WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.480 on the Lord's Prayer, and the plan was to finish that series this morning. However, Friday night, 00:00:08.080 --> 00:00:15.220 as I was aware of the riots that were breaking out in our city and in other cities around our 00:00:15.220 --> 00:00:24.100 country over the killing of George Floyd, as I prayed and was grieving with my wife, 00:00:24.100 --> 00:00:33.340 my heart kept going back to Romans chapter 8. And as much as I love the series on the Lord's Prayer, 00:00:33.539 --> 00:00:41.200 I woke up Saturday feeling that we really needed to spend time in this chapter to try to make sense 00:00:41.200 --> 00:00:46.680 of what has happened over this past week, and to know how to grieve and to know how to respond. 00:00:47.120 --> 00:00:52.000 And so the plan is that we will finish the series actually next week, and we're just going to take 00:00:52.000 --> 00:00:57.600 a pause just to talk a little bit about what has happened. And at first glance, I know it doesn't 00:00:57.600 --> 00:01:05.659 seem like Romans 8 is directly applicable to issues of race and injustice and things like that. And yet, 00:01:05.840 --> 00:01:12.019 I hope what we see together is that this chapter in particular gives us a kind of framework. 00:01:12.819 --> 00:01:17.240 It helps us understand and make sense of the kind of world that we live in, 00:01:17.239 --> 00:01:23.919 a world where viruses kill people and cripple economies, a world where there is deep racial 00:01:23.919 --> 00:01:31.359 division and pain and systemic injustice. It helps us make sense of this world. And then it also shows 00:01:31.359 --> 00:01:37.459 us why Christians should be on the front lines fighting for a better world. So we're going to look 00:01:37.459 --> 00:01:43.560 at Romans 8 verses 15 through 25, and we're going to see three things. We're going to see why the world is 00:01:43.560 --> 00:01:49.920 the way it is, what God is doing about it, and what that means for us as Christians in the world. 00:01:50.240 --> 00:01:52.159 So let's pray, and then we'll open God's Word. 00:01:53.439 --> 00:01:58.859 Lord, we thank you for your Word. And on this day in particular, Pentecost Sunday, 00:01:59.400 --> 00:02:05.480 we recognize that our hope does not lie in human wisdom or ideas, but in the power of your Spirit 00:02:05.480 --> 00:02:09.520 and in the power of your Word to do your work in our lives. 00:02:09.520 --> 00:02:15.400 And so we pray that your Spirit would empower your Word and that through this time we would come to 00:02:15.400 --> 00:02:22.020 see the living Word, Jesus Christ, face to face. And it's in his name that we pray. Amen. 00:02:23.480 --> 00:02:29.640 So the first thing we want to ask is, why is the world the way it is? And in this passage, 00:02:29.840 --> 00:02:36.700 Paul gives us two pretty hard truths that we need to wrestle with. These are hard pills to swallow, 00:02:36.699 --> 00:02:41.060 but in order to make progress, we need to understand what Paul is talking about here. 00:02:41.500 --> 00:02:49.359 The first word that Paul uses to describe our world is the word futility. Futility, that shows up in 00:02:49.359 --> 00:02:55.239 verse 20. And futility essentially means that this world is not the way that it was supposed to be. 00:02:55.739 --> 00:03:02.239 It means that no matter how hard we try, no matter how hard we work, no matter how intelligent we are, 00:03:02.240 --> 00:03:09.040 or how advanced our technology might become, things never work the way they're supposed to. 00:03:09.640 --> 00:03:17.460 It means that our work, our relationships, our institutions, our governments, they will always 00:03:17.460 --> 00:03:26.140 fall short. They will never be what we hope they will be. It also means that sin pervades everything. 00:03:26.139 --> 00:03:33.139 So everything that we touch, everything that we build, all of the systems and institutions that 00:03:33.139 --> 00:03:40.419 we establish, all of it is pervaded by sin. That's what futility means. And then along with that, 00:03:40.679 --> 00:03:47.919 Paul uses the word corruption. And that shows up in verse 21. And corruption essentially means that 00:03:47.919 --> 00:03:54.259 everything in the world breaks down. Everything decays. It means that everything that exists 00:03:54.259 --> 00:04:01.739 is expending more energy than it can replenish. And so over time, everything is breaking down. 00:04:02.060 --> 00:04:08.840 And this is true cosmically. It's true socially. It's true politically. It's true psychologically. 00:04:09.500 --> 00:04:15.560 It's of course true physically and our own bodies. In all of these ways, everything is breaking down. 00:04:15.899 --> 00:04:22.039 It means that nothing lasts forever. It means that one day the United States is simply going to be a 00:04:22.040 --> 00:04:30.400 chapter in somebody's history textbook. So life is extremely difficult. That's what futility means. 00:04:30.500 --> 00:04:37.060 Nothing works like it should. And nothing lasts. That's what corruption means. And these are incredibly 00:04:37.060 --> 00:04:43.840 hard truths to wrestle with. And we have to ask, why is this the case? Why do we live in a world like 00:04:43.840 --> 00:04:51.300 this of futility and corruption? And if we go back earlier in the letter to the Romans, you see this word 00:04:51.300 --> 00:04:59.000 futility show up for the first time in chapter one. And there Paul says that God created everything 00:04:59.000 --> 00:05:05.540 originally. Everything was created good and beautiful and perfect. And God created all of this 00:05:05.540 --> 00:05:12.360 for his glory and created us so that we could worship him and glorify him. And then Paul says in that same 00:05:12.360 --> 00:05:18.939 chapter that human beings made the decision to exchange the worship and the glory of God 00:05:18.939 --> 00:05:25.439 for the worship and the glorification of the things that God made. And so instead of worshiping God, 00:05:25.779 --> 00:05:33.180 we worship the things of this world, things like money and sex and power and individualism and 00:05:33.180 --> 00:05:40.639 romantic love and success and influence and celebrity and all of the things that captivate our hearts. 00:05:40.639 --> 00:05:48.519 Those are the things that we worship instead. And the result is futility. The result is corruption. 00:05:48.939 --> 00:05:56.199 The result is that the entire world is broken because of that. Now, this is extremely relevant 00:05:56.199 --> 00:06:02.800 for how we think about the events of this past week, because I think the Christian understanding 00:06:02.800 --> 00:06:09.560 of evil and sin, as we've just been talking about, transcends the typical political categories 00:06:09.560 --> 00:06:16.800 that people operate out of. So most of the time when I talk to people who tend toward the right, 00:06:17.300 --> 00:06:25.060 they tend to focus on personal sin, and yet they tend to downplay or altogether disregard the reality 00:06:25.060 --> 00:06:30.819 of systemic structural sin. And likewise, when I talk to people who lean toward the left, 00:06:31.199 --> 00:06:36.560 what I tend to experience is that those people tend to do the exact opposite. They emphasize 00:06:36.560 --> 00:06:43.480 systemic structural sin, all of the evils of society, but they minimize or altogether ignore 00:06:43.480 --> 00:06:50.160 personal sin and the call to personal holiness. And what we see in places like Romans 8, and in many 00:06:50.160 --> 00:06:55.439 other places, by the way, in Scripture, is that when Christians talk about sin and evil, we should be 00:06:55.439 --> 00:07:02.519 talking about both. That we're talking both about personal sin and we're talking about systemic 00:07:02.519 --> 00:07:08.919 structural sin. And when we see something like what happened to George Floyd, what we see is both 00:07:08.919 --> 00:07:15.879 playing out. That was the result of the personal sin of the officers involved, but it's also a reflection 00:07:15.879 --> 00:07:24.839 of systemic and structural sin that exists at many levels in our society. It's just more confirmation. 00:07:24.839 --> 00:07:32.199 It's just more confirmation to black Americans everywhere that the very people and the very 00:07:32.199 --> 00:07:37.279 institutions that are supposed to keep them safe can't be trusted to do that. And in fact, 00:07:37.359 --> 00:07:45.599 they do harm instead. That's systemic sin at work. And so what Scripture shows us is that we can be 00:07:45.599 --> 00:07:52.579 brutally honest about our own personal sin, and we should also be unflinchingly and brutally honest 00:07:52.579 --> 00:07:59.459 about systemic sin. Because what we see is that our personal sin is what causes the systemic sin. 00:08:00.579 --> 00:08:07.639 It is our personal sin that gives rise to the systemic sin and the corruption at a societal level. 00:08:08.019 --> 00:08:14.839 And this is why years ago, when the Times asked G.K. Chesterton the question, 00:08:15.219 --> 00:08:19.579 what do you think is wrong with the world? Chesterton responded with only two words, 00:08:19.579 --> 00:08:28.180 I am. That is the Christian response to evil and suffering, personal and systemic. 00:08:29.180 --> 00:08:35.879 So this is why the world is the way it is, and this is why life can be so unbelievably challenging. 00:08:36.299 --> 00:08:43.139 But now we have to ask, what is God doing about all of this? What is God doing in the world? And that's 00:08:43.139 --> 00:08:49.379 where this passage is really amazing because it shows us the scope of God's work in the world and 00:08:49.379 --> 00:08:53.960 where all of this is going. And particularly, I want to draw your attention to two things. 00:08:54.439 --> 00:09:03.139 First of all, God right now is building a new family in the world. He's building a new family in the world. 00:09:03.139 --> 00:09:04.799 It says in verse 15, 00:09:05.179 --> 00:09:11.439 You've received the spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, Abba, Father. 00:09:11.960 --> 00:09:16.220 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. 00:09:16.600 --> 00:09:21.199 Now, I know that it's using the language of sons there, and it sounds like it's a masculine focus, 00:09:21.580 --> 00:09:25.600 but I want you to understand what Paul is actually saying here and how radical this is. 00:09:25.879 --> 00:09:28.759 Now, I said this a few weeks ago, but it bears repeating. 00:09:28.759 --> 00:09:36.059 In Rome, adoption was very common. And in Rome, adoption often happened among the upper classes. 00:09:36.299 --> 00:09:42.439 If you did not have a male heir to pass everything down to, that was a big deal. And so an easy way 00:09:42.439 --> 00:09:48.840 to remedy that problem was to go out and to find a worthy young man, adopt him, make him your heir, 00:09:48.960 --> 00:09:53.980 and then pass your land and estate and title, all of that down to him. So it was a common thing, 00:09:54.039 --> 00:09:58.439 but it really only happened in the upper classes and among men. I don't know that we have 00:09:58.440 --> 00:10:04.780 any instances of women being adopted for this reason. And yet what Paul is talking about is 00:10:04.780 --> 00:10:12.200 radically different. What Paul is saying is that God's adoption, God's desire to adopt us 00:10:12.200 --> 00:10:18.080 is not based on gender, and it's not based on race, and it's not based on class, 00:10:18.220 --> 00:10:25.440 and it's not based on your worth or how impressive you are. Every single person that God adopts 00:10:25.440 --> 00:10:33.040 receives the full rights and privileges of a firstborn son in the Greco-Roman world, 00:10:33.160 --> 00:10:39.740 which is everything. Every single person whom God adopts receives all of those rights and privileges. 00:10:40.380 --> 00:10:46.760 And what the gospel tells us is that God did this not because we were worthy or impressive, 00:10:46.759 --> 00:10:55.639 but sheerly as an act of his love. That Jesus Christ, who was the son, who was the heir, 00:10:56.039 --> 00:11:03.000 who had all of the rights and privileges, that he was willing to give all of that up to empty himself, 00:11:03.600 --> 00:11:11.639 to humble himself, to become a servant and even a slave for humanity. That he was willing to endure 00:11:11.639 --> 00:11:22.340 humiliation and torture and ultimately be executed as a criminal so that God might invite you and I 00:11:22.340 --> 00:11:29.960 and people from every tribe, tongue, and nation to be adopted and become sons and daughters of God. 00:11:30.360 --> 00:11:35.620 This is the truth of the gospel. And so through Jesus Christ and through the cross, 00:11:35.620 --> 00:11:43.340 God is building a worldwide family. He's building a family in which racial differences and cultural 00:11:43.340 --> 00:11:50.740 differences and ethnic differences, that those differences remain as a kind of beautiful tapestry 00:11:50.740 --> 00:11:58.100 of God's creativity. And yet in the kingdom and in the world that God is building, there are no longer 00:11:58.100 --> 00:12:07.019 any penalties or privileges associated with race or class because God has given every single one of his 00:12:07.019 --> 00:12:16.120 children the same status, the same privileges as a firstborn son. So it's a radical idea, this vision of a 00:12:16.120 --> 00:12:24.779 society that has at the same time absolute unity and diversity. It has absolute equality and individuality. 00:12:24.779 --> 00:12:30.779 This is what the gospel is doing in the world. So this is one of the things that we see God doing. 00:12:30.899 --> 00:12:35.139 He's building a new family, people made up of every tribe, tongue, and nation. 00:12:37.179 --> 00:12:44.620 God is also building a new world. And one day God will establish a completely renewed world. You see this in 00:12:44.620 --> 00:12:52.339 verses 21 and 22. One day God is going to set the world free from futility and corruption. As Paul says, 00:12:52.340 --> 00:12:58.360 it's bondage to decay. And one day he's going to renew it. And one day the heavens and the earth will be 00:12:58.360 --> 00:13:05.980 won. And all of the pain and all of the suffering and all of the grief that we experience now, all of 00:13:05.980 --> 00:13:13.000 that will be like the pains of childbirth. It will one day give way to a joy that is so complete and so 00:13:13.000 --> 00:13:19.759 all-encompassing that it blots out all of the pain that we've experienced. Every tear will be wiped away. 00:13:19.759 --> 00:13:27.559 So God is building a new family and he will one day build a new world. And that new world will be the 00:13:27.559 --> 00:13:33.279 eternal home of this family that God is building. So that's what God is doing in the world. 00:13:34.120 --> 00:13:39.139 Now, what does this mean for us? Our third and final question, what does this mean for us 00:13:39.139 --> 00:13:43.360 here and now, especially in a week like this one? 00:13:43.360 --> 00:13:52.060 I think the challenge that we need to wrestle with, I think the challenge that we need to wrestle with 00:13:52.060 --> 00:13:59.419 is that even though God is building this great multi-ethnic family where everyone has the same 00:13:59.419 --> 00:14:06.419 status and privilege as the firstborn son, that that is not true of the world that we live in now. 00:14:06.419 --> 00:14:13.219 That is simply not true. It is not the case. The thing that we have to wrestle with is that right 00:14:13.219 --> 00:14:20.360 now, no matter if you're Christian or not, there is a vast difference in our society between what it 00:14:20.360 --> 00:14:26.740 means to be white and what it means to be a person of color. And the way I experience this most often 00:14:26.740 --> 00:14:34.819 is the fact that I can be strongly tempted to avert my eyes from issues of race, to opt out 00:14:34.820 --> 00:14:40.820 because it's too painful and too complicated and too hard. And I can have that temptation to want 00:14:40.820 --> 00:14:48.820 to opt out. And the mere fact that I have the option to opt out is an indication of the difference. 00:14:49.620 --> 00:14:54.720 Because for people of color in our country, that is simply not an option that they have. 00:14:56.000 --> 00:15:00.720 So the question that we have to ask ourselves, if we're Christians in this country right now, 00:15:00.720 --> 00:15:07.580 when we look at our churches, when we look at our communities, do our churches reflect the reality 00:15:07.580 --> 00:15:14.580 of the kingdom that God is building? Or do they reflect the reality of this society that we live in, 00:15:14.620 --> 00:15:21.220 the society that is in bondage to futility and decay and corruption at a systemic level? 00:15:22.220 --> 00:15:26.320 And this is a very hard question for us to wrestle with because it's painful. 00:15:26.320 --> 00:15:32.640 And these realities are painful. Verse 23 says, 00:15:33.060 --> 00:15:39.760 we ourselves who have the first fruits of the spirit grown inwardly. And I've wondered for years, 00:15:39.879 --> 00:15:45.100 what does it mean that we as Christians who have the spirit grown inwardly? What does it mean that 00:15:45.100 --> 00:15:51.380 the spirit would cause us to groan? And here's what the New Testament scholar Doug Moo says. And for me, 00:15:51.379 --> 00:15:57.779 this kind of a light bulb came on when I read this for the first time, he says essentially that once 00:15:57.779 --> 00:16:03.899 the Holy Spirit enters your life, once the Holy Spirit enters you and begins to inhabit you, 00:16:04.379 --> 00:16:12.120 you begin to sense as never before, you begin to see clearly what God wants us to be and what God 00:16:12.120 --> 00:16:19.080 wants this world to be. And once you see that and sense it and know it in your heart because the 00:16:19.080 --> 00:16:26.779 spirit is pressing it into your heart, once you see that, you can't unsee it. And so here's what 00:16:26.779 --> 00:16:33.560 Moo says. He says, the spirit increases our frustration at not meeting God's standard and our 00:16:33.560 --> 00:16:40.759 yearning to be what he wants us to be. And this is not motivated by a spirit of fear or a fear of 00:16:40.759 --> 00:16:47.960 punishment. This is motivated by love. It's motivated by our delight in God and our desire to be everything 00:16:47.960 --> 00:16:52.939 that God wants us to be and to see this world become everything that God created it to be. 00:16:53.439 --> 00:17:02.059 And so we might think of this as a kind of holy unrest, a kind of holy discontent that sets in. The 00:17:02.059 --> 00:17:09.200 spirit stirs us up, increases our frustration that things are not the way they could be. And I believe 00:17:09.200 --> 00:17:16.480 that this is the spirit's call to action. I believe the Holy Spirit right now is calling us as the church 00:17:16.480 --> 00:17:24.360 to action because this is not some kind of let go and let God pietism where we sit back and say, oh, God 00:17:24.360 --> 00:17:29.380 will take care of it. That's simply not what's happening here. This is a call, I believe, to roll up our 00:17:29.380 --> 00:17:35.779 sleeves and to dive in and to do everything that we can in the power of the Holy Spirit to push back the 00:17:35.779 --> 00:17:46.599 darkness, both at a personal level and a systemic level. So my hope and my prayer is that not only do 00:17:46.599 --> 00:17:53.700 we grieve and lament this horrendous tragedy, not only do we cry out for justice to be done, 00:17:54.259 --> 00:18:00.680 but my hope and my prayer is that the killing of George Floyd and so many others like him, 00:18:00.680 --> 00:18:08.440 that this would shake white Christians awake, that this would galvanize us, that this would finally 00:18:08.440 --> 00:18:13.480 convince us that we cannot check out, that we cannot sit back, that we cannot avert our eyes, 00:18:13.660 --> 00:18:19.880 that we cannot look the other way, that this would be a call to action. Because listen, friends, 00:18:21.160 --> 00:18:29.660 the church, more than any other institution in history, is equipped to do the hard, long, 00:18:29.660 --> 00:18:36.580 painful work of seeking healing and reconciliation in our world. There is no other institution that 00:18:36.580 --> 00:18:42.460 comes close. And for all of the ways that the church has been complicit and all of the ways that 00:18:42.460 --> 00:18:48.420 the church has done harm throughout history, there are also innumerable examples of the ways that the 00:18:48.420 --> 00:18:56.140 church has done extraordinarily good and beautiful things for race relations and for equality and for 00:18:56.140 --> 00:19:02.700 human rights in our world. And so we have a choice to decide what kind of churches are we building? 00:19:03.560 --> 00:19:09.560 What kind of society are we building together as Christians in the world? 00:19:11.140 --> 00:19:19.400 I think white Christians in particular need to recognize that we cannot sit back and remain silent. 00:19:19.400 --> 00:19:26.720 We cannot remain silent in the face of injustice like this. All too often, I think white Christians, 00:19:27.380 --> 00:19:34.060 we are eager to skip to the forgiveness part and to the reconciliation part. And we are eager to quote 00:19:34.060 --> 00:19:40.900 that we are all one in Christ Jesus and that there is no longer any racial identity. I think many white 00:19:40.900 --> 00:19:46.220 Christians want to leap to that. But we need to recognize that when we do that, we are ignoring and 00:19:46.220 --> 00:19:52.180 minimizing and denying the fact that there is an open wound in our society, that there is an enormous 00:19:52.180 --> 00:20:00.200 amount of pain, and that there are real injustices that need to be corrected. And so we cannot be silent. 00:20:00.640 --> 00:20:07.400 We cannot check out. We cannot minimize and ignore these things. And listen, friends, this is a long, 00:20:07.660 --> 00:20:13.900 hard road. This is not a solution that's going to come next year or even in a decade or even in decades. 00:20:13.900 --> 00:20:21.360 This is a lifelong commitment that we must make. And it means that we have to be willing to enter in 00:20:21.360 --> 00:20:30.440 and to listen and to humble ourselves and to let go of all presumption and to let go of the temptation 00:20:30.440 --> 00:20:37.040 to politicize this. And we need to be willing to stay in it no matter how hard it gets, no matter how 00:20:37.040 --> 00:20:41.019 awkward it gets, no matter how painful it gets. We need to commit for the long haul. 00:20:41.019 --> 00:20:50.759 This is why we are doing our best to seek partnerships with other majority non-white churches 00:20:50.759 --> 00:20:58.660 in the DMV area. It's why I believe all Christians, especially white Christians, need to be intentionally 00:20:58.660 --> 00:21:06.579 seeking out relationships with people of color, relationships where we can sit and listen and learn 00:21:06.579 --> 00:21:12.319 and begin to understand the world that we live in from a non-white perspective. 00:21:13.179 --> 00:21:19.059 I think it's been extraordinary for me. It's been an extraordinary blessing that over the last year, 00:21:19.139 --> 00:21:26.240 I've been able to develop a relationship with a mentor who is an older African-American pastor in the 00:21:26.240 --> 00:21:32.199 Baltimore area. He has a lot more wisdom and experience than I do. But I have learned, 00:21:32.200 --> 00:21:39.700 we talk almost every week as often as we can. And not only have I come to deeply love and respect this 00:21:39.700 --> 00:21:47.600 man and to feel his love for me, but I've realized how much I simply don't know. I've realized how much 00:21:47.600 --> 00:21:55.299 I have to learn. And it's been profoundly humbling. But it's been life. It's been life. 00:21:55.299 --> 00:22:03.399 And you know, every so often, for the last several years, I'm a part of a multi-ethnic group of pastors 00:22:03.399 --> 00:22:08.859 who get together simply to have breakfast and to know one another better and to develop friendships. 00:22:09.720 --> 00:22:14.519 And it's only had pastors. And I can tell you at the last breakfast before this whole pandemic hit, 00:22:14.579 --> 00:22:19.639 we had easily over 50 pastors there, which means there are at least 50 churches in the DMV area 00:22:19.640 --> 00:22:27.520 that care deeply about racial reconciliation and healing. So there is hope and God is at work and 00:22:27.520 --> 00:22:34.800 beautiful things are happening. But my prayer, my prayer is that right now we would grieve 00:22:34.800 --> 00:22:39.180 and we would stand in solidarity with our African-American brothers and sisters, 00:22:39.740 --> 00:22:45.700 and we would cry out for justice, and we would groan together in the spirit that we would 00:22:45.700 --> 00:22:53.720 cultivate and hold on to a holy discontent because we are compelled by the cross, 00:22:54.840 --> 00:23:00.500 because we are compelled by what Jesus Christ has done for us. And we are so compelled that we would 00:23:00.500 --> 00:23:07.440 not rest until this world is made whole again, so that we would go out in the power of the Holy Spirit 00:23:07.440 --> 00:23:12.940 and embrace the ministry of reconciliation that I believe sits at the very heart of the gospel. 00:23:15.500 --> 00:23:16.120 Let's pray. 00:23:18.259 --> 00:23:21.480 Lord, we thank you and we simply pray for your wisdom. 00:23:23.400 --> 00:23:29.240 Even as I pray, I know there is so much more that needs to be said, so much more that needs to be said. 00:23:29.240 --> 00:23:33.480 And so I pray for your wisdom and I pray for you to be what we could never be. 00:23:34.120 --> 00:23:40.920 And I pray for you to do in our hearts what only you can do through your love and the power of the Holy Spirit. 00:23:41.339 --> 00:23:46.859 And we pray that you would be building this new family, that our churches would reflect the glory of the kingdom 00:23:46.859 --> 00:23:50.460 as we see it in Revelation, this great multi-ethnic family. 00:23:51.140 --> 00:23:56.279 And we pray that you would give us the endurance and the courage to have the hard conversations 00:23:56.279 --> 00:23:57.779 and do what needs to be done, Lord. 00:23:58.220 --> 00:24:01.480 We pray that you would give us the humility to keep going. 00:24:02.059 --> 00:24:04.559 And we pray this in your Son's holy name and for your glory. 00:24:04.980 --> 00:24:05.240 Amen.