Sermon from Aug. 4, 2024, by the Rev. Dr. Tara W. Bulger

Romans 8:14-18, 22-25

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father!” it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ—if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.

I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.

We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

This is the Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

I have done a lot of funerals as a minister, and in every funeral that I do, usually in the last prayer of the funeral service or at the graveside, I say --about the person who has died--that their baptism is now complete in death. The person who has died has completed their baptism in death. We believe that baptism starts something in the life of the believer. When we are baptized, many things happen. We are cleansed of sin, we are renewed, and we are given gifts of the Holy Spirit, but we also believe that just like Jesus was baptized, when we are baptized, we are entering into living our lives like Jesus. Just as Jesus lived this life and when he died, he rose to a new life, we, too, will live and die and rise to a new life. In baptism, we say that we are dead to sin and alive to all that is Christ, but that won't fully be complete until we die and we are raised to new life with Christ.

It's a bit morbid. In fact, in the first century, baptisms looked much like funerals. They would bring the people who were going to be baptized, and they would strip their clothes away. They would take them down into the water, fully submerse them,  and then pull them back up. This act reminded the baptized that they were dying to the old life of sin and were raised into a new life with Christ. When they came out of the water, the church would gather around them and clothe them in the new clothes of Christ.

Caesar Augustus, in that first century, had such a hard time with Christians because it's very hard to scare people who think they're already dead. They believed they were already dead in this life. So what did it matter what happened in this life? It was impossible to scare them. It's also very hard to scare people who know that God is with them and, for them, that they are indeed children of God.

So we have this hope, this hope in this life of Christ. We have hope for the life to come. And it is this hope that the apostle Paul is writing about to that church in Rome. At the time Paul is writing, Christians are being persecuted all over Rome. This will continue until about the fourth century. This is a time when the people, the Christian community, have broken away from their Jewish brothers and sisters, and Rome is persecuting them. And so there is fear for them. There is a sense of not recognizing the world around them. They are eagerly waiting for Jesus to come again.

Paul writes to them, and he tells them to have hope. He tells them to have hope for two reasons. One is to remember that they are children of God. Just as God blessed Jacob--who did everything wrong--God sees us even in our sins and promises to be with and bless us. There was nothing that the people in the first-century church could face where Jesus would not be there with them and for them. They are God's own. Paul wants them to know that Jesus will not be with them, bringing good even out of the darkness. They are beloved children of God, and the Father never forgets them.

The second thing that Paul wants to tell the church is something that we, in polite society, don't talk about a lot, but it's the promise that there will be resurrection after death. There will be new life. It's not an if or a maybe in holy scripture. God promises that we will be raised to new life with Christ even when we die. The church is to take heart because no matter what difficulty we are promised that in the end, Jesus can redeem it all. And make no mistake, there is difficulty in suffering in life, isn't there? That's a part of the life of Christ too. Even our Lord and Savior did not get out of suffering, and we know that there is suffering in this world. They experienced it in the first century and we experience it now when we find ourselves in grief, when we are in that place where everything seems dark and we can't think of any way to get out of it, and that is precisely when we have hope. Because hope is the promise that the light of Christ will shine into the darkness in some way that you cannot conceive of, but that it will happen.

It's a promise of God. And so today, into our own suffering and difficulty, we take comfort. We take comfort that the presence of Jesus Christ is always with us. Did you know that even crying out in anger to God is a form of faithfulness over and over again, particularly in the Psalms? To cry out to God and say, "I am alone and I am angry with you, Lord," was a faithful response because you are still talking to God. We are promised that the Lord God always hears us, and we are promised that Jesus Christ is with us and for us--holding us even when we don't feel like we're being held. Think back to a time in your life where you thought all hope was lost. I imagine there was a ray of sunshine at some point in the form of a person or a circumstance. That was Jesus Christ reaching out to you in your darkness.

We also take hope in the idea that one day Jesus will redeem all of creation. It's the second coming of Christ. We don't talk about that a lot either, but the Apostle Paul writes that all creation is groaning for that time when Christ will come again and make the world what it should be. I thought about that a couple of weeks ago watching the news and seeing the death of Sonya Massey, and I just thought, "Lord, how long? How long must there be most this suffering?" And I took comfort in two things.

One is that when Sonya Massey was shot, I have no doubt that the first person to grieve and the first person to greet her in love was Jesus Christ. That's who our Lord and Savior is. And I take comfort that over the long arc of history, the Lord God works through us for justice. You give me hope. You are living out your calling to be loving Christians. You are living out your calling to forgive others. You give me hope. And so we have hope not only that Christ is with us now, but that Christ works good and that Christ will redeem it all in our deaths, but also one day far into the future when Christ comes again. That's what hope is. You are to hold your face to the light of Christ even though you cannot see and be warmed by hope. Even more than that, I will tell you that as Christians, we are people of hope and you are to offer that hope to those who are struggling, to just be present with them, to hear them cry out to God and assure them that even though they may not believe--you believe for them, in the goodness of God who cares for them.

That's what the Christian community does, and it's who we are. And so all those doctrines we've talked have their culmination in this, that Jesus Christ is with us and for us, and that there is no darkness into which the light of Christ cannot shine. Thanks be to God for that. Amen.