SAINT LUKE S
SAINT LUKE’S
6TH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST YEAR A ISAIAH 55:10 –13 PSALM 65:1–14 ROMANS 8:1–11 MATTHEW 13:1–9, 18–23 A SERMON BY ALEX HERASIMTSCHUK JULY 16, 2017
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Over the course of the past week I overheard the lamentations of my colleagues in seminary who were given the task of preaching this Sunday. And what was the cause of their lamentation? The New Testament readings are notoriously difficult to preach on – Romans 8 and the Parable of the Sower. And given that I myself was on the rota to preach one of these texts, I was in their company with respect to this dilemma. But, for my money, I would argue that between these two texts, the language of Romans is a bit more obscure, and should hence be avoided in the realm of homiletics! So, when I felt myself being drawn closer to preaching on Romans, I thought to myself: “Lord, what have I done to deserve this? Why are you having me preach on this notoriously dense and complicated text???” Well, we know that the Lord works in mysterious ways, so there must be a reason for it. For those of us who may be unaware, Romans is an epistle written by St. Paul to the Church in Rome. And it is believed that Paul was writing to them because he wanted to use Rome as a headquarters for his missionary journey to Spain. You see, Paul did not establish the community in Rome and they didn’t know him very well. So, in order to prove himself as a legitimate evangelist, he writes to them this letter, which we know as the Epistle to the Romans. And it is arguably Paul’s most developed theological treatise. For it is within Romans that he provides us with what he sees as God’s overarching plan for the cosmos the history of salvation from Adam to Christ.
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Our selection for today, from Romans 8, appears at the tail end of this discussion of salvation history. And it is within Romans 8 that Paul proclaims the following: “Christ’s sacrifice on the cross has brought forth a new age. An age when the faithful have been freed from sin and death. And as recipients of this gift of liberation, the faithful have a duty.” And what is this duty? To no longer live according to the flesh,
but instead to live according to the Spirit. As Paul writes: “…walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit…To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.” This is a very powerful statement. But what does it mean? For Paul, flesh is synonymous with human frailty. Flesh refers to the weakness of the natural body and the human mind. And it is because of the weakness of the flesh that it is vulnerable to the influence of sin. For, according to Paul, sin is not something that we humans create. Rather, sin is a kind of cosmic force that plagues creation. You may recall that it is in Romans that Paul says that creation is “groaning” under the weight of sin. Sin roots itself in the flesh and it brings forth ruin, misery, and death. The Spirit on the other hand, for Paul,
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represents the power of the divine. It is the energy - in Greek, the energeia, of God. And contrary to the flesh, the Spirit brings forth love, righteousness, peace, and life. Thus, for Paul, the flesh is weak, and the Spirit is strong. Only the Spirit can combat the influence of sin – the flesh is useless against it. So, live “according to the Spirit,” says Paul, for only the power of the Spirit will save us from sin and death. Although the basic message of Paul is fairly straightforward here, we do encounter a problem. When he describes life in the Spirit his choice of words is controversial. In Romans 8 and elsewhere, Paul has a tendency to speak quite disparagingly about the flesh. In our passage today Paul refers to the flesh as “sinful,” as “hostile to God.” And because the flesh is associated with human nature, Paul is often accused of being a dualist – arguing that the body is evil and that the Spirit is good. If the critics of Paul are correct, to live a truly spiritual life the faithful should abstain from the desires of the body. For many in our society today, this is an unwelcomed message. Indeed, when I delivered my homily to the 8am folks this morning, many of them approached me afterward expressing how Paul’s teachings on the flesh causes them to struggle with the infamous, “Catholic Guilt;” which as many of us know, is not just limited to Roman Catholics. We live in a world where positive body image is encouraged, and we are taught to accept and even embrace our human desires as natural. The last thing we need, it seems, is another theology that encourages guilt and self-loathing. But is this a fair portrait of Paul? Is Paul truly a dualist who pits the flesh and the Spirit
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against each other? Is this what he means by living “according to the Spirit?” In Romans 8:11, Paul says something very interesting. He writes: 11
If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies…
The Spirit of God will give life to your mortal bodies. To live according to the Spirit does not mean to eradicate the flesh, but to transform it. Remember, the Spirit is the divine energy of God, it is the source of life. And when the power of the Spirit dwells within us it strengthens the flesh, fills it with the divine energy of God so that we may resist the force of sin that plagues this world. The ancient fathers of the Church referred to this transfiguration of the flesh as theosis, or “deification.” It is the Spirit’s holistic transformation of the entire person. To walk with the Spirit for Paul means to be transformed by it – body and soul. And are we not faithful to this message? Why do we attend Church? Is it not to be transformed? For the Spirit to fill us as we pray? To be one with the mystical body of Christ as we partake of the Eucharist? We enter the house of God for renewal, to be strengthened by the energeia of God. And as we are transfigured, we depart these walls to transfigure the world. To bring forth a new creation free of sin. Filled with love, righteousness, and life.
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