Scripture: Philippians 3:3-14; Romans 3:23; John 3:16; Luke 15:3-7 Series: 2022
A Lenten sermon closing a series on The Rescue (salvation), arguing from Philippians 3 that no one—not even the credentialed Paul—earns salvation; it is grace all the way down. Using the Thai cave rescue’s smallest boy, the parable of the lost sheep, and the Malthusian scarcity logic behind colonial-era Indian famines, Pruitt contrasts a world that decides who deserves to live (always choosing itself) with God’s kingdom of abundance where Christ’s love has no limits and leaves no one behind. He calls hearers, quoting Leo the Great and John 3:16, to see themselves with the abundance Christ sees and to prophesy rather than complain.
Illustrations: sports-records-and-olympics, shot-put-gold-medal-neighbor, nypd-diver-tryout, the-rescue-final-clip, grizzly-bear-run-faster-joke, paul-resume-credentials, malthus-east-india-company-famines, beeloved-counting-kids
April 3
Who Gets to Be Saved
“If anyone else has reason to put their confidence in physical advantages, I have even more: I was circumcised on the eighth day. I am from the people of Israel and the tribe of Benjamin. I am a Hebrew of the Hebrews. With respect to observing the Law, I’m a Pharisee. With respect to devotion to the faith, I harassed the church. With respect to righteousness under the Law, I’m blameless. These things were my assets, but I wrote them off as a loss for the sake of Christ. But even beyond that, I consider everything a loss in comparison with the superior value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. I have lost everything for him, but what I lost I think of as sewer trash, so that I might gain Christ and be found in him. In Christ I have a righteousness that is not my own and that does not come from the Law but rather from the faithfulness of Christ. It is the righteousness of God that is based on faith. The righteousness that I have comes from knowing Christ, the power of his resurrection, and the participation in his sufferings. It includes being conformed to his death so that I may perhaps reach the goal of the resurrection of the dead. It’s not that I have already reached this goal or have already been perfected, but I pursue it, so that I may grab hold of it because Christ grabbed hold of me for just this purpose. Brothers and sisters, I myself don’t think I’ve reached it, but I do this one thing: I forget about the things behind me and reach out for the things ahead of me. The goal I pursue is the prize of God’s upward call in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 3:3-14 CEB
When I was a kid, I loved learning sports all-time records. I loved learning about who had the most home runs (Roger Marris when I was little and then it changed a few times), who had the best batting average in baseball, knowing who had the most yards rushing football, (Sealy native Eric Dickerson, who was given a car by Texas A&M but still went to SMU). I loved the Olympics, finding out who was the best in the world. We had a neighbor growing up in College Station who had won the gold medal in shot putt back in 1968 and a silver in 1964. A really friendly guy. Gold medal winner, Best in the world. I loved having that connection to a champion. A lot of aspects of life include a bunch of people trying to earn a few spots. Two weeks ago, we heard about Mr. Bienkowski’s preparation to be a diver for the NYPD. How there were 32 people trying out for four slots, but only two made it. They were looking for the best.
So what happens to those of us who aren’t the best? What happens to people who aren’t the strongest, the smartest, the kindest? Where’s the space for everyone else? Today, we’re showing our last clip from the movie, The Rescue. It is going to look at the heroes getting the last kid out.
1:31:52 -1:36:04
My friends, we are finishing our series on The Rescue on how God saves us, trying to understand salvation and the purpose of Christ’s coming in a fresh way. How salvation is not simply a state a person is in; you were saved from something and you are saved for something. We began this series talking about what salvation is. Then we spoke about where we are. We have to know where we are to know where we are going. We have to know where we are to know why we even need to be saved to begin with. If we don’t think we need anything, if we don’t think we need to be saved and Jesus comes around knocking, we’re not going to respond. Then we spoke about what we need to do to be saved, realizing that there’s nothing we can do: it is grace all the way down. Last week, we spoke about how we are saved through the cross of Jesus Christ. Finally, today we’re looking at who gets to be saved, who deserves to be saved? In the movie, the only kid left was the smallest one by a lot. The standard mask didn’t fit. They thankfully had an extra mask that barely fit. They did what they had to do: they did not leave anyone behind. When we’re in smaller groups, it is somehow easier not to leave people behind. With BeeLoved or other childcare centers, I hear teachers counting kids all the time.
When groups get larger and larger, it becomes a more difficult proposition. Once we get to the point of not knowing each other, leaving someone behind becomes easier and easier. You’ve got to save yourself. You’ve got to save your family first. You’ve got to do what you have to do. The old joke that if you’re Escaping from a grizzly bear, you don’t have to run faster than the grizzly bear. You just have to run faster than the slowest person in your group. Who gets to be saved, who deserves it. We see a familiar version of who deserves to be saved with Paul in his letter to the Philippians. As if he were applying for a job, Paul basically gives us his CV, his résumé, for how much he deserves God’s love. He did everything right. Not all of us can be like Paul and do all these things right, but even Paul, the best of them, could not save himself. Last week, when we talked about how we’re saved or shared with different models of salvation inside of scripture, how everything up until Jesus, leaves folks behind. To use the example of the parable of the lost sheep, every model is happy with 99 and okay with leaving the one behind. A lot of human societies have been okay with this, too. In the late 18th century, the East India Company was one of the largest organizations in the world which was also incredibly profitable. And they had their own university just for the company. One of the teachers at the university was an Anglican priest named Thomas Malthus. Malthus was an early practitioner of statistical analysis. He studied how populations grow and how resources grow. Malthus looked in and said that resources grow mathematically, which means it like basically adds every year. Whereas humans grow exponentially. Here is a chart to make his point clear. A married couple has four kids. All of their kids get married, and they have four to eight kids and so on and so on. And what he said was that, eventually, humans are going to run out of resources. There’s not going to be enough space for all the people. Show slide ]So People should stop having as many kids. Now, this logic has been around since that time. People have have said, again and again, there’s too many people. There’s not enough stuff. If you’re having kids you’re selfish. The problem with this logic was very quickly apparent. The East India Company was created by the English to exploit the treasures and resources of the sub-continent we know now as India. It was not designed for the betterment of the populations in India, but solely for the profit of East Indian Company stockholders. Eventually, the English crown took over the company after the mutiny of 1856, but the logic was still there. And in the late 19th century, There were a set of El Nino famines that killed almost 30 million people on the subcontinent. Instead of changing the harvest to food, millions of Indians died to send cotton to England rather than feed themselves. There was a specific choice made by the colonial administrators: some deserve to live and others deserve to die. When people choose who should live, they always pick themselves first and they usually pick against the ones who aren’t fast enough, who are sick, who look different, who talk different, who can’t get the things done. Even Paul was not good enough. It says in Romans that we all have sent fallen short of the glory of God. In this world, there is scarcity. There are limits. I profoundly disagree with Thomas Malthus and his calculations, but there is scarcity. There are limits in this world. There are limits to oil. There is only so much in the ground. There are limits to land. There are limits to water and oceans. More is not being made.No one’s way of life can last forever. None of the things of our life will stay the same. And complaining about changes doesn’t change things. It doesn’t create more land or more oil. Complaining about things can help us connect with others who have similar complaints, but it never leads us to love. Complaining divides the world again without living into something new. There is a difference between complaining and prophesying. God doesn’t say, “blessed are the complainers” God does not give the gift of complaint, we are all naturally gifted at that, but the gift of prophecy, which is a glimpse of the kingdom of heaven here and now. Prophecy isn’t about telling the future but seeing as God sees. Viewing the real world where Christ is king. And in that kingdom, there is no us and them because there is no scarcity of Christ’s love for you. There are no limits. There isn’t a point after which you are no longer worthy. Your worthiness and your inclusion in God’s kingdom have nothing to do with what you have done.
As Leo the Great said,
“No one, however weak, is denied a share in the victory of the cross. No one is beyond the help of the prayer of Christ. His prayer brought benefit to the multitude that raged against him. How much more does it bring to those who turn to him in repentance.”
You are already loved. There is no difference that God despises. You are going to make it out of that cave alive. For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
In this season of Lent, may you look at the world, may you look at yourself, not with what you lack, but with what you have. May you see yourself with the abundance that Christ sees you. May you see yourself in the possibility that Christ sees you. May you prepare your hearts for holy week knowing that Jesus leaves no one behind, not even the lost sheep, not even the lost son.
Let us pray. Heavenly father. We thank you for your love and for your discernment in loving us. Even when we don’t deserve it, help us to humbly accept your grace and humbly offer mercy the same way that we have received it. In the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. Amen.