Actually I’m not talking about taxes at all. Just dying. And more specifically, dying for others.
John 4:5-42; Romans 5:1-11; Psalm 95; Exodus 17:1-7
For whom would you die? Really think about it. Out of all the people you know, for which of them would you give up your life. I’d imagine the list is fairly short, likely involving family or extremely close friends. I can bet that, if we were to die for someone, that person would have a deep connection to us; they’d be someone who we expected would do the same for us.
We see this played out all the time, both in fiction and in life. Soldiers often give their lives in defense of their comrades. In Star Wars Obi-wan Kenobi gives his life to buy Luke the chance to escape. Spock in The Wrath of Khan died to save the Enterprise and his friends. (Can you tell I kind of like science fiction?) But what you don’t often hear or see in fiction is a person who will sacrifice themselves for the sake of their enemies. It’s rare, for example, for a soldier to put themselves in harm’s way for the sake of the people who were very recently trying to kill him/her.
Now, even given those situations, the “average” person will not often put themselves in danger for someone else. This is what Paul is getting at in Romans 5. Every once in a long time, someone might give up their life to for a “good person”. But even then, he realizes how rarely this happens. Humans just plain don’t often sacrifice themselves for others. In a way, we’re not wired that way, due to the influence of sin in our lives. It’s in our nature, as the writer of judges puts it, for “everyone [to do] as he [sees] fit.” To quote a much more irreverent source, humanity’s motto seems to be, “I do what I want!”
And when it really comes down to it, what WE want is rather self-serving. We want toys; we want money; we want nice houses; we want clothes; we want bacon. Oftentimes even the things we do to help other is self serving. We give money to things to make ourselves feel good, or to get the tax breaks that come with charitable donations.
When you really get into it, humanity isn’t worth dying for. As I’m so fond of saying, we are horrible, miserable sinners who just care about ourselves. Which makes Jesus’ death for us all the more amazing, because when we wanted nothing to do with God, He gave everything up for us. Jesus set aside everything that he had as the Son, in order to be born, live, and die as a human. All because he loved us — even when we wanted absolutely nothing to do with God.
Can you really fathom that? Jesus died for the Roman soldiers who nailed him to the cross. He died for the Roman governor who sentenced him. He died for the Jewish leaders who plotted to kill him. He died for Judas, even though Judas betrayed Him. He died for Peter, even thought Peter denied Him. He died for the thieves crucified next to Him, even though one mocked him. And He died for us, even when we never knew Him.
That is the love that God has for us. That is how much God wants us to be in relationship with Him. So much that it was worth the pain of crucifixion so that all of our sin is taken away. But it doesn’t stop there. Paul writes “Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!”
Let me say this another way. Because of Jesus’ death, instead of being God’s enemies, he calls us friends. Jesus’ death took away the power of sin to keep us from God. The question then is, if God does so much for us when we didn’t want anything to do with Him, how much more will he do for his friends?
So what does this mean for us? Paul gives us the answer here as well, “Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.” The only way to respond is to praise this God who gave himself for us — not because we deserved it, but precisely because we didn’t. That’s the major reason why we gather together on Sunday mornings, to celebrate everything that God has done for us — and most especially the forgiveness that we have in Christ.
It’s that desire to give thanks to God, even though we can never praise him enough, which leads Paul to spontaneously get excited when he writes his letters. It’s that same desire to praise that led Jesus’ disciples to go out to all the world and preach and teach about him. And it’s what brings us here today to celebrate what God has done.