Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Sometimes a headline represents far more about the world we live in than meets the eye.

Such was the case earlier this month on the Christian Post website, in an article titled “Episcopal Seminary to Set Aside $1.7 Million For Slavery Reparations”.

In the article, written by Michael Gryboski, we are told,

“An Episcopal seminary in Virginia has announced that its setting aside $1.7 million for an endowment fund aimed at paying reparations for slavery.

Virginia Theological Seminary, founded in 1823 and based in Alexandria, announced last Thursday that it was creating the fund largely in response to the institution having direct ties to slavery.

Money from the fund is expected to go to projects such as helping emerging congregations linked to the seminary, aiding African-American clergy, and helping to support work by historically African-American congregations.

The Rev. Joseph Thompson, director of the seminary’s Office of Multicultural Ministries, which will oversee the fund, said “...Though no amount of money could ever truly compensate for slavery, the commitment of these financial resources means that the institution’s attitude of repentance is being supported by actions of repentance...” [He goes on to say that] “It opens up a moment for us to reflect long and hard on what it will take for our society and institutions to redress slavery and its consequences with integrity and credibility.”

Gryboski, M. (2019, September 10).

Episcopal seminary to set aside $1.7 million for slavery reparations fund.

Retrieved September 12, 2019, from https://www.christianpost.com/news/episcopal-seminary-set-aside-17-million-slavery-reparations-fund.html

The notion of “reparations”, that is, that the (mostly white) descendents of slave-owners are morally obligated to pay money to the (mostly black) descendents of slaves—is an outgrowth of what has come to be known as “Critical Race Theory”—the notion that “racism is engrained in the fabric and system of the American society” (What is Critical Race Theory?

(2009, November 4).

Retrieved September 13, 2019, from https://spacrs.wordpress.com/what-is-critical-race-theory/).

Insofar as the subject of racism goes, Critical Race Theory inverts the cornerstone of Western justice: “Innocent until proven guilty”.

Instead of your accuser having to prove you are a racist, the burden of proof shifts to you to prove you are not a racist!

And this is at the heart of the Rev. Thompson’s comments in the article—that even though “no amount of money could ever truly compensate for slavery”, this is an attempt to demonstrate that they are not a racist institution, and that setting this money aside will help to “redress slavery and its consequences with integrity and credibility”.

Now, there are massive world-view implications coming from this story, but the one that I want us to consider this morning is that

We live in a world of incurable divisiveness.

Consider the divisiveness that this kind of worldview creates—under Critical Race Theory, everyone is either a perpetrator of racism or a victim of racism.

But that “institutionalized guilt” is not just characteristic of race relations in our country, is it?

We see it in the socio-economic realm as well, don’t we? Remember the “99 percent” rallies from a few years ago?

The “evil one percent” of top wage earners are automatically guilty of everything bad that happens to the other 99 percent.

The same thing goes for the so-called “Me Too” movement, doesn’t it?

To be accused of sexual misconduct is to be guilty of misconduct.

And the second thing to notice about this state of affairs is that there is no cure for that divisiveness— “No amount of money can ever truly compensate for slavery”.

The only way a perpetrator can be absolved is if they do enough to satisfy the victim’s demands.

But it is never enough, is it?

No amount of reparations, no amount of donations to alleviate poverty, no attempts to prove innocence will ever suffice.

Your estrangement from those who call you a perpetrator can never be overcome.

(And that means your status as a “victim” can never be overcome, either!)

How do we respond to this incurable divisiveness in our world?

How do we speak as Christians to the constant accusations, the bitterness and envy and striving that characterizes our every day lives?

Should we follow in the footsteps of some of the most powerful and influential evangelical denominations in America and affirm the fundamental truth of an incurable divisiveness regarding race, that Critical Race Theory should be an “analytical [tool] subordinate to Scripture” (Southern Baptist Convention > On Critical Race Theory And Intersectionality.

(2019).

Retrieved September 13, 2019, from http://www.sbc.net/resolutions/2308/resolution-9--on-critical-race-theory-and-intersectionality)

Should we go about our attempts to preach reconciliation from the position of repentant perpetrators, always trying to prove that we are not guilty by our “actions of repentance”?

Or is there another way?

This brings us back to the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Galatians.

Remember, he is writing to the Christians in the churches of Galatia who were being told that they were inferior because they were Gentile—there was an incurable divisiveness between Jew and Greek, wasn’t there?

They had to become Jews before they could be good enough to be Christians—and even then, they had to continually prove their worth in order to continue to be acceptable to the Jewish Christians!

But Paul meets that incurable divisiveness head-on in this passage.

And what he goes on to demonstrate in this passage is at the very heart of the Gospel message that we must proclaim to this world:

Nothing that separates us in this world is as powerful as what unites us in Christ.

Paul summarizes his argument against the incurable divisiveness that trapped the Galatians in verse 26:

In the verses that follow Paul will unpack the meaning of that declaration, that we are “sons of God through faith”.

And if we are to be the kind of witness that God calls us to be against the incurable divisiveness of this world, we must plant our flag on Galatians 3:26—that it is what unites us—faith in Jesus Christ—and not the incurable divisiveness of this world—that defines us.

There are two fundamental arguments that Paul follows here.

The first is that we are

I.

United with one another through baptism into Christ (Gal.

3:27-29)

Look at verses 27-29:

Paul says that everyone who has been baptized into Christ has put on Christ.

When we examine what else Paul says about baptism in the New Testament, we find that he uses it as a sign that we have died to sin.

In other words, when you are baptized as a Christian, you are making a statement that you have identified with Jesus Christ in His death.

You are making the statement that you are a sinner who deserves death under the wrath of God, and your only hope of salvation comes as you put your faith in the death of Jesus Christ to die in your place.

And surely Paul’s point here is that

Everyone who has been baptized has been freed from their guilt.

And that means that no Christian has the right to claim to be any better than any other Christian.

There’s an old saying that “the ground is level at the foot of the Cross”.

All sin deserves damnation, and all of us have sinned.

The truth is that everybody sins—white people sin against black people, and black people sin against white people.

Rich people sin against poor people, and poor people sin against rich people.

Men sin against women and women sin against men.

And Jesus died to deliver all of them from all of their sins.

He died to deliver racists from the detestable sin of racial vainglory—both black and white, Jew and Greek.

He died to deliver rich people from their sins of greed and avarice and selfishness, and He died to deliver people from grasping envy and hatred and covetousness.

He died to deliver sexual predators from the heinous sin of molestation and mistreatment, and He died to deliver people from sins of false accusations and slander.

And so when anybody comes to Christ at all, they come as sinners who were damned to Hell by their sin except for the grace of God calling them to repentance and faith in Jesus.

And that means that

Everyone who has been baptized has put on Christ.

That means, as Paul goes on to say in verse 28, that the old incurable divisiveness no longer matters!

There is no more racial divide between Jew and Greek—you have both put on Christ!

There is no more animosity between slave or free (rich or poor)—you have both put on Christ!

There is no more suspicion or malice between male and female—you have both put on Christ!

When you come to Jesus Christ as a child of God through faith, you are united with each other through your baptism into Christ.

Nothing that separates us in this world is as powerful as what unites us in Christ.

We are united with one another through baptism into Christ, and in the first seven verses of Chapter 4 Paul goes on to demonstrate that we are

II.

United with God through adoption into Christ (4:1-7)

In verses 1-2 Paul illustrates his point with a reference to the way a son receives an inheritance from his father.

Paul makes the point that, before the son reaches his majority, he is no different from the slaves in the household.

He is not free to take advantage of his inheritance, but has to abide by the “trust fund manager” instead.

Imagine a kid coming up to his guardian: “Hey, Jeeves!

Can I have a thousand dollars to buy the new iPhone?”

“Sorry, Master Billy, but your father has stipulated that you cannot receive more than fifty dollars a week.

And may I remind you that that sum is only payable if you maintain a B plus average in your algebra class this semester?”

Billy is going to walk away grumbling about his “slave-master” of a father, isn’t he?

He does not see the inheritance—all he sees is the Law that hangs over him.

Paul uses that example to demonstrate the difference between seeing God as a slave-master and seeing Him as a father.

Verses 3-5:

Apart from Jesus Christ, all you see about God is that He demands that you be perfect.

The elementary principles of this world—the incurable divisiveness of your sin against Him drives you with the lash of guilt and shame.

You try everything to feel better about yourself, to explain away your sin, to fight against God’s standard of perfection by pointing to all your good deeds: “I am a good person!

Look at everything I’m doing—how can God say I’m guilty??!?!”

You don’t want to have anything to do with God, because you cannot escape the certainty that you cannot meet His standard.

Think of it this way: A couple of weeks ago I spent a day on the road for Penn State, distributing flyers for an upcoming open house on campus.

I started in St. Marys, then drove through Ridgway to Brockway, then down 36 to Brookville, and on into Punxsy.

It was a beautiful day for a drive, and I enjoyed all but the last thirty miles or so of it—because right as I passed Wendy’s a state cop pulled out of Clark Street right behind me and followed me the whole way through Big Run and Sykesville, up to Brady Street Car Wash!

Now, what happens when you are driving and you have a cop following you?

All of a sudden you get real careful about everything you do, right?