Romans 1:16-17, 3:21-31

Shame is a funny thing. It causes us to act in ways that are primal in a way, to run and hide. Rob Bell, a noted pastor and author from Michigan, tells the story of his son being so ashamed over being caught in the midst of a lie that he ran and hid under the covers of his parent’s bed. Think back to a time in your life when you were so filled with shame that you hid, maybe you literally hid, or tried to cover up that which shamed you.
I think some of us feel shame about being Christians. Oh yes, we come to Church once a week and sit quietly through the sermon, but we hide the fact that we are Christians when we leave the building on Monday. Or worse we proclaim that we are Christians but don’t live out lives that match.
In Romans 1:16 and 17 Paul proclaims, “I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jews first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith; as it is written., “The one who is righteous will have faith.” Let’s be honest folks, for Paul not being ashamed means living a radical faith that most of us avoid. Paul was thrown out of towns, flogged, verbally persecuted, and put in jail. He would ultimately die for his faith in Christ, and through all of that he lived a life that cried the gospel message to others.
I personally find it somewhat tragic that we aren’t really persecuted for our faith today in America. Persecution is a surefire way to separate those who aren’t ashamed of the gospel message from those who hide because of what it will cost them. Instead we can live under the glossy veneer of Christianity, while not really having any interest in being a disciple of Christ’s. We want to reap the benefits of Salvation without having to give to others. We want everything to be on our terms.
But see that isn’t how Salvation works. We were saved for a purpose, and that’s not to come to church for a few hours a week; we are saved to show the world the righteousness of God. And truly only God can make us righteous. If we are true disciples then we crave to be like the one we follow. It’s really not about you, its about God making you a vessel that can proclaim his glory with your life.
Up to this point, I feel like I’ve already created some enemies in the congregation, but stick with me. I think the number one way that we act like we are ashamed of the gospel message is to forget about grace. Grace, redemption, mercy, and love, these are central to the gospel story. And yet we fall into the trap of not forgiving someone who has wronged us, or becoming hostile to people at work or a million other things that neglect the act of grace. We can even use the Bible to belittle people and tell them why they need God. And yes, people do need Christ, but please show me once in the pages of the gospel where Christ belittled someone in sin in order to save them. He spoke the truth, but he did so in love.
Phillip Yancey, a Christian author, wrote a few very well known books, one of which is called “What’s So Amazing About Grace?” This book was a huge deal after September 11th, 2001 because it was given to the families of victims when the twin towers crashed. It went on to be voted best book of the year. In it Yancey tells story after story of moments where grace was received and moments where people frankly missed the mark, missed an opportunity to show others God’s righteousness through grace. One such story is about Yancey going to a gay march with his friend Mel, who is also an author. 300,000 people gathered to march in Washington and were surrounded by Christians yelling words of hatred such as “Aids, aids it’s coming your way.” “Faggots go home”, and “Shame on you for what you do”. But among the marchers were at least 3,000 people who identified themselves as Christians and they turned to these people who were spewing poisonous words at them and sang “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.” Yancey is quoted as saying “The abrupt ironies of the scene of confrontation struck me. On one side were the Christians defending pure doctrine and on the other were the “sinners” many of whom openly admit to homosexual practices. Yet the more orthodox group spewed out hate and the other group sang of Jesus love.”
Brothers and sisters, I ask you who reflected God best in Yancey’s story? Who lived out his grace with their lives? Somehow we have gotten stuck on the idea that it is our job as Christians to judge others. That is in fact God’s job. Our job is to lead people to him by love. Please do not understand me, grace does not mean that we excuse the sin that others live in, but it does mean that we see each person we interact with as a child of God and treat them as such. Noticing others sin is not a reason to belittle them. Challenge them in love, but not attack them. And challenging them in love only after God leads the way. His timing is perfect, just as his love is. We need to look to him for guidance if we feel the need to challenge another. We need to have faith in God that he will lead us, instead of assuming that he has just dropped the ball and needs us to judge others for him. The Church does not a monopoly on God’s grace. God has shown us grace and we are called to model his grace for others. Are we hiding God’s good news in shame by making ourselves and our own ideas of justice so big that we diminish God?
Flip forward now to Romans chapter 3 starting in verse 29. “Is God the God of Jews alone? Is he not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also, since God is one: and he will justify the circumcised on the ground of faith and the uncircumcised through the same faith.” Let’s give this a bit of a modern translation. God is not the God of West Side alone. He is not the God of Pennsylvania alone. He is not the God of America alone. In fact, he is not even the God of Christians alone. God is bigger then all of this. He loves every single person on this earth, even if they don’t love them back. I don’t know how many of you have tried to love someone who just didn’t want you to love them, who even hated you maybe, but God loves every person. His message doesn’t extend to a few, it is available to all. And because he is the God of all, as his disciples we are called to love everyone too. This isn’t going to be easy. We have grown up in a world that tells us to hate those who hate us. Shane Claiborne is the face of the new monastic movement in the United States. In 2003 he traveled to Iraq with a group of international peace makers where he met a bishop at an ecumenical gathering. Shane was told by the bishop that many in the Middle East were concerned for the church in America. Shane continues the story: “The bishop said, “Many Americans are for this war.” Shane nodded. And he asked. “But what are the Christians saying?” Are we living in the truth that we have brothers and sisters around the world? Do we care about the Iraqi civilians dying because of the war? Do we care about the 30,000 children who die each day of starvation? Do we care about the orphans in Africa? Look into their faces and see that God loves them too. And as his disciple our heart should break for them because his does.
I have been blessed to travel around the world. I have been blessed to worship the same God with my brothers and sisters in each country I’ve been in. God is alive and well in those countries, and our brothers and sisters there are praying for us. Are we praying for them? Or are we ashamed to be part of the same family as them?
For our final piece for discussion flip back to verse 22 of the same chapter” For there is no distinction, since all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God; they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith. He did this to show his righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over the sins previously committed; it was to prove at the present time that he himself is righteous and that he justifies the one who has faith in Jesus.” My question for you, are we hiding in shame from God because we have not claimed the reality of what his son’s death on the cross has done for us? Do we think that we are not good enough to be a Christian and do we not extend grace towards ourselves. When you have accepted the salvation of Christ to be the mark of your life and pursue being his disciple, you are a Child of God. But you were God’s child even before you sought him. Notice in the gospel, Christ never primarily identified people by their faults or as a sinner. No, Christ saw past the stains into the piece of God that was in each person he reached out to. Take time to see the piece of God in you and claim the truth and power of his death and resurrection. Yes, you will stumble and yes you will fall, but Christ does not. His death and your yoking with him is eternal. We are FOREVER redeemed! Let us live like it!
How does our faith in God effect us? Does it lead us to be so dependent on God that we speak his words of life to others? Does it lead us overflow grace to everyone we know, not jut the people we sit next to in church on Sunday? Are we reflecting God’s righteousness.? Do we love our brothers and sisters around the world? And Have we claimed the power and truth of Christ’s atonement? Let us not be ashamed of our God and his message. May we live the gospel with our lives. It is not going to be easy because it will be counter-cultural to the society that we live in, but if we seek to be authentic disciples of Christ we want to be like him, care about what and who he cares about. Let us not be complacent. Let us cry with Paul “I am not ashamed!”