Romans 1:16-17, 3:22-28

We’ve all heard of people who go through life basically trying to convince others (and sometimes themselves) that they are something they’re not… I read this week about a man by name of John Corcoran from Texas who kept a deep secret for most of his life from pretty near everyone he knew... 

You see, during grade school John Corcoran never learned to read or write, but because he caused a lot of trouble he somehow kept getting promoted to the next grade. When he got to high school he mastered some new skills – but reading was not one of them. He says, “I started cheating by turning in other peoples' papers; [I] dated the valedictorian and ran around with college prep kids. I couldn't read words but I could read the system and I could read people.” And he not only got by, he thrived. 

He received an athletic scholarship to Texas Western College and cheated his way through there as well, getting a degree in education, of all things. Somehow he got a job as a teacher and for the next 17 years taught in high school without being able to read or write. He says, “…I created an oral and visual environment. There wasn't the written word in there. I always had two or three teacher's assistants in each class to do board work or read the bulletin.” 

Eventually he left teaching and became a real estate developer. Later in life he finally learned to read and write and became an advocate for better educational systems. 

One of those stories that make you wonder – “How could that happen in today’s world?”

But you know, in a sense, we’re all like John Corcoran. Most of us don't have to fake reading and writing, but we live our lives trying to persuade ourselves, persuade other people, and persuade God himself that we are good people. Deep down inside, though, in those quiet times, in those honest times, we have a growing awareness it’s not all true.[1]

A few months ago I had occasion to notice a Christian brother for whom who I had (and have) great respect (not from this community, by the way) engaging in some behavior that was kind of disappointing to me. It wasn’t anything outright awful, it was more of an attitude that I hadn’t seen before in him, and it really bothered me. Without going into any unnecessary details, I’ll tell you that I had a hard time forgetting about this… 

And then the other day (Friday, in fact) again, without getting into any unnecessary details about this (for reasons that will soon become obvious!) I found some thoughts going through my mind that well, disappointed myself.  It was kind of “Man, where did that come from?” You know?  And my mind flashed back to this brother whose offense was pretty minor (and maybe all in my mind), and I suddenly had this realization – probably Holy Spirit driven – that I still haven’t come to grips with the scope of my own sinfulness.  I’m still trying to convince myself that “I’m basically a good guy.” 

And with one scale of measuring, maybe I am a ‘good guy’ – we can always find people who are ‘worse’ than ourselves, or as Jesus said, we can easily point out the splinters in someone else’s eyes, while ignoring the logs in our own. But righteousness is not graded on a curve. God does not compare us with other people. Righteousness is based on a continuum that starts and ends with God’s holiness. And as Paul wrote in Romans 3, “We have all sinned and we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.” The operative word there is, “all”. 

I think one of our Adult Sunday School classes has been reading the book by Mark Galli, Jesus Mean and Wild: The Unexpected Love of an Untamable God.  (What an intriguing title!) In that book the author writes about facing up to this truth about who we really are. 

“I look at myself some days and it's hard to imagine that I am a miserable offender and that there is no health in me [as the Book of Common Prayer suggests]. I go to church. I read my Bible. I help at the homeless shelter once a month. At home, I do the dishes, take out the trash, and don't beat my children. I don't even ground them. Most nights, when I close my day with prayer (see there, regular prayer—another jewel in my crown), I usually have nothing but peccadilloes to confess—a little sloth here, some impatience there. 

For others the problem with repentance runs deeper. They have been raised in legalistic environments and carry around a guilt-laden backpack that would bend the knees of a Himalayan Sherpa. And most of the guilt, they realize, is neurotic—not based on any real transgression, but the product of defective discipleship. Years of “Christian nurture” has contorted their souls. So after drinking a glass of wine or failing to say the rosary or breaking one of a thousand other man-made religious taboos, they cannot shake the pangs of miserable guilt. If this is what repentance conjures up, they are right to want nothing of it. 

Others still fight not false guilt but spiritual despair. They believe, rightly so, that true religion is about love and grace. But they've heard a rumor that the Lord is a holy God, and they suspect that they just may be miserable sinners. So they spend their days making sure these two combustible ideas never mix—something repentance tries to do—because if they ever did, such people fear that the resulting explosion would blow their faith to smithereens. 

Add to this the twentieth-century fascination with self-esteem and a society hooked on affirmation steroids, and it is no wonder that we have created a faith that can hardly pronounce the word [repentance].[2]

A Ben Wattenberg wrote another book with a great title over 20 years ago, a social commentary on the future of the United States. It was called, “The Good News Is the Bad News Is Wrong.”  He may have been right or wrong in his points there, I don’t know, I never read the book, I just like the title!  But I’ve heard people take that phrase and try to apply it to the Good News of the Scripture – the Good News that Paul wrote about in Romans 3.

And typically, the point of those comparisons lies in drawing a contrast between the “Good News” of Christ [as you may know, the word ‘Gospel’ simply means, ‘good news’] with ‘Bad News’ which is usually spelled out as being sin or something related to our brokenness. And I just don’t think that is a good comparison. I don’t think that the opposite of the “Good News” of God’s grace to us in Christ Jesus is the news about our sinfulness… 

For me, to realize that I’m a sinner, that I’m broken, that I do not reach the standard of God’s holiness – and never will – that’s not bad news, that is simply truth. It’s being honest. And unless I understand that, unless I embrace it, I’ll never be comfortable in my own skin, I will have no depth to my self-awareness, and I will have nothing meaningful to add to those conversations about the nature of evil and pain; and I’ll have no direction at all in dealing with the most basic of all my human issues: my separation from God. 

I would rather say that the Good News is that sin isn’t the last word for us! (Amen?) And make the Biblical affirmation that ‘bad news’ has become irrelevant in light of the Good News! Psalm 112 says, ¹Blessed are those who fear the Lord… ⁷They will have no fear of bad news; (because)
their hearts are steadfast, trusting in the Lord.” 

The truth is that we need help. I mean, think about the Lord’s Prayer. Jesus said, “When you pray, pray like this… say, ‘Our Father in heaven, may your name be holy’.  Our model prayer starts with holiness. 

May your kingdom come – your will be done on earth as in heaven.  A double petition asking in two different ways: “may we do what you want us to do.”

(The world would be a better place!)

Then… give us this day our daily bread (so here’s a petition asking for something very basic. Daily food.  If you’ve ever gone 24 hours fasting for spiritual or medical reasons (pretty much the only reasons we would ever do that in our culture of abundance), you know that we very quickly get hungry. We need our daily bread. That’s how we’re made. 

Did you ever notice – even though we’ve prayed this prayer about a zillion times – that the next petition is part of that same sentence? It’s connected with the word ‘and’. “Give us this day our daily bread…and… forgive us our trespasses.”  So, our deep need for forgiveness is hooked right together with our need for daily bread… for food. You think that’s an accident? 

I doubt it.  The truth is that we are sinners and we need help. We need forgiveness and God’s grace every day, just like we need to have our breakfast, lunch, and dinners. 

The Good News is that the help that we need is readily available. To everyone! We don’t have to live up to it, we don’t have to earn it, it is a gift to anyone who asks. And it is a costly gift, but the price has been paid for us by someone else. 

So Paul writes, “I am not ashamed of this Good News about Christ. It is the power of God at work, saving everyone who believes... ¹⁷ This Good News tells us how God makes us right in his sight. This is accomplished from start to finish by faith.” 

Paul is saying, ‘I’m not embarrassed by my faith in Christ!’ And neither should we be. We don’t run around pounding people on the heads with our big Bibles, but as we talked about a few weeks ago, we should be ready and able to give an answer to anyone who asks us the reason for the hope within us. It’s Good News! 

You may know that the General Conference of the UM Church ended a few weeks ago. One of the duties of General Conference is that they have the authority to change or adapt the ‘official’ liturgy of our church. And in fact, they made a change in the liturgy of baptism and church membership.  And I think this is a wonderful change. I look forward to begin using it here. 

The last vow that we ask parents of baptized infants, or people joining the church has been, “Will you support this church by your prayers, your presence, your gifts, and your service?”  We will soon be adding one word to that vow: Witness. Asking: “Will you support this church by your prayers, your presence, your witness, your gifts, and your service?” 

I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ…because it is the power of God at work saving everyone who believes. 

Graeme Keith, treasurer of the Billy Graham Association and Billy’s lifelong friend, related that he was on an elevator once with Billy when another man in the elevator recognized him. He said, “You’re Billy Graham, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” Billy said.

“Well,” the man said, “you are truly a great man.”

Billy immediately responded, “No, I’m not a great man. I just have a great message.”[3]

It is truly Good News: God’s power at work.