“I know my own; My own know Me. You not the world, my face shall see. My peace I leave with you. Amen.” What beautiful words we just sang about how Jesus sees us.
“Built on the Rock the church shall stand.” What is the Rock the hymn is describing, what Rock holds together even when building are falling down around us? The Rock is the confession of faith that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
This confession first revealed by the Father to Peter is a confession that is shared by all of us, the church throughout the world. This Rock, the truth of the gospel is the foundation that helps the church to stand no matter the storm we face. We are secure because Jesus knows us, and we know Jesus.
Jesus set up the confession of faith Peter spoke by asking the disciples “who do people say that the Son of Man is?” Many in the world at that time saw Jesus and came to their own conclusions of who he is. The same holds true today in our world and even within the church, it all depends on how you look at things, what you confess about who Jesus is.
On one extreme people see Jesus as a friend who agrees and supports any decisions in life they make, who is always on their side and would never judge or condemn them for how they spend their time, their priorities in life, or what sins they commit. Some in the church can choose to believe that Jesus is their personal cheer leader even if they rarely if ever come to Jesus in repentance and come to worship to receive His gifts of forgiveness and salvation.
On the other extreme, some people see Jesus as the unforgiving judge who is disappointed in their efforts at living the faith, whose laws and standards you can never live up to and who brings much guilt. In either case, people can miss seeing Jesus through discarding the law so much that there is no need for a Savior, or in pushing so hard to follow the law that there is no sense of hope in knowing Jesus.
If you don’t see Jesus for who he is, then you miss the peace Jesus brings to His church. The Confession of faith of Peter, the Rock on which the church stands is to see Jesus for who he is, the Savior who stands in our place and carries us through.
How we look at Jesus makes all the difference. We prayed in our Collect prayer: to “know Jesus to be the way the truth and the life so that we can boldly confess Him to be the Christ and steadfastly walk in the way that leads to everlasting life.”
In knowing Jesus for who he is for us, our Way, Truth and Life- we have the focus and clarity to confess His name and walk in the way of discipleship in a hostile world. In seeing the world through eyes that know His mercy and love to us, we change how we view our life in this world.
In our reading from Romans we have a picture of how God’s mercy brings about a changed perspective. The reading begins with complete wonder at God’s ways.
“O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” God provides us mercy when we deserve none, Grace when we expect punishment, love when we expect judgment or disdain. Mercy changes our perspective on life.
In Romans chapter 12 the vision of life lived in response to mercy is described in greater detail. “I appeal to you therefore brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a as a living sacrifice holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Notice that phrase “by the mercies of God” It is saying in view of, or in light of God’s mercies to us, we should live our lives differently.
The foundation of God’s mercy to us is the sacrifice of Jesus’ life to us. Through eyes that see God’s mercy to us, the scripture invites us to see our own lives as prospects for sacrifice, our spiritual worship as a living sacrifice to God. Presenting our bodies as living sacrifices means that we give first unto the LORD in love.
We are not conformed to the view of the world that our lives are only for ourselves and we should do whatever we want. Instead we begin to see that sometimes God’s will is found through making sacrifices in life. The Holy Spirit transforms us and renews us to live in love for God’s will. Listen again to those words from Romans: “Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
The pattern of this world is filled with much folly, much running in circles in pursuit of popularity, wealth, pride and selfishness. The world’s pattern is everywhere we look, on our phones, in the things people say to us- it is all around us. We need spiritual reality checks on a regular basis, we need our mind’s transformed by God’s Word, we need to see that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.
But we don’t only read about God’s different perspective, we experience it for ourselves as we experience God’s particular mercy to our own lives. As we reflect on how Jesus has extended us mercy, we can begin to imagine how God sees all people with that same mercy.
A story is told of a seminary student in Chicago who took a part time job driving a bus to help pay his way through school. One night he had the misfortune of being mugged while on his route. He received bruises and cuts and even some damage to his teeth. In time the police caught these men who mugged him. He was called to identify them as a witness and he attended the trial. The criminals stared at him coldly when they saw him in the courtroom and he returned the favor. The verdict of guilty was reached and the judge read the sentence of prison time for each of the men.
The seminary student began to feel compassion for these criminals. He remembered that Jesus died on the cross for their sins as well as for his. The judge asked him if he had anything to add. “Yes I do your honor. I have a request to make. I would like to serve the combined prison sentence of these men who hurt me in their place.”
The judge was startled by such an unusual request. “I don’t believe that is possible, there is no legal precedent for such action. The seminary student replied: “Actually your honor there is. Almost 2,000 years ago a man from Nazareth named Jesus who was guilty of no offense, willingly took the punishment for all people by dying on the cross.”
The judge did not grant the seminary student’s request. But the young man managed to visit the men in prison in order to tell them more about Jesus who took our place on the cross. God’s mercy helps to transform us to see people and situations differently.
Responding to the mercy given to us does not need only involve something as drastic as offering to take the punishment for others.
Think of how different a variety of situations in life can be experienced with this view. If you are grocery shopping these days it is usually something of a tense experience. You may wish you could simply get in and out as fast as possible. It is easy to view all the people at the store as a burden to what you want to get accomplished.
But through our response to God’s mercy we can see people in a crowded store differently. They are not people who are in the way, but God’s creation who Jesus also died for. From the perspective of the mercy we have in Jesus how differently we might see the congested traffic on the way to work or the co-worker who is always getting under your skin. “For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than he ought to think.”
In the scripture there is no shortage of examples of how God’s mercy changes the outlook toward others. We all know Zacchaeus as the wee little man who climbed up the sycamore tree to get a good view of Jesus. He also was not a well respected man. He was a chief tax collector, a despised man an outcast and a sinner.
Nobody wanted to associate with him. Jesus, however saw him up in the tree and singled him out for attention, inviting himself to dinner at Zacchaeus’ house. By these merciful actions toward Zacchaeus, Jesus covered the scandalous and offensive life with his own reputation and righteousness. His merciful kindness gave mercy to a poor sinner.
At the dinner Zacchaeus stood up and offered to give half of all his goods to feed the poor. He promised to restore fourfold to those he cheated. He now saw those he cheated through the eyes of mercy for the first time. Jesus declared him to be a son of Abraham, a child of mercy. He was indeed justified by Christ through faith. What stands out about him was how by Christ’s gift of mercy to him, he learned to be merciful to others in return.
May our Lord grant us courage to confess His name before the world. May the Lord fulfill his purpose for us in the church, as His steadfast love endures in our lives forever. Amen.