Our Beliefs : Sermons : Sermon Archive - 2008 : April 6, 2008

Theme: Strangers in a Strange Land

Church year occasion: Easter 3

This morning I want you to pretend that you have amnesia. That's when you can't remember things. In this case that's going to make your life very difficult because I also want you to pretend that you somehow made it thousands of miles away from home, and you are standing on a street corner in Moscow, and because you have amnesia you have absolutely no idea how you got there or why you're there. What in the world would you do? I suppose the first thing is to try to remember all the things you know about Moscow. What do you know about Moscow? It's the capital of Russia, which used to be the sworn enemy of the United States not too long ago. (Since you're an American, that doesn't give you happy thoughts.) It has Red Square and cathedrals built in the Byzantine style of architecture with beautiful onion-shaped domes. Maybe you've read War and Peace so you know that Napoleon captured Moscow, but he had to leave in defeat while General Kutuzov attacked his army all the way back to France, and most of them froze to death in the Russian winter.

But that's a rather negative thought, too, and you're trying to stay positive at this point. If you're like me, you'd probably just try to figure out how to survive. So what would you do? You'd try to talk to someone. But what if you find out that no one speaks English? How would you ask someone where a hotel is, one preferably with hot running water? Where would you eat? How would you pay for it? How would you get around? How would you get home? Where is your family? Do you have a family? I think it's safe to say that it would be quite a harrowing experience. Even after you did finally get home, you'd think of how horrible it was being a complete stranger in a very strange land.

And that is exactly what the Apostle Peter wants you to realize about your life in this world. This isn't your home. You should feel very uncomfortable here. Your home is in heaven. As a Christian, you are a stranger in a strange land, and you should be looking forward more than anything to finally getting home to heaven. So the key, Peter says, is realizing we're strangers in a strange land. And then, we'll live as strangers in a strange land.

I just love reading this book of the Bible, 1 Peter! Peter is writing to Christians who were enduring tough times, enduring a widespread persecution of those who follow Jesus and live for him. We endure plenty of tough times as Christians as well as we suffer from broken relationships, the pain of disease, the heartache of divorce or death. We also suffer because we're Christians, perhaps not to the degree that the early Christians did. Some of them ran the risk of losing their lives for their faith. But at the least, we run the risk of losing our friends and family because of Christ and for standing up for him and everything he tells us in his word. You know what I mean -- our family and neighbors and co-workers should have no doubt that we oppose abortion because God's word opposes abortion, that we call homosexuality a sin because God's word calls it a sin, that we tell those we care about what Jesus did for them even though it might strain our relationship with them or we might lose them as a friend. We do that because God has called us to be his witnesses and because Jesus is the only one who can save anyone from their sins. And that's why Peter's words are so welcome because they are filled with such hope and encouragement.

Peter says, "Since you call on a Father who judges each man's work impartially, live your lives as strangers here in reverent fear." When it comes right down to it, we're all in the same boat. We live in a fallen world, and we have contributed to the pain and misery of people in it because we have hurt others; we have lived too much for this world and what this world has to offer; we have become complacent at times in our Christian faith and didn't think it was all that important to live a Christian life. Often, we haven't shown ourselves to be strangers to the sin and ways of this world. So Peter first reminds us that the one we call our heavenly Father knows exactly how we are living. Nothing is hidden from him before whom we must give an account. We can't pull the wool over his eyes. And he will judge us one day. That ought to fill us with more dread than we can even imagine. We should fear him more than anything else.

But that isn't the kind of fear Peter is talking about. He says, "...live your lives as strangers here in reverent fear." We should fear him, as in, hold him in awe and reverence. He is the Almighty. With a thought, he should send us to the place we deserve, which is a place of punishment, eternal punishment, for every time we've failed to obey him. That should be enough to have us hold him in awe and be terrified of him. But Peter calls him our Father. And the only way we can call him that is by what he did in sending his Son into this world and changing our lives forever.

Peter says, "For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect."

Think of the many ways we've failed our God, the many times we've seen Jesus amazing love to us compared to our lack of love for him and our lack of love for each other. Yet in his love, he didn't punish us. Instead, he punished his own Son Jesus in our place. No amount of silver or gold could have redeemed us or bought us back from our slavery to the devil. No ransom price containing all the gold, silver, platinum, diamonds, jewelry and everything else this entire world is worth could have paid the ransom price for our rebellion against the Almighty God. Only one payment would do it. God's Son had to become man, take our place under God's holy wrath, and suffer and die in our place to pay the horrible price to set us free from sin and death and the empty way of life we used to live before we knew Christ and all the ungodly things we've done since we've come to know Christ. The price he paid was his own precious blood, from a lamb of sacrifice that was perfect in every way just as in every way we had failed to be.

How do we know that payment was enough to pay for every last one of our sins, even the most horrible ones we ever done and might weigh on our hearts day and night and give us no peace because we know how we have offended the holy God? The key is the resurrection. Jesus' resurrection. Peter says about Jesus, "Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God." By raising Jesus from the dead, God was declaring that our nightmare was over. Now when we stand before God, we don't have to be afraid of punishment, but we know that our sins have been paid for by Jesus. His resurrection assures us of that. So our faith and our hope are in our saving God.

And that makes all the difference in the world for us as Christians. It means that when we face a horrible tragedy in our family or with a friend and we feel like our hearts are being torn out, we don't try to just muddle through it as best we can. We lay all our cares on our Savior God, and we know that we will care for our broken hearts.

Since our faith and hope are in our Savior God, when we are faced with a temptation to sin against our God, we will use the power of the Holy Spirit to say no to that temptation because our God deserves better from us after all he's done for us. He doesn't deserve to be an afterthought. He is the heart and soul of our lives. He is the one we think of all the time and strive to live for with every moment of our lives.

This past week on the nightly news I saw a segment on doga -- yoga for dogs. That's right -- you can pay to bring your dog with you when you do yoga. But they don't just watch. You actually move your dog into the proper positions as you are doing the yoga yourself. This world is a strange place with so many people following things that give them a momentary pleasure, but they don't see the importance of what Jesus has done for every sinner when he died for them and rose again. This life is strange to us; it is different. Because God has made us different when he called us to believe in Jesus and gave us eternal life, we will be different as well. We won't be too comfortable in this life. We'll see this life as something that's strange -- and not just yoga for dogs. We're passing through while we keep our eyes focused on Jesus and our heavenly home. Peter encourages us: "...live your lives as strangers here in reverent fear."

Living is not something Alan Klapmeier takes for granted. When he was 25, Alan took a flying lesson at the Sauk-Prairie airport, just north of Madison, Wisconsin. It was late afternoon, so the sun was low in the sky. He had just taken off and was turning away from the airport, when another plane was nearing the airport from the opposite direction, flying with the sun in the pilot's face. Unfortunately neither pilot saw the other, and they collided. The other pilot went into a tailspin and fell to his death. Alan did everything he could to keep his plane from crashing, even though part of his left wing was shorn off. He grabbed the stick and pushed it as far to the left as could as he tried to land, but the right wing kept getting closer to the ground. If it hit the ground before his landing gear, the plane would cartwheel into pieces and he and his instructor with it. At the last possible minute, he felt what he most hoped for -- the wheels hitting the landing strip. It was a tough landing, but he was able to leave the plane uninjured and fly again. As a result, he and his brother founded a company that builds the Cirrus SR20 which would increase the safety for small planes by adding a parachute that is large enough to carry the entire plane to safety. It would be a bumpy ride and a rough landing if it needed to be used, but it would greatly increase the possibility of leaving the people in that plane alive.

As Christians, we shouldn't take living in this world for granted, either. Like Alan Klapmeier, we should have been dead. But God gave us new life through Jesus' life and death on the cross and resurrection. Even though this life might seem to be spiraling out of control at times, we have a parachute, and it's already deployed. We might have a bumpy ride and a rough landing at the end of this life, but thanks to Jesus we know that when we land we will walk away alive into the mansions of heaven. Since you know that to be true, you can live your life boldly for Jesus, without fear of the consequences, because heaven is your final destination. Until then, live as a stranger in this strange land. Amen.