Willpower - Sermon for the 9th Sunday after Pentecost

Willpower            Matthew 13:44-46
Ninth Sunday after Pentecost
July 30^th, A+D 2023
Our Savior’s and Our Redeemer Lutheran Churches
Hill City and Custer, South Dakota

Willpower. 

   I once had a member who taught me a lot about human will power.  Let’s call my friend Andy.  He was, and still is, a recovering alcoholic.  Andy was a great help to me, and he taught me a lot.  In particular, Andy the recovering alcoholic helped me to better understand addiction. 

   What do you think of addicts?  Of alcoholics, or those hooked on other drugs?  Would you say they have strong willpower? 

   For a very long time, I did not think so.  It seemed obvious to me.  People who become addicted to things pretty clearly lack the willpower to abstain.  I thought about addiction as a more extreme version of me not having the willpower to get out of bed some mornings, or my failures to discipline myself to use my time wisely.  But Andy corrected me.  He taught me that a person addicted to alcohol or other drugs actually has tremendous willpower, much more than most people. The problem is, unless and until they get help with their addiction, their willpower is all pointed in the wrong direction.  Their will is to use.  They regularly demonstrate a tremendous drive to get their substance. Their addiction intensely focuses their willpower on feeding it. 

   Andy taught me this surprising truth about addicts, and Diana confirmed it.  That’s also not her real name, and she also was a member I once served.  Diana struggled with addiction, while being an active member of the congregation.  At times, trying really hard, she would do pretty good for a while.  Many other times, Diana lost control.  And despite her expert efforts to cover it up, I usually knew right away if she was under the influence.  Because, whenever she was drinking, there was always the same smell.  It was a strange smell, and I never knew what it was, exactly, whether it was the alcohol she drank, or something else that she used to try to cover it up.  But I came to recognize when she was drinking by that smell. 

   One time, Diana was hospitalized, what for, I don’t remember, but almost certainly it was related to her addiction issues.  And in this time, I got a glimpse of her will power to get alcohol. 

   I didn’t find out for a day or two, but when I heard Diana was hospitalized, I went to see her.  And, when I stepped in the room, well, to borrow from Lynyrd Skynyrd, “oo-ooh, that smell.”  I don’t know how Diana managed it.  Nurses, CNAs and doctors were in and out of the room constantly.  They were very aware of her issues.  There wasn’t that much stuff in the room, nor a lot of obvious places to hide a bottle.  And yet, even though I couldn’t see it anywhere, I was sure Diana had managed to get her alcohol into her room.  I could smell it, and my olfactory assumptions were confirmed when I visited with her.  Her badly directed willpower had achieved its goal. 

   Why, you might ask, am I talking about the willpower of addicts?  To help us understand the willpower of Jesus. To help us understand the parables of the Treasure in the Field and the Pearl of Great Price.  Am I comparing Jesus to people suffering from addiction?  Well, yes, insofar as His single-minded commitment to saving us, while different because it is holy and good and life giving, does share some points of comparison with the willpower of addicts.  The drive to feed their habit that people suffering from addiction often display can help us understand, at least a little, the drive of Jesus to achieve our salvation.  For His willpower is intensely focused on having you for His very own, to live with Him in His Kingdom, in everlasting innocence, righteousness, and blessedness.  Whatever it takes.   

   The parables of the Treasure in the Field and the Pearl of Great Price are often taught as lessons of how we sinners should behave.  How a good Christian will give up everything and focus all their energy and efforts on acquiring the eternal and infinitely valuable Kingdom of Heaven.  And it is true that we should give up everything to gain access to God’s Kingdom.  God would be just to hold us to such a requirement.  But teaching this as the meaning of these parables is wicked.  And cruel.  Because we can’t do it.  It’s like telling an addict their only hope is to dig deep inside and simply quit desiring their substance.  Actually, teaching that these parables are about our obligation to give up everything to gain heaven is even worse than telling an addict to fix themselves by force of will.  For perhaps some addicts can dig deep inside and beat their habit.  I don’t know.  But no sinner can do what it takes to gain the Kingdom of Heaven.   

   Have you ever noticed how the Creeds don’t talk much about what we do?  The two ancient summaries of Christian teaching that we confess Sunday after Sunday, the Apostles’ and Nicene Creed, tell us about God’s work, of creating us and all things, and redeeming us from sin and death, and sanctifying us day by day until He comes to bring us into the new heavens and new earth. 

   In these two parables of the Treasure in the Field and the Pearl of Great Price, Jesus teaches the same thing, in two incredibly tight similes.  "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.  Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.”  

   Jesus is the man who discovered a treasure in a field, and sold all He had in order to buy that field.  Jesus is the merchant who sold all He had to buy that pearl of great price.  The field is the world, as is the pearl market.  And the treasure, well the treasure is you.  The treasure is the Church, the people of God rescued by Jesus.  You are God’s pearl, His treasure.  For you, Jesus gave up His rightful place at the Father’s right hand, entered the sordid field of this world, and gave His life to purchase you and all the other sinners from Satan, who held us in bondage due to our sins.  Whatever it takes.

    It is as we hear in Hebrews 12: where we look upon Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.   The joy that Jesus saw before Him was the chance to present you, along with His whole Church, to His Father, to present you forgiven and restored, to live with God in perfect peace and glory, forever. 

   Paul says the same thing another way in Philippians, chapter 2: Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, ⁶ who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, ⁷but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. ⁸ And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.  ⁹ Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, ¹⁰ that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, ¹¹ and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. 

     The mind of Jesus, all His willpower, is laser focused on doing whatever it takes to rescue you, to purchase and win you, forever.  His will to save was so strong that Jesus suffered all, without complaint.  He came to His own people, but they rejected Him.  He healed and taught and gave hope to the downtrodden, and for this He was said to have a demon.  He revealed Himself to be the Messiah, fulfilling all the prophecies of the promised Savior, and for this He was sentenced to death.   None of these obstacles weakened His resolve.  His will was steady and sure, all the way to the Cross, and out of that borrowed tomb.  

   Jesus’ will to win salvation made Him seem out of His mind to His own family.  His will to suffer evil and not defend Himself with His Almighty power caused His closest friends to flee, abandoning Him to His fate.  None of this even began to deter Him.  His will was and is to save sinners.  To win His treasure.  To purchase His pearl.  To have you, for His very own.

    Today, Jesus continues to will your salvation, coming to you through His Word and in His Supper, to forgive, restore, renew and strengthen you day by day, until you are welcomed into His presence forever.       

    There’s one more thing we should cover.  We started out talking about addicts.  I am an addict.  You are all addicts.  Not necessarily in the normal sense of that word.  Christians do of course sometimes suffer from addictions.  But I’m talking about being addicts in a different sense.  In our sinful nature, we, like all descendants of Adam, are addicted to sin. 

    Think about it.  We know sinning is wrong, and hurtful.  Part of us wants to stop sinning, to flee from temptation.  And yet, we cannot free ourselves.  There is something within us that is attracted to sin, drawn to it, an urge we can neither avoid nor defeat.  That sounds a lot like an addiction.  Our sinful nature wills to sin.  Our flesh is intensely focused on doing precisely those things that our new nature knows are bad, and wants to avoid.  

    But in this conflict there is hope.  The Saint in you hates sin.  The new creature born by the power of the Holy Spirit, working through Water and the Word, the “new you” wills to walk in God’s way.  And so, Christian life on this earth is a struggle.  But the fact that you are caught in this struggle is good news.  For it shows that you have been purchased and given new birth by the Pearl Merchant, by the treasure finding, field buying Savior, Jesus Christ our Lord.  

    Jesus’ will is to proclaim Good News to sin addicts.  His will is to have you and me for His very own. And so we pray, Thy will be done, Amen!