e-vo for week of March 23

Dear e-votees-

Our appointed epistle lesson for this week speaks of boasting.

Of what are you most proud? In what do you exult? In what do you glory?

Peace,
Karl

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1 Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. 3 And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. 6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. 8 But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. 9 Much more surely then, now that we have been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life. 11 But more than that, we even boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Romans 5:1-11, NRSV

The world teaches us to boast of our accomplishments. The world teaches us to exult in a well-rounded curriculum vitae. The world teaches us to glory in what we have done that others only wish they could have done. When we lean too hard on the world’s understanding we focus on lifting ourselves up. It we can’t lift ourselves up than it will often suffice to tear down those around us. We go through this world as competitors where there are winners and losers. We strive and we strain and we do what we can in our own power to be on the side that wins.

God calls us to be so very different than the world. God calls us to put our own accomplishments aside (as did Paul) compared to the surpassing greatness of Christ. Paul compares his impressive list of ranks and achievements to raw sewage (generally translated something more gentle like “rubbish” in Philippians 3:8) in light of what Jesus is and has done.

Jesus, in the world’s eyes, wasn’t one in whom you would boast. He didn’t have much. The company he kept left much to be desired. He eventually was tortured and condemned and lifted up but not in the way that any of us would hope to be lifted up. The world would put Jesus clearly in the loser column. Anyone daft enough to follow after one such as him would certainly be in that column as well.

Paul writes some verses that Lutherans lean upon quite profoundly:

8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— 9 not the result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.

Ephesians 2:8-10, NRSV

We have been saved in way that disallows boasting. We have been drawn into God in a way that allows good works to be the fruit of renewed lives not the entrance fee to an exclusive club of winners. When we fail and when we struggle and when we suffer we are shaped into people with endurance. Those experiences, painful though they may be, cultivate character. As we grow in character we learn to hope in the face of the “raw sewage” of life. And hope does not disappoint us. If we are to be boastful people (in the taking glory sense and the exulting sense so much more than the prideful sense) then we are to boast in God through Jesus. We are to boast even in our sufferings which God uses to work things for good since we love God and are called according to God’s purpose. If we boast it is not in who we are or what we have done—it is in whose we are and what God has done on the cross.


God, draw us up into our Lord Jesus. Help us not to be haughty but to be willing to wash feet and talk with the outcasts we meet at the wells of our life and even dare to give our lives away that others may find the true life in you. Amen.