Sunday, October 24th, 2004; 21st Sunday after Pentecost
Pastor Scott R. Stein; Christ the King Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, CO
The sermon:
Two weeks ago we began a series of four sermons on The Will of God, based on the book titled The Will of God by Leslie Weatherhead. To understand God’s will we divide the will of God into three categories. The first is the Intentional Will of God, which is God’s ideal plan for humanity, God’s desired purpose for our lives and all of creation. The second category is the Circumstantial Will of God, which is God’s plan within current circumstances that are the result of sin in the world. The third category is the Ultimate Will of God, which will be the final accomplishment and realization of God’s purposes for all creation.
Imagine a group of children playing in a small slowly flowing river that runs down a mountainside into the valley below. The children are having a great time lining up rocks to try to dam up the river. I used to do that when I was a little kid. It was fun to make the river deeper for a while. No matter how many children there are working together to dam up the river, they will never succeed in stopping the water from reaching the valley below. The river might be dammed up temporarily by the children, but it is only temporary. The water, which always continues to flow, will be diverted and will find another route down the mountain. Sooner or later the river will find a way through or around the dam. Sooner or later the water will flow to its goal – the valley below.
Compared to God, we are like little children. We can use river flowing down the mountain as a metaphor for our relationship with God and how we affect God’s will. The river of God’s will flows from above, never ceasing, always flowing to the valley below. The Intentional Will of God is that the water of life flow down to the valley to give life, abundant life. And we, children of God are there, where the river flows. We could just watch the beautiful, life-giving river of live flow to the valley, but we don’t. We don’t always live according to God’s will for our lives, which stops the accomplishment of the Intentional Will of God, just as if we piled up stones to dam up the river of life. Although we can temporarily defeat God’s purposes, we never completely defeat them. Our actions, our sin, our choosing in free will to disobey God can slow the river and divert the river. Sooner or later the water will flow to its goal – the valley below. Sooner or later, in spite of the circumstances that sin in our world creates, the river of life flows to its goal.
God is patient, because God knows that the Ultimate will of God will be accomplished through the power and omnipotence of God. God is omnipotent, God has all power. That does not mean that by a sheer display of force God gets his own way. If that were the case, humans would not really have free will. God chooses not to forcibly impose God’s will upon us. God chooses that God’s will, God’s desires for humans, will be accomplished by women and men choosing God’s way, not by the imposition of God’s will in overwhelming dominance. Power means the ability to accomplish one’s purpose. Since God’s purpose in creating humanity is to win the love, devotion, and voluntary faithfulness of humans, anything God might do to force a man or woman to comply to the will of God would defeat God’s purpose in creating us. When we say that God is omnipotent, we don’t mean that nothing can happen unless it is the Intentional Will of God. We mean that nothing can happen which can ultimately defeat God’s purposes – the Ultimate Will of God.
The omnipotence of God is that God’s ultimate goal, the Ultimate Will of God will be reached, and nothing of value will be lost in the process, no matter how humankind may divert and dam up the river of God’s purpose. God uses women and men, you and me, as his instruments, even in spite of what we humans do. Even when humans try to do the opposite of the Intentional Will of God, in the end, ultimately, God’s Ultimate Will will be accomplished.
As an example of how the Intentional, Circumstantial, and Ultimate Will of God occur in the activity of the world, let’s look at what happened when God became incarnate in human flesh, and Jesus Christ came into the world. The Intentional Will of God was not that Jesus should be crucified, but that he should be followed. Jesus offered forgiveness and mercy to all people, calling in Mark Chapter 1, “The kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the good news.” He calls us to be disciples, just as he called his first disciples, “Follow me.”
Contrary to the Intentional Will of God, all people did not, and still do not, follow Jesus. Instead Jesus was arrested, put on trial, beaten, and crucified. The Circumstantial Will of God in those circumstances was that Jesus should accept death in such a positive and creative and redeeming way as to lead to the accomplishment and fulfillment of the Ultimate Will of God. The Ultimate Will of God – namely, the redemption of humanity, winning people back to God, not in spite of the Cross, but through the Cross, born out of the circumstances of human sin, as an instrument to reach the Ultimate Will of God.
So with evil intent Jesus Christ was crucified. The Son of God was murdered on a wooden cross, the best known instrument of torture and death in the Roman Empire. On Good Friday night the men and women who followed Jesus, in the deepest depths of despair, said in their hearts, “We trusted Jesus, we followed him. He came to establish his kingdom. He told us so. And evil has been allowed to win, to take him from us. It’s the end of everything. It’s the end of the Kingdom of God.” But that was not the end. Within six weeks people were preaching about the Cross, no longer as an instrument of torture and death, no longer as the source of great despair, but as the instrument of salvation and eternal life. With a courage that is startling they proclaimed the death of Christ as the ultimate redemptive act of God! The crucifixion of Christ, which seemed for a moment to stop the flow of the river of the water of life forever, was used by God to accomplish the Ultimate Will of God.
In Ephesians 3:20 Paul writes that there is a power at work in us; the power of God working through the Holy Spirit. And that power is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine. God is at work in us. The problem is that we don’t always know how to discern the will of God. And even when the will of God is clear to us, we don’t always choose to live in God’s will. Next Sunday the sermon will discuss Discerning the Will of God.
In the last chapter of the Bible, in Revelation 22, John writes about the final accomplishment of the Ultirmate Will of God. “The angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city [of God]. On either side of the river is the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. Nothing accursed will be found there any more. But the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him; they will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. And there will be no more night; they need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever.” Amen, come Lord Jesus. Amen.
