kneel down and make a small offering to Caesar as deity. But rather than be homogenized into that civil religion, these Christians would have rather gone to the lions, would rather have gone to the gladiators in the arenas, and be eaten and chopped to bits, rather than homogenize their faith or make it less clear than what it actually is.

        Christianity, in order to retain its soul and saving message, finds it absolutely essential to maintain its claim to absolute and uncompromised truth. Especially that truth that which God tells us about in his Son, that Christ, who is God, became flesh and dwelt among us. That indeed we find that this One who came to save us in the flesh serves as our righteousness alone. That this One who died took on His body the penalty for our sins, and made full and complete payment for every last one of them. And what is more, following His death, after three days in a tomb, He rose physically from the dead, not merely a spiritual resurrection, but human flesh and cells became alive, and He lived, and lives still this day That is the message that does not compromise well. And does not homogenize well with the American Civil Religion at all.

        Indeed, the days when America was known as a "Christian nation", (if in fact it ever was, and I frankly doubt it), have long since come to an end. The culture in which we find ourselves is far more attuned to that of he first century this day than it ever has been before in our lifetimes. And I want you to know that the same challenges that were presented to those first Christians are also presented to us, to maintain the integrity and the solidity of the truth of this faith which we hold dear and which is our only salvation.

        So we must remain, you see, unafraid and unintimidated to say exactly what our faith says, and to do so in a world that does not like it very much. Hear the bold words of this text again. I am the Lord and there is no other. Apart from me there is no God.

        That is plain, that is simple, that is true, and that plain simple truth echoes the words of the first and greatest commandment, you shall have no other gods before me, found in Exodus 20:3 which we all know by heart. And we all know the meaning of that commandment, "you shall fear and love god above all things".

        And I would say to you, there is no backing away from such a statement of faith. There is no requirement, and I would suggest to you, absolutely no advantage to adjust this message, and that of Christ crucified and risen, so that it be more palatable to our prevailing cultural views. I would suggest to you, that we are called to speak plainly as God has spoken to us. But we need not do so with harshness, nor need we do so with a lack of respect. But we can do so with wisdom and with courage. Please notice how Paul goes about his witnessing on Mars Hill.

        First remember this. To the Greeks, everything that was of the flesh was corrupt . That indeed, anything that was created, anything that was solid, that we could touch and feel, was of no importance whatsoever. So how does Paul talk about Christ?. Verse 24 of Acts 17: The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built with hands.  Well, of course, every Grecian god lives in temples built with hands. How’s that for kindness and compassion and compromise? And yet he speaks the truth. Verse 25: and He is not served by human hands as if He needed anything, which of course the Greeks constantly did, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From the one man he made every nation of men. Well, that’s not at all in harmony with Greek understandings of how men came to be. That they should inhabit the whole earth and that He determined the time set for them and the exact places in which they should live. Verse 27: God did this so that men could seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. But the Greek gods were quite far from all of us. For in Him we live and move, and have our very being. As some of your own poets have said, we are His offspring. Again he taps into that culture of which he resides. 29: Therefore, since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image made by mans’ design and skill. Once again, right "in your face" to the Greeks. In the past, God overlooks such ignorance, but now he calls all people everywhere to repent. 31. for He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice, by the man he has appointed. A man will judge the world? A fleshly human man?

        He goes on. He has given proof of this to all men by raising Him from the dead. Who cares, if you’re a Greek, if flesh would raise from the dead? Flesh is of no importance.? Flesh is corrupt. Yet Paul, in this setting of religious discussion, says, this is that which we proclaim and we won’t back away from it. 32 When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, as you might surmise, some of them sneered. But others said we want to hear you again on this subject. After that Paul left the council.

        A few men became followers of Paul and believed.

        What compromise do you find in that witness? What adjustment is there to be more palatable to the culture? Not a thing regarding the theology that he said. He points at the statue to the unknown god and says, "let me tell you about it". He quotes one of the Grecian poets, but only to make his point. And so we see, St Paul gives us a bit of a model, if you will, for witnessing in a culture that is foreign and hostile to the faith in which we believe and that which we teach and confess.

        Rather than soft-sell the Christian faith by compromise with the Greeks, Paul teaches an uncompromising message that he knows will offend some of those who hear it. Without compromise, dear friends, we too are called to speak to truth, so that - and listen carefully - so that the unbeliever might be saved.

        A confused and obfuscated proclamation of the gospel can only result in a confused and obfuscated understand of the same gospel. We must be clear. We must be straight. Isn’t that how you wish people would deal with you?

        Now then, it is in fact, not out of a sense of self-righteousness or superiority by which we do these things, but out of love and out of concern for those who are in unbelief. We must go out of our way to witness with clarity, so that they will know. It is absolutely no act of Christian love to offer some form of confession that gives any quarter to the false notions of God or the redemption which is ours alone through Christ Jesus. We must be clear.

        We need to remember that that precious Gospel, that Gospel which we proclaim, can’t be improved on by us. How could it be possible that we would presume to improve on the message that the love of God for fallen and sinful man was so great that He was moved to send His only Son, and to send Him out of the perfection of godhead into human flesh, corruptible, and mortal. How could we presume to improve on the message of the love of God which is so great that it is God himself in human flesh who dies to grant us the forgiveness of our sin. How could we presume to improve on the message that the curse of sin, which is death and suffering and the grave, has been fully and completely overcome through Christ’s resurrection from the dead. And now death is no longer the end but only the beginning.

        How could we presume to improve on the message that God will bring us to the protection of heaven, whose grace and merciful being is far beyond anything we can possibly begin to imagine, at whose arrival we will find that there will be no more tears, no disease, no suffering, it can’t get any better than that. And no matter our intentions we cannot and will not improve on it.

        No, friends, the great American mush-god of American Civil Religion will save no one from death and hell regardless of how pious, regardless of how tolerant, and regardless of how celebratory we are with respect to the diversity of faiths it embraces. Yet it is in this very culture, it is indeed in this syncretistic culture, it is indeed in this area where various faiths and plethora of saviors are offered to us that we had the same opportunity as did St. Paul, to speak clearly, to speak lovingly, to speak winsomely, but to speak without compromise, of the great love of God which is ours in Christ Jesus our Lord.

        Just as the early Christians were called to give witness to their faith in a culture which largely rejected their message, we too stand in that same privileged place, and in that same kind of culture. And so we speak with utter clarity, utter clarity of Christ crucified and risen. Utter clarity of sins forgiven and righteousness bestowed by Christ. As our now sainted past president of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod said before his death, "Get the message straight, Missouri...", be clear, "...and get the message out, Missouri", speak the faith. People are dying to hear from us. In Jesus’ name, amen.