Luke 24: 13-35
SCRIPTURE:
1 Peter 1:17-25 [MSG]
You call out to God for help and he helps—he’s a good Father that way. But don’t forget, he’s also a responsible Father, and won’t let you get by with sloppy living.
Your life is a journey you must travel with a deep consciousness of God. It cost God plenty to get you out of that dead-end, empty-headed life you grew up in. He paid with Christ’s sacred blood, you know. He died like an unblemished, sacrificial lamb. And this was no afterthought. Even though it has only lately—at the end of the ages—become public knowledge, God always knew he was going to do this for you. It’s because of this sacrificed Messiah, whom God then raised from the dead and glorified, that you trust God, that you know you have a future in God.
Now that you’ve cleaned up your lives by following the truth, love one another as if your lives depended on it. Your new life is not like your old life. Your old birth came from mortal sperm; your new birth comes from God’s living Word. Just think: a life conceived by God himself! That’s why the prophet said,
The old life is a grass life,
its beauty as short-lived as wildflowers;
Grass dries up, flowers wilt,
God’s Word goes on and on forever.
This is the Word that conceived the new life in you.
INTRODUCTION:
It is two weeks into Easter, this being the third Sunday of Easter, so I hope our chocolate obsessions have been satisfied and that glucose levels are returning to normal. I’m not convinced your dietitian would approve of the efficacy of fasting forty days in the form of giving something up for Lent, only to open the floodgates of permission on Easter morning. Moving on, there is an expression, “who’s your daddy,” which is a slang phrase that originated in the United States in the early-to-mid 20th century and gained significant pop-culture traction through various media over the decades.
Who's Your Daddy?! is also an online multiplayer parody simulation video game created by Joseph Williams under the name Evil Tortilla Games, which says a lot right there. The idea being that one player controls the father, who must prevent household accidents, while the other controls the baby, who attempts to endanger itself in various ways. The father can secure cabinets, hide dangerous items, and block access to hazards, while the baby may ingest bleach, crawl into ovens, or insert objects into electrical outlets. Sounds like real life, doesn’t it?
Well, the obvious feminist jab at incompetent male parenting aside, if the baby survives, then who they had as a parent, protecting them, nurturing them, teaching them and guiding them, and yes, being a role model for them, is all important because all that will be reflected in who the child becomes. Others will see the parent in the child, which is the essence the author of 1 Peter is making in the letter we will read from this morning. We’re going to ask if the people around you can tell, “Who’s your Daddy?!”
SERMON: “Who’s Your Daddy?!”
Some of you here have met my Mom. I think you’d say she was a sweet, intelligent lady with a sharp and sophisticated sense of humour that was kept under tight control, which is why most of you must think I am like my Dad. And as much as I claim to have a majority of my mother’s genes, Rolanda would attest I’m more like my Dad than I care to admit. It is impossible to become other than what we are, yet it is often the case that we are not what it is possible to become.
In our Epistle reading today, the author of 1 Peter explores this idea in relation to Jewish Christians spread throughout the Roman province of Asia. Quoting the prophet Isaiah (40:6-8), he says their “old life is a grass life, its beauty as short-lived as wildflowers; Grass dries up, flowers wilt” (1 Pet 1:24) and calls it “that dead-end, empty-headed life you grew up in” (18). What he is referring to is a theme Jesus was fond of and spoke often of. Particularly in a conversation with the Pharisees in the Temple, they challenged his authority to teach. In reply, Jesus told them his Father bore witness to what he was teaching, and so it was true.
He went on saying that “if you knew me, you would at the same time know the Father” and “you’re tied down to the mundane; I’m in touch with what is beyond your horizons. You live in terms of what you see and touch. I’m living on other terms. I told you that you were missing God in all this. You’re at a dead end. If you won’t believe I am who I say I am, you’re at the dead end of sins. You’re missing God in your lives” (John 8:19b, 23-24).
The author is speaking to his readers about the same distinction Jesus was making. Unless everything in their lives looks to God the Father, as his did, they are and have nothing. They are just withered grass and wilted flowers. But that is their old life. As he says, “Your new life is not like your old life” (1:23). But what does he mean when he speaks of old and new life? What’s the difference?
In answer, he says, “Your old birth came from mortal sperm; your new birth comes from God’s living Word. Just think: a life conceived by God himself” (ibid). This is the same theme Jesus spoke to Nicodemus about: that he had to be born again. Unfortunately, it’s just as metaphysically mysterious here in 1 Peter as it was for Nicodemus in the Gospel of John (John 3:1–21).
When we accept Jesus into our lives, we don’t, as far as we can tell, physically change. And yet, all the rhetoric of the New Testament would tell us otherwise. “Anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new. The old life is gone; a new life emerges!”(2 Cor 5:17) says Paul to the Corinthians. So what is the essence of this new life? How does it come about?
Well, you may recall that the author of 1 Peter begins this passage speaking of God as our Father as the lead-in to what he is saying about this old and new life, and that’s not a coincidence. He dives right in, declaring the lengths God went to accomplish this miracle of giving us a new life. This past Easter, we remembered what that was: Jesus crucified and buried, his shed blood the means to clean up our lives. This was no afterthought. The author of 1 Peter may be recalling Jesus’ words recorded in John 3:16: “This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son.”
He wants us to be absolutely certain and entirely convinced of the immeasurable extent of God's love for us. Which makes his opening words in this passage, “You call out to God for help, and he helps—he’s a good Father that way,” almost facetious considering the lengths God went to to accomplish becoming your Father. This is important to keep in the front of your mind because it contrasts with the relatively insignificant cost of your first birth, as the author puts it, “from mortal sperm.” This world from which we are conceived invested nothing in our future. It is the old life of dried-up grass and wilted flowers.
In contrast, he declares, “It’s because of this sacrificed Messiah, whom God then raised from the dead and glorified, that you trust God, that you know you have a future in God.” So God your Father, who expended so much to make you his child, isn’t going to just leave you to fend for yourself as the world and your old life do. He’s a responsible Father. He’s not going to let you live a sloppy life. You have a life conceived by God himself.
Let me bring you back to where we started. It is impossible to become other than what we are, yet it is often the case that we are not what it is possible to become. If we are no more than children of this world with human fathers and mothers, born from mortal sperm and destined to die and return from whence we came, then this is what we will be. Nothing more. Short-lived as wildflowers, grass that dries up, and flowers that wilt. It is impossible for us to become more than what we are.
Yet, if God’s Word conceived the new life in you, then it is possible to become more than what we were. The question is, are we what it is possible to become? Even I need to pause and think about that for a moment. Because of Jesus Christ, you have been invited to become children of God. Reborn into a new life, cleaned up by following the truth. And because of this, you should “love one another as if your lives depended on it.” And I would suggest because they do.
So the question Who’s your Daddy? takes on a deeper meaning. When people speak with you, see what choices you make, experience how you face crisis and success, whose child do they think you are? Does what you say, do, and how you live show them just another person on this planet, living day to day, a nice enough person, like the rest, but nothing extraordinary. In fact, you’re expected to dry up and wither away just like everyone and everything else in this mortal world. Your God paid a huge price for that not to be the case.
Jesus didn’t die so you could be ordinary. Just another piece of flotsam or jetsam in the sea of humanity. The going rate for your body, mind, and soul is the life and blood of God’s one and only begotten Son, Jesus. That’s why he “won’t let you get by with sloppy living.”
Sloppy living doesn’t specifically say much, but the author of 1 Peter explains. “Your life is a journey you must travel with a deep consciousness of God. … that you trust God, that you know you have a future in God.” and “Now that you’ve cleaned up your lives by following the truth, love one another as if your lives depended on it. Your new life is not like your old life.” So this is what is expected of you if you identify as one of God’s children. But he’s not going to leave it up to you to do this.
The price God paid to make you his child is far too dear to leave things to chance and certainly not to your own wisdom, insight, will, and abilities. When it says “he’s a responsible Father,” it means not just for your welfare but also the fulfillment of everything he intended for you and responsible to his only begotten Son, to himself, for the vast price paid for your redemption. Certainly not one recourse or avenue will be left unprobed to ensure you accomplish what His Word has begun in you. His Word will not return to him empty, but will fulfill all he has intended it to do in your life and in the world (Is 55:11).
And that’s the bad news that 1 Peter’s writer is conveying to his readers, like us. You’ve accepted the Holy Spirit’s invitation to become children of God, to accept God as your Father through the loving sacrifice of his Son, Jesus, so that you could be made truly alive, a life conceived by God himself. However, he is a responsible Father. You are not your own; you have been bought with a price (1 Cor 6:20). God will seal you with His Spirit (Eph 1:13) which means from that day forward you are living a new life, whether you feel it or not, and you will be identified as children of God, no longer children of the world, of mortal sperm.
And what this means for us is that everything that occurs in our lives is ordered and governed by God to make us like him. It may be challenging, beyond our means to bear. It may be difficult, beyond our ability to persevere. But it is not outside the all-encompassing loving arms of our Father. “You call out to God for help, and he helps—he’s a good Father that way” (1 Peter 1:17). Do not despair of the difficulties of life; they are God’s love making you a new and glorious creation. Rejoice in the blessings of life, embrace them with your whole being; they are God’s love showing you his new and glorious creation in you. Love one another as if your life depended on it, because as children of God, it does.
So, show me, Who’s your Daddy!?
Amen
