Scripture: Philippians 3:17-21; John 3:30; Exodus 32; Matthew 4:4 Series: 2022
A Lenten sermon in a series on ‘The Rescue’ (using the 2018 Thai cave documentary). Preaching from Philippians 3:17-21, the pastor argues that to be saved we must first admit we cannot save ourselves; like the trapped boys who had to be anesthetized, the solution cannot come from inside the cave of sin. Using a live interview with a retired NYPD rescue diver, Pelagius and works-righteousness, the golden calf, and Barth, he insists salvation rests solely on grace. Our response is not nothing but humble imitation of Christ-like people, becoming less so Christ becomes greater, and reaching out to those who show us Jesus.
Illustrations: the-rescue-thai-cave-film, steve-bienkowski-rescue-diver-interview, pelagius-works-righteousness, golden-calf-well-intentioned-idolatry, barth-the-way-into-the-far-country, i-need-thee-every-hour-spiritual
March 20
What should we do to be saved
“Brothers and sisters, become imitators of me and watch those who live this way—you can use us as models. As I have told you many times and now say with deep sadness, many people live as enemies of the cross. Their lives end with destruction. Their god is their stomach, and they take pride in their disgrace because their thoughts focus on earthly things. Our citizenship is in heaven. We look forward to a savior that comes from there—the Lord Jesus Christ. He will transform our humble bodies so that they are like his glorious body, by the power that also makes him able to subject all things to himself.” Philippians 3:17-21 CEB
So we have been talking about the rescue over the past few weeks, about how God rescues us and saves us. Also, about this movie, The Rescue,about the 2018 Thai cave disaster and how this event can illustrate some of the ways that God rescues us. Today, I want to start by focusing on scuba diving in general. I’ll get to Jesus and those kinds of things, but I want to give us just a little baseline on SCUBA before we go into the video clip from the movie. So I’m going to ask Mr. Steve Bienkowski to come down. He is a Retired Rescue Diver for the NYPD and so not only is he scuba certified, but he has rescued people in the water.
- What do you need to do to SCUBA dive (basics)?
- Is this something you could teach a 12 year old in a few minutes?
- What are ways that people can be their own worst enemy when in the process of being rescued?
Steve interview.
Thanks Steve. Okay. Now we are going to see another clip from The Rescue. What’s happened now is that the boys and their coach have been found in the cave, but nobody knows how to get them out. Everyone quickly realized that finding them was the easy part. Earlier in the movie, there were some pump workers stuck a hundred yards from the entrance and had to be rescued. They were only under water for thirty seconds but it was a great struggle. Here we go.
Show Clip 49:12 - 51:41
So my friends, we are continuing our series on The Rescue. We started by talking about What Salvation Is. In that sermon, I defined salvation as “God’s merciful reaching down to us to pick us up from our muck to stand upright, to be ambassadors of God in this world and for all eternity. It is not based on what you do. It’s not based on who you are. It is based solely on the grace of God found fully in Jesus Christ offered for us.” Last week, we spoke about Where we are and how we need to know where we are to know where we going. Today, we are going to look at how God saves us. That is, the understandable question: what do we need to do to be saved? It is a trick question because the reality of the matter is that we are so often our own worst enemies. When we try to do things to be saved, we get in our own way. Even being conscious or aware can sometimes get us into trouble. This is really the heart of this series and why I wanted to share clips from this movie. I’ve never been a good multimedia preacher or someone who can connect with relevant cultural phenomena, but this experience of absolute need struck me. The boys could not save themselves. The radical idea to save them was to anesthetize them. They allude to it in the clip a little bit. Rescuers have to go in with medication because if the boys are awake, they will go into shock. There are a lot of things that can go wrong, but the solution can’t come from inside the cave. In our own moral life, we, ourselves, are also often our own worst enemies. We can blame the devil or other people. We can pass the buck. Most of the time, though, it stops right here with our own heart. There are other factors that make life easier, and other factors that make life harder, but in order to be rescued by God from this world of sin and death, you have to admit that you cannot save yourself. You cannot escape the grip of sin on your own. Humans have tried again and again, They have tried and they have failed. They’ve tried for noble reasons, The Christian doctrine of original sin illustrates this. Talk of sin can seem kind of harsh. I mean, sin is a bad word, right? We’re sinners. That means we’re bad, right?
Christians have tried to get around talking about sin for a long time. Pelagius, a writer from England in the 5th century, really tried to emphasize freedom and the possibility of a moral life without constraint and apart from grace. It is a noble attempt but the consequences are profoundly tragic. Pelagius offered an example of works-righteousness. The more you do, the better you are. The problem with this is that it means that if you can be saved on your own, all of us who need grace are of a lesser caste and a lesser sort. And we are cursed from the get go. And what kind of malevolent God would do that? The golden calf moment, in the Exodus story, is so often lifted up as this example of idolatry. It is, but it was well-intentioned idolatry. The people wanted to do something. They were tired of waiting on Moses. They were tired of waiting on God and they wanted to do something to respond to God. The point of taking the gold they had stolen from Egypt and turning it into a calf was not to create a new God. They were trying to honor God, The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But in the midst of this, they dishonored God deeply. In the midst of wanting to do something, needing to do something, needing to feel useful to God, they turned away from God and sinned. You don’t need to feel useful to God. You are already loved. Even in the midst of sin, when we don’t deserve it. When we got trapped in this cave of sin on our own accord and don’t deserve to be rescued, God offers his son, Jesus, for us.
As Karl Barth wrote,
That Jesus Christ is very God is shown in His way into the far country in which He the Lord became a servant. For in the majesty of the true God it happened that the eternal Son of the eternal Father became obedient by offering and humbling Himself to be the brother of man, to take His place with the transgressor, to judge him by judging Himself and dying in his place. But God the Father raised Him from the dead, and in so doing recognized and gave effect to His death and passion as a satisfaction made for us, as our conversion to God, and therefore as our redemption from death to life.1
It is about Jesus. The old Sunday School joke about how the answer to every question is Jesus is not far off. The answer is Jesus.
So what are we supposed to do? If we can’t save ourselves, if God has to knock us unconscious to get us out of the cave, should we just do nothing?
By no means.
This is where the words of Paul in Philippians come in
Brothers and sisters, become imitators of me and watch those who live this way—you can use us as models.
We look for people who act like Jesus so that we can act more like Jesus and show more people the power of Jesus. As Jesus himself prayers in John 3, “He must become greater, I must become less.” Once we accept that we must be less and that we need help, we can receive help and grace and be transformed by the Holy Spirit into the kind of people that help and guide others.
As Paul continues, our choice is between Christ or destruction because there are many who do not seek to imitate Christ Paul says, “As I have told you many times and now say with deep sadness, many people live as enemies of the cross. Their lives end with destruction. Their god is their stomach, and they take pride in their disgrace because their thoughts focus on earthly things.”
We are back in that cave. We have survived, but if we think we can save ourselves, we are fools. The world around us convinces us that we can do it on our own. But in that way, we are trapped. Freedom isn’t found in boldly scaling the mountain but in humbly receiving grace. In humbly looking to others for guidance. In humbly sharing of yourself with others because that is what Jesus did. In humbly becoming less. In humbly, letting go of desires of the body that consume our time and our mind and our health. In humbly realizing that one does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.
As Paul finishes this passage, “Our citizenship is in heaven. We look forward to a savior that comes from there—the Lord Jesus Christ. He will transform our humble bodies so that they are like his glorious body, by the power that also makes him able to subject all things to himself.”
In Christ, we are citizens of heaven. That is our home. That is our goal, the place where we long to be. Lent is a time to admit what we may be ashamed of. We cannot make it on our own. We cannot swim out of that cave on our own. Even if you are in the best shape. If you are the fastest, the strongest, the smartest, the richest, you cannot swim faster than death. You cannot out think pain. You are in need and in that we are not alone.
Who are the people in your life that show you Jesus. Take a moment. Think of two people who show you kindness and mercy and humility. Write down their names on your bulletin or in your phone. Reach out to them this week to let them know the impact they have made on your life.
Because of what Christ has done for us, you are free to love. You are free because you don’t have to save yourself. You don’t have to spend all your life trying to conquer death. Christ has won the victory. You don’t have to spend all your life trying to evade pain. Christ has won the victory. Receive his power. Call out to Christ, as in the old spiritual.
I need Thee, O I need Thee Every hour I need Thee O bless me now, my Savior I come to Thee
Let us prayer,
Heavenly father, we need you every hour. Forgive us when we stray and lie to ourselves. Help us come back home under your wings. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Footnotes
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Karle Barth, Church Domatics 4.1.59. ↩