What do you need saving from?

Reverend Sue
Aug 4
7 min read

From what, or when, do we need saving? Not just at the beginning of our faith journey but now? (Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost. Proper 14 [19] Matthew 14:22-33.) Many of us begin by feeling a need to be saved from sin but as we travel through life we find we also need saving from weariness, despair, flagging hope or just the sense of overwhelm and distraction.

Sentence:

“No one who believes in him will be put to shame.” Romans 10:10

Collect:

Gracious Lord,

place within our hearts both the desire for rescue and salvation

and the trust that you come to us in word, sacrament and spirit

whenever we are in distress and give us the courage to reach out to others as you have to us.

Amen.

Reflection:

If any of us have, or have seen, an old Bible it probably had beautiful watercolour plates, or wood cuts, of the scene of Peter attempting to walk across the stormy sea to Jesus – and finding that his faith was a bit wobbly. It is a wonderful image and metaphor for various moments in life when we feel that faith calls us to a difficult walk but having tentatively set out we then falter and find that rather than walking under our own steam we end up calling out desperately to our Lord to save us.

You may like to read what I wrote on the Jacob – Joseph story.

Gifts in unexpected places

Or you may like to read what I wrote in response to Elijah.

Life giving Questions

This week’s stories brings us the reassurance that Jesus does indeed save. But Jesus also rebukes Peter for his lack of faith suggesting that if Peter’s faith had been sufficient, or if the relationship between Peter and Jesus had been strong enough – or right, he would have been able to walk upon the water all the way to the boat without failure.

While I am not anticipating ever being able to walk on water I am challenged by seeking to be faithful in life’s difficult moments and to trust in the Lord and the process of faith. Biblical faith is clearly more than just calling on Jesus for rescue in a tight spot (although we all do it and we are invited to do so). Faith is also about how we live all of life including, but not restricted to, its challenges.

Paul’s words this week make it clear that salvation (the state of being rescued, delivered, protected, healed, preserved and made whole according to Strong’s Greek) is about the state of the whole of our life. Paul suggests that salvation is either by complete and righteous keeping of the law – nigh on impossible – or by faith – relationship. It is in many ways the theme he has been coming at from every different angle over the last few chapters. Sometimes by very legalistic argument and at others by refiguring the ancient stories of his own tradition – such as last week’s exegesis of the Jacob and Esau story. Always coming to the conclusion that the law is righteous but impossible and that we are therefore only saved by grace, or the righteousness that comes from a faithful love relationship with the divine, not by our accomplishments and our rightness of actions or ideas.

Paul says that Moses said about the righteousness that comes from the law: “’the person who does these things will live by them’. But the righteousness that comes from faith says, ‘Do not say in your heart, “Who will ascend into heaven?” (that is to bring Christ down) or “Who will descend into the abyss?” (that is to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? ‘The word is near you, on our lips and in your heart.’ “ (10:5-8)

Here Paul is referring in part to Deuteronomy 30: 11-20 in the light of the Christ. This is the well known exhortation to choose life. “Surely this commandment that I am commanding you today is not too hard for you ... It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up to heaven for us, and get it (the law) for us so that we may hear it and observe it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea (or abyss) that you should say ‘Who will cross to the other side of the sea for us, and get it for us so that we may hear it (the law) and observe it?’ No, the word is very near to you; it is in your mouth and in your heart for you to observe. See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today, by loving the Lord your God, walking in his ways ...then you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering into...”

Paul is radically reinterpreting, or refining, if you will, this ancient and central exhortation that if you want life and all the Lord’s blessings then you must follow all the laws. But Paul is saying that while the law is righteous it is too hard and that we have been given a new way, a life giving way, which is to be in loving relationship with the one, Jesus, who fulfilled the law and therefore to be set free – or in short hand the state of salvation, of being rescued and made whole.

And just as we do not need to jump through the hoops of meeting the requirements of the law neither are we to presume to judge others and declare who will ascend to heaven or who will descend into the abyss. More than this when we judge who might go where we are in effect telling Christ where to go and this is not our place.

If only Christians would heed this. We make a sport out of betting who and where our neighbours might be destined. Not only are we not qualified to do so we might be very surprised by the answer. Jesus said that many a tax collector and sinner would get into heaven before the religious righteous – that the first would become the last. We need to avoid judgment or to at least make it very tentatively and with much humility remembering that old line “there but for the grace of God go I”.

Rather than concentrating on what divides us in human terms – race, culture, success, material possessions, health status, intellect etc – we are challenged to attend to the witness within our own hearts. The word of life and love is already very near to us.

Salvation, or the state of being rescued, delivered, protected, healed, preserved and made whole, is to experience being in an unfolding, ever developing relationship with the divine one. So, whether in the storm tossed sea, or the abyss, or the promised land, we are already home in our hearts. Our hearts are the symbol for our soul, for our innermost eternal being. And our heart is invited into communion with the heart of God which is our true and eternal home.

Remember a few weeks ago when we heard from Paul: “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, know what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”(8:26) That wonderful sense that in difficult times God does both sides of the relationship and prays from within our hearts for what we need but cannot find words for.

And we who know this, who experience it at least at times, are called to share that faith or relationship experience with others that they too might know salvation. Salvation is not only a narrow legal getting off some hook, or being plucked out of the stormy sea in a crisis. Salvation is a whole life giving restoration and fulfilment. Which is surely out greatest hope and the great need of our world?

Instead of prejudging how the final judgment will turn out for others or even for ourselves are we not simply called into the fullness of life now for ourselves and for others? Who do we need to extend a hand to in help or encouragement? And who is offering us a hand that we might take hold of humbly and with gratitude?

Where in our life, who in our life, needs a word of comfort, joy, encouragement or even just a smile or a wink across a crowded room? And who is offering us a word, a smile, a wink, a gesture of comfort, joy, or encouragement?

Even so, come Lord Jesus Christ, come and save us.

Intercessions:

Creator of stormy seas and safe harbours,

Help us to live and move upon the surface of your world

with respect and awe for the power of the created order

Help us to share the plenty with all your peoples and creatures

and to come to one another’s aid as you came to Peter’s.

In particular we pray for those who suffer from fire and storm,

drought and flood, earthquake and war …

that leaders of nations and industry and agencies of care

bring comfort and hope.

Creator of storm seas and safe harbours,