“Be Imitators of God”
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text is today’s Epistle Reading from fourth and fifth chapters of
Ephesians, which we consider under the theme “Be Imitators of God.” A newsmagazine recently published a bizarre photo of a large mob of
thousands of Middle Eastern men, each viciously attacking himself with a long
machete. Blood was shown pouring out from serious looking wounds they had
each made on themselves. It turns out this is a supposed sacred rite,
regularly followed by these men’s religion. It may surprise you to learn that Martin Luther at one time did much
the very same thing. Before the Reformation, when he was still a monk,
Luther would often whip himself severely, to punish himself for his sins.
When we visited Germany last summer, Terry and I saw the small cell where Luther
lived as a monk in the monastery at Erfurt. More than once he was found in
this cell passed out from loss of blood, several times whipping himself almost
to death. Why would those Middle Eastern men attack themselves with machetes?
Why would Martin Luther whip himself so savagely? And, especially, why
would they do this in the name of religion? The answer is found in our
text: “Be imitators of God, therefore.” Those Middle Eastern men are simply imitating their false god.
For they believe that God is angry with the world, and angry at them. They
believe that God is full of hate, and so they are full of hate too, even toward
themselves. That also explains the mindset behind the suicide attacks that
we hear about in that part of the world. They are actually imitating what
they think God is like. But, what about Martin Luther, a Christian monk, and the founder of our
Lutheran faith? At that time, he too was imitating what he thought God was
like. For, in the Dark Ages, the Christian God was often falsely portrayed
as being angry at the world, full of hate for humankind. Perhaps this misunderstanding comes from the many places in Scripture
where it says we are to “fear” God, as the Psalm with which we began today’s
service: “As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion
on those who fear him.” But, that does not mean “fear” in the sense of
being frightened, afraid, fearful of punishment. The “fear of the Lord” is
rather “fear” in the sense of reverence, respect, honor. The word “revere”
is actually derived from “fear” in this sense. Luther says that as a monk he WAS afraid of God. He says he did
not love God, he hated God, because he thought God hated him. And, so,
Luther imitated a God he thought was full of wrath and punishment by punishing
himself. “Be imitators of God, therefore.” But, Paul goes on: “AS DEARLY
LOVED CHILDREN”! Martin Luther was wrong; that Middle Eastern religion is
wrong; ALL other false religions of the world, which all proclaim that God is
angry and full of hate toward humankind, are ALL WRONG. God’s attitude
toward the world is not hate, but love; not anger, but forgiveness. God’s
attitude toward YOU is not hate, but love; not anger, but forgiveness. “As
dearly loved children.” It is true that we are all like the wayward son in the Parable of the
Prodigal Son, who went astray from his father’s ways. But, the Good News
is, like the father in the parable, your heavenly Father welcomes you back with
open, loving, forgiving arms, welcomes you back into his family, as his dearly
loved child. You remember in the Parable of the Prodigal Son how at the end the
eldest son grumbled and complained when the wandering son was welcomed home?
Unlike the parable, it was actually the eldest Son of God’s family who himself
earned you the right to be welcomed back into the family of God. “For my
Father’s will,” Jesus says, “is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes
in him shall have eternal life.” “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us,” John says, “that
we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” That is
what YOU are, through faith in Christ, God’s own dearly loved child. In the closing days of World War II, United States Army Lieutenant
Peter Sichel, an intelligence officer, received special permission to travel
with the forward army units advancing on the German city of Mainz. For,
although Lt. Sichel was now an American citizen and a U.S. Army officer, Germany
was his native land, and Mainz his hometown. A decade earlier, his family
fled the Nazi menace and settled in the United States, forced to abandon their
centuries-old, world-famous vineyards and winery at Mainz. Fearful of the fate of a quarter-million bottles of wine and champagne
as the German retreated and the victors celebrated, Lt. Sichel arranged to place
the property under the protection of the Allied Military Government until it
could be returned to his family, the rightful owners. As one of the first
Americans to enter the conquered city, he found the family business intact, and
still bearing the sign “Sichel and Sons.” The Nazis who confiscated it
kept using this famous family name. When a watchman at the gate, who was not aware of the Allied capture of
the city, refused to let him in, Lt. Sichel pointed up to the sign and said, “It
says ‘Sichel and Sons,’ doesn’t it? Well, I am a son! Now open the
gate and let me in.” Paul says in Galatians, “You are all sons of God through faith in
Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed
yourselves with Christ.” In Holy Baptism you were born again as a child of God.
You were adopted into God’s family. At the gate of heaven you will be
granted admission because you are a son or daughter of your heavenly Father.
As Paul says in Romans, “We are God’s children. And since we are children, then
we are also heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ.” God’s Son earned you eternal life, he earned you the right to be
welcomed back into the family of God, by suffering himself, in your place, all
the punishment your sins deserved. Paul puts it this way in our text:
“Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as an offering and sacrifice to God
with a fragrant and pleasing aroma.” In ancient times incense was often
used in worship, and so a sacrifice with “a fragrant and pleasing aroma” means
one that is accepted and favorably received by God. Christ’s sacrifice was
accepted as payment in full for all your sins. As Hebrews says, “He
appeared . . . to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself.”
“Therefore,” Paul says in Romans, “since we have been justified through
faith”—made right with God through faith in Christ—“we have peace with God
through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The saddest thing about the punishment which those Middle Eastern men
and Martin Luther inflicted on themselves is that it’s both completely
meaningless and totally unnecessary. There is no punishment left to suffer for
your sins because “Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as an offering and
sacrifice to God”; he has “[done] away with sin by the sacrifice of himself.” The Reformation began when Luther, through studying the Scriptures,
finally understood this Good News, finally understood that “we have peace with
God through our Lord Jesus Christ,” finally understood that our God is not angry
but a loving heavenly Father. Luther writes, “[When I grasped that]
through grace and sheer mercy God justifies us through faith . . . I felt
myself to be reborn and to have gone through open doors into paradise. . .
[in God’s] fatherly, friendly heart . . . there is no anger. . . He who
sees God as angry does not see him rightly . . .” “Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children.”
You’ve probably seen how little children love to imitate their parents.
That’s not something they’re told to do or instructed to do, it’s just something
that comes naturally. That is really a wonderful illustration, which Paul
uses in our text, of your motivation for living a Christian life. In your
everyday life, you WANT to imitate your heavenly Father, not because you’re
ordered to or obliged to, but it’s a desire that comes naturally, because you
are born again as a dearly loved child of God. In our text, Paul tells us the #1 way that you will imitate your
heavenly Father in your own life: “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger,
brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and
compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God
forgave you.” As a born again child of God, live out your daily life
imitating your heavenly Father, especially following him in the way of peace and
forgiveness. Children not only imitate their parents, they also like to imitate
their older brothers and sisters. And Paul tells us that as a child of
God, you will also imitate the eldest Son in God’s family: “and live a life of
love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as an offering and
sacrifice to God.” Just as Christ sacrificed himself for you, like a child
imitating a big brother, you will imitate Christ in your life, most of all by
sacrificing yourself for others. Paul puts it this way in Philippians: “Do
nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others
better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own
interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be
the same as that of Christ Jesus.” “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along
with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another,
forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. Be imitators of
God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ
loved us and gave himself up for us as an offering and sacrifice to God.” Return to Top | Return to Sermons | Home | Email Church Office
|