Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
10/1/10
Luke 17:1-10
Bror Erickson
[17:1] And he said to his disciples, "Temptations to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come! [2] It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin. [3] Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, [4] and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, 'I repent,' you must forgive him."
[5] The apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith!" [6] And the Lord said, "If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you.
[7] "Will any one of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, 'Come at once and sit down at table'? [8] Will he not rather say to him, 'Prepare supper for me, and dress properly, and serve me while I eat and drink, and afterward you will eat and drink'? [9] Does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded? [10] So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.' " Luke 17:1-10 (ESV)
“And the apostles said: “increase our faith.” This should be the prayer of every Christian, not just that of the Apostles. “Increase our faith” Let it grow. When faith grows, fear love and trust in God grows, love for our neighbor grows, contentment grows, and despair lessens. And of course it is by means of prayer, devotions, and most of all, steady church attendance that God waters the mustard seed of our faith that it would grow to be a tree.
And the apostles said increase our faith. The Greek connects this statement to what has just been said about temptations coming, causing little ones to sin, and forgiving your brother seven times a day. It seems a little disjointed here in the ESV, like three different discourses being recorded in staccato fashion. (I’m just going to make a disclaimer here if you will let me. I love reading the New Testament in Greek. I spend hours a week doing it. There are so many nuances to be found, and sometimes subtleties that are lost to an English translation, but that is the nature of translation. And that is what sermons are about in many ways, explaining the text. So it is necessary for me to study the Greek, and notice these, to bring them out in the sermon. It is the bane of knowing Greek to be at times frustrated with translations. Yet In the end these translations are perfectly fine in communicating the Gospel. They are good for use in home devotions, and study, and should not be distrusted because a nuance is lost.) These discourses seem disjointed, I was saying, But they are all connected, and what holds the preceding paragraph together with the following paragraph is the disciples praying for increase of faith.
Lord increase our faith, that is how the disciples respond to the admonitions about temptation and causing to sin, and forgiving your brother seven times. There is a hint of despair in their voices, because they know they are men, and what has been asked of them is a hard thing for men to do.
Jesus starts out talking about temptations to sin. Temptations to sin, the Greek here is scandalize. But it can’t be translated that way. In today’s world we would think of a scandal, some petty gossip about a movie star. No one is scandalized by these things in the sense of the Greek word scandal. This isn’t merely being offended, or aghast to hear the lurid details of someone’s affair the dirty details of which we watch the news for. The Greek word scandal means causing one to stumble, that is lose their faith, or to put an obstacle in the way of them coming to faith. Every time I read this I think of parents who don’t baptize their children or take them to church, confirmation comes to mind too. That is a particular sore spot with me. Jesus loves little children and wants them baptized, wants them brought up in the faith. Today, parents just don’t care most of the time. But those who teach that babies shouldn’t be baptized, well I wonder if there are enough millstones for that sea of fire. That is really the scandal, the temptation to sin, the offence that makes one lose faith, false doctrine. False doctrine, my biggest beef with it is it leads people away from Christ, drives them out of the church. It isn’t that there are not Christians who have heard and believe the gospel in these other church bodies. But the legalism drives to false belief, to despair and then finally to those things we think of as scandalous, other great shame and vice. Or perhaps it keeps them from hearing the gospel at all when it is particularly diabolical such as with the LDS or the Jehovah Witnesses, denying even the triune nature of God, that there are three persons who are one God, so that it can be said of each of the persons that they are God, and yet that there is only one God. Denying the Triune nature of God makes the gospel absolutely impossible. If it was not God who died on the cross for you, then no one died on the cross for you, and your sins are not forgiven. But perhaps the biggest scandal, the biggest stumbling block, bigger than all modern day heresies and yet the product of all of them is the failure to forgive. And this is why Jesus hones in here and tells the disciples to pay attention to themselves.
Failure to forgive. This is a scandal because the gospel is forgiveness, but if we can’t forgive others when we have been forgiven our sins in Jesus Christ? Well, how then does our life reflect the gospel of Christ, his love for us, his forgiveness of us. And if we can’t forgive others as he has forgiven us, especially when they ask for it, well then how can we expect them to know what Christ’s forgiveness is? But then that is just it. I mean this is why the disciples scream “increase our faith.” They know they don’t have it in them. Do you?
Forgiveness is not an easy thing. I struggle with it. Oh it can be easy at times, for little things. But then I can hold a grudge too. And we’ve watched that happen. We see where that gets people. Failure to forgive can lead to all sorts of shame and vice. In forgiving others we pay attention to ourselves, we take heed of ourselves. Hatred is any man’s down fall, and it is hatred that keeps us from forgiving. Forgiveness is what puts to death hatred. And so it is faith that we need increased so as to forgive, because faith lives in forgiveness and then can’t help but to forgive, as dutiful servants of the Lord, doing the Lord’s work as unworthy servants, that is forgiving others as we have been forgiven.
Faith lives on forgiveness and so it lives to forgive. It is impossible for us to have a proper fear love and trust in God without knowing His forgiveness in Jesus Christ. And we could go back to false doctrine here. False doctrine is always legalism, it always results in us having to do something. And on the outside it might not make a difference if you do something because you think you have to, or because you want to, the same thing is being done. But faith isn’t that way, faith does not have to do anything. Faith knows that Jesus Christ has died for your sins, and there is nothing you can do about that, and nothing you can do for that. Faith knows that Jesus Christ rose from the dead to give you life, and now you have it, because your sins have been forgiven. And that faith gives birth to love, and love forgives because that is what love does. But then in this world our faith is not always as strong as it could be. And so we pray with the disciples, Lord increase our faith that we may forgive as you have forgiven us.
Now the peace of God that surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord Amen.
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