RENEWAL BEGINS ON THE INSIDE

Colossians 3:1-11

Tenth Sunday after Pentecost

August 5, 2007

I guess I should be grateful to Hollywood—at least, to Disney—for keeping C. S. Lewis’ name in front of people. After all, more than a generation has passed since he had his membership transferred to the Church Triumphant. Hollywood’s production of the first of Lewis’ Narnia series, “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” as a block-buster film has brought Lewis “back to life” in our consciousness.

Lewis was a lecturer, an Oxford don, a theologian and a thoughtful Christian. His radio messages in the 1940’s and 1950’s were, perhaps, the Anglican equivalent of our Walter A. Maier on The Lutheran Hour. By way of commercial—if you’d like to know more about C. S. Lewis—the Adult Ministry Team is hosting a “movie night” the last Saturday of September, showing “Shadowlands”—a movie about C. S. Lewis. I bring him up today because something he wrote has remained with me for quite a number of years.

In talking about God’s action in sending Christ, Lewis said something to the point of “Jesus didn’t die to make us better; He died to make us new.” Think about that for a moment. So much of what is said in the name of Christianity seems to understand that we’re not so bad and only need to be better. Lewis throws all of that out and talks about our being made new. Paul speaks the same way as he writes to the Colossians. He talks about our being new in Christ.

But, what do we mean when we say, “new?”

We hear a great many things claim to be new. The laundry detergent my mother has always used claims to be new. I would suppose that for as many people as we could ask, we’d get different understandings of what “new” means. I remember a conversation I had years ago in Saint Louis. It was with a lady who was part of a team of those folks that go around your neighborhood—always dressed better than the neighborhood—sharing their unique view of God.

You have to understand the place of this conversation. She came to my door—I lived in the parsonage which was physically attached to the church. She knew what she was looking for. I don’t know, maybe she was going to get extra points if she made her point to a pastor. The conversation wandered over to Paul’s words in Second Corinthians, Chapter 5, and “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.” I asked her what she thought new meant.

She replied that, if you had a chair and you took it to be reupholstered, you would tell your friends it was new. I asked if that was what God really meant by new—simply a new look on the outside. As we read Paul today, I doubt that. Paul writes a wonderful Christological letter to the Colossians, telling us almost poetically who Jesus is. Along with this, Paul also tells us who we are—in Christ. The change isn’t simply on the outside. Renewal begins on the inside.

Who does the renewing? Who’s in charge of the verbs?

It would be easy to read these particular words from Paul and imagine that you and I are in charge of the verbs. Paul says things like “set your minds” and “seek.” What happens, though, when you and I are in charge of the verbs? Not much that’s good—much less “better.”

Think about your New Years’ resolutions. What about that diet you began with such good intentions? Or, that exercise program you were going to follow so faithfully? Then, remember those promises you’ve made to other people—and to God? How well have you done with the verbs? At best, we may have accomplished a change on the outside, but when it comes to changing the inside, we’d rather make excuses and rationalizations that we’re not really so bad as to need change.

That’s why God does the verbs. Renewal happens because God makes it happen. Paul is clear about that even in our verses today. Look how it begins: “If you have been raised with Christ….” When was the last time—other than Easter—you heard of someone who was dead, raising himself?” Maybe in operating rooms with equipment—so it wasn’t on their own power, but it doesn’t happen by your strength or mine. Only Jesus rose from the dead. So God works in us in Christ.

Last month, we talked about integrity and alignment. Left in our hands, integrity is only the alignment of what’s on our inside with what we show people on the outside, orbiting around our definitions. God works integrity differently. Integrity begins in His heart and changes your heart and mine and then, shows itself on the outside. He realigns us, too, so that all that we are orbits around His definitions and actions in Christ. We are aligned by and around His mercy in Christ.

God does the verbs in us in Christ, but Paul talks about His work being “hidden.” Hidden—so it’s on the inside—because the world has rejected His working. When Christ came with a call not simply to be “better” but new and offered that renewal in forgiveness rather than excuses, the world rejected Him. The world still rejects His death for sin and His resurrection, sealing forgiveness. They chose not to see—as they choose not to see what God is doing in us.

Just because it’s hidden from the world, doesn’t mean God isn’t at work—active in you, changing you on the inside. As the verbs are in God’s hands, so are you and I. He’s working in and with us so we can “put to death” that earthly stuff and stop walking in those things that bring God’s wrath. It is good news that you and I are in His hands.

Think about how your life goes, out there in the world. That world that rejects Jesus—rejects you—grinds against everything you are about. Paul says don’t lie and you know people who lie and never get caught. Paul warns against cheating and deceiving and you’ve seen those people get promoted. Paul has this catalog of terrible things and you and I see the people who live that way fill the pages of the Entertainment section of the newspaper. It can grind on you, living this hidden life—when the world is so public in its rejection.

That voice inside of you and me that still speaks in that “earthly” way teases us with the idea that we should “cave in” and live like the rest of the world. The struggle is hard against such teasing, such luring. If it were up to us to strive to be “better” on our own, we’d have brought it all to destruction long ago. That’s why it is such wonderful news that God does the verbs and holds you in His hands.

He’s given us a resource to draw on each day. Yes, of course, He’s given His Word. But He’s also given us His Word through other means. We think of Holy Communion as that weekly opportunity to be reconnected with Christ and His forgiveness and His victory over the world and sin. We Lutherans have another resource—Holy Baptism.

We could easily wonder about baptism as an on-going resource. After all, it just happens once. However, its fruits are given daily. Remember how you learned in Luther’s Small Catechism that daily the old self was drowned in the waters of baptism—dying with Christ—and daily we are raised with Christ out of that water to newness of life? Every morning when you shower or bathe—I don’t think I’m assuming too much for most of you—as the water hits your skin, remember that God is doing the verbs for you in Christ; that you are in Christ and the world cannot grind you down. You are new! Renewal begins on the inside by the grace of God in Christ.

Paul says, “Live new.” How can God’s grace specifically work in our congregation and living? I can address the second question first. Those who were present at the December voters meeting last year might remember after the discussion about the budget and elections that we approved a “forty-fifth anniversary campaign for spiritual and physical renewal.” That’s a great number of words to put in the bulletin or on the calendar, so your Executive Council studied things and shortened things to RENEW 2009. 2009 is simply the year we celebrate our 45^th anniversary as a congregation.

RENEW because it begins with God doing the verbs—making us new in Christ. It is His call to live the newness of life out as a congregation. Already the ministry teams are planning and dreaming what can be made new. Dreams of building renovation and plans to overhaul ministry programs are already forming. It will be amazing what renewal God will work in and with us.

You may be sitting there, thinking, “Yes, Pastor. Things need to be fixed. Someone needs to look into fixing the building. Someone needs to renew our ministry programs. But, it can’t be me. I’m tired from the struggle with living in the world. I’m too busy with everything going on in my life. I come to church to rest—I need to be filled up so I can go out into my job, my school, my neighborhood and do it all over again.” However, if RENEW doesn’t begin on the inside, it will simply be a reupholstering of Mount Olive and the lady who came to my door years ago will be proved right.

God works. Yes, we come here to rest, but not because we’re bruised by the battle to be better. We come to rest to be fed and prepared for the work God is doing. He connects with our hearts and changes us on the inside so that what’s on the outside shows His mercy and His work. Our prayer is something like the “Serenity” prayer—let there be renewal and let it begin with me. Renewal begins on the inside—God’s work in you. Renewal begins on the inside of Mount Olive—God’s working with you.

God is working here in and through Mount Olive, so when people drive by, they don’t say, “Now, there’s a pretty church.” It’s my prayer, that by God’s working with His Word and Spirit, that they’ll say, “Now, that church is on fire for God! I know that because I know some folks that worship there and they live their faith out loud!” We’ll not just look new on the outside, we—by God’s work in Christ—will be new on the outside.