Sermon Tone Analysis

We all know what it feels like when others think we don’t belong.

We walk into the room and the conversation stops.

People won’t look us in the eye.

Maybe they try to pretend that they didn’t notice that we walked in.

In one way or another, we hear about people talking about us instead of to us.

It’s one thing if people respect us enough to speak to us directly, even when there is some issue or disagreement.

It’s another when people make the decision that for whatever reason—justified or not—that you are no longer on the “approved list,” and you feel like a social leper, with people avoiding you like you have a contagious disease.

There may have been reasons for why you’re being criticized, and you know it, and maybe you even admit you did something wrong.

There are other times when it’s news to you and you had no idea that you’d done something wrong.

Or, maybe you didn’t do anything wrong.

You were just different, and, for some, there’s no room for different—just conformity.

To be excluded gives us a little taste of what hell might be like—to be isolated and alone with your suffering.

No one wants to be there, and whether or not we realize it, we ourselves are tempted to put other people there.

When we are the object of this kind of social condemnation, it’s easy for us to wonder about our worth—maybe even our worth in God’s eyes.

Maybe it causes a crisis of faith.

When we suffer this way, we might begin to wonder if God loves us.

If God doesn’t love us, what’s going to happen in my life?

What’s going to happen when I die?

Will there be nothing?

We read about hell in the Bible, and we think, “Am I going there?”

You might be listening and you might think that what I’m saying is ridiculous, but be patient, there are others here—someone you’d never imagine—who think I’m talking directly to them.

J

In the text today, Jesus has been teaching around the countryside.

In chapter 11, we read that Jesus had been invited for dinner at the home of a Pharisee.

Jesus accepted the invitation, but as you read the story, we find that Jesus didn’t keep up with the expectations that others had for him.

Without telling the whole story, Jesus didn’t wash his hands before the meal.

The pharisee wasn’t criticizing Jesus’ hygiene; he was shocked that Jesus didn’t keep a religious custom.

I have no idea exactly, but perhaps it would have been the same as not praying before a meal.

The pharisee’s comment set Jesus off.

He knew his every move was being watched.

He knew he was being evaluated and judged every step of the way.

He ends up calling the Pharisees unmarked graves, which people walk over without knowing it.

Apparently, when people made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, people would paint or white wash a grave so people could see it and avoid it, so they wouldn’t walk over it and become ceremonially unclean.

When Jesus calls the Pharisees unmarked graves, he is saying that they make people spiritually defiled when they followed the Pharisees teaching.

They are spiritual dead and people become spiritually spoiled when they follow them.

The experts in the law heard this and told Jesus that when you insult the Pharisees this way, you also insult them.

Jesus replied,

That verse preaches.

All this builds to .

Jesus is teaching again.

There are so many people around they are practically trampling on one another.

I can imagine all these people clamoring to hear Jesus and he is thinking about the confrontation in the Pharisees house.

We read,

The pharisees, the teachers of the law—all of them—do not lead or hold power in order to improve the well-being of others.

Instead, they simply like the influence and power that they wield and their teachings infect the people and grow, like yeast mixed with flour and water.

Jesus said,

Jesus is saying, let’s not give people power that isn’t theirs.

When we follow Jesus’ teaching, let’s remember this....

Don’t feed the lie of shame and guilt.

In conversations this week, I’ve been reminded that in a relatively rural area like ours, it doesn’t take much for us to know a little bit about a lot of people around here.

In many ways, that is a blessing.

At it’s best, we can be community of shared values and support.

In times of crisis, there is no better place to be.

If you live in a city or a more populated place, you don’t find that.

It’s easier to be anonymous, which creates it’s own problems, but in small towns, one of the dangers is that we are motivated by shame and guilt, not joyful living.

We hold our secrets tight, fearing that if they become known, we will be the topic of conversation.

And, depending on what we did or said, we will be cast into a kind of hell—where people might isolate us or we isolate ourselves, as we sense the judgment of others.

So, we live in fear that we are going to be found out.

I’m not saying that we’re perfect.

I’m not saying that we should play the part of the victim.

Be honest.

We sin, too.

Some times we have messed up.

Sometimes we know very well that we’ve done wrong.

How we respond is the key.

That’s what Jesus is getting at in this text and it has eternal implications.

Who really has the authority of your life?

More importantly, and this is easy to forget, who has authority over your soul?

Eventually, Jesus says,

Luke 12:2-3

Everything will become known.

The disciples secrets, the crowd’s secrets.

The secrets of the pharisees and teachers of the law.

Your secrets.

Who do you trust with those secrets?

Jesus has an interesting way of answering that question.

He goes straight to the heart of it.

He says,

It isn’t the Pharisees or the teachers of the law.

It isn’t that group of friends, or that person at church.

Fear God alone.

(changed from Fear God, not death.)

Ultimately, it is God who judges.

It is God who condemns.

You, me, anyone else, we do our best to tell right from wrong.

But, as it is so obvious in this world, people hold themselves and others to so many different standards.

Jesus reminds us that ultimately we will have to stand before God and give an answer for our lives and the choices we have made.

One small note, we hear this, and many people use it as a an excuse not to listen to anyone.

“I answer only to God,” essentially means, “I’m not going to let anyone else tell me what to do.” That’s not right either.

What Jesus is saying is that when we apply God’s law to ourselves and to others, but then make the Law more important than God—we get sideways.

This might sound confusing, but it’s confused a lot of people.

You might be thinking, God gave us the Law to follow and obey.

Therefore, if God gave us the Law then if we don’t keep it, we deserve punishment, maybe eternal punishment.

There’s some truth to that—but the best lies have a little bit of truth them.

The lie tells us the Law is the most important thing.

God tells us that Jesus is the most important thing.

God has the authority to send us all to hell, but he desires to see us live in relationship with him.

Jesus says,

Luke 12:6

Jesus says we are not forgotten.