09/01/2026
Sunday Sermon - Scott Muffett, S.A.M
August 30, 2026 | Pentecost, 14, a
Jeremiah 15: 15-21; Psalm 26: 1-8; Romans 12: 9-21; Matthew 16: 21-28
May the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus be with you all.
Today I am deviating from my normal practice of basing my sermon on the Gospel reading. Paul’s words to the Christians in Rome from our second reading this morning are simply too powerful and compelling for me to ignore. I had to think on them a bit and wanted to express to you my take on the importance of LOVE in our lives.
In my Sundays and Seasons Preaching lectionary, the scholarly take on Paul’s words in today’s readings says this: The second reading is a concise and rhetorically punchy list of ethical injunctions, with special focus on social relations. It seems very scholarly doesn’t it? And very dry. I had to chuckle when I read that sentence as I imagined basing my sermons on this type of discourse. I would lose all of your interest in a matter of seconds were I to speak in this manner.
But the scholarly review of the readings is helpful. It describes context – which in this case is that Paul is writing to the believers in Rome during the roman emperor Nero’s reign – a reign that persecuted the upstart sect of Jesus followers – who were not quite yet labeled as Christians. And although we are not facing a direct threat of persecution from an emperor, I do believe our church is under threat and is being undermined by an active element in this world. I believe we are being persecuted, but in a more subtle way. So Paul’s words stirred me up when I read them again.
His words to the people of faith in Rome, and consequently to us, are quite challenging. Paul writes to encourage God’s people to live a life grounded in love, to live according to Jesus’ calling. It seems like the right thing, obviously, but when Paul describes the way in which we are to live in our calling, it can be overwhelming to us.
Do you think these ethical injunctions were any easier to swallow for the Christians in Rome, who were facing persecution? I doubt it. I think these injunctions are hard for all Christians to follow. Perhaps not all of them are difficult, perhaps we are inclined to find one or more of them something we are already inclined to do - but when taken as a whole, they can be daunting.
Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil. Hold fast to what is good. Love one another…be fervent in spirit…rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer”. These are just the beginning of what Paul writes in the first three verses. His list goes on. In fact, it includes 30 little commands or sayings to encourage us.
Listening to his words, trying to absorb all 30 of these injunctions, can be exhausting - and it may even make us feel unworthy. It is easy to wonder if the Holy Spirit could ever give us the strength and dedication to create within us all of these desires of God. Paul’s list is somewhat overwhelming and as a result may lead us to ask ourselves “Where do we start? What should we pay attention to? What is a Christian to do with all of these words?”
Instead of trying to define each of these 30 injunctions – or encouragements - I’d like to boil it down to two basic themes. The two basic premises of Paul’s encouragements are self-sacrificial love and overcoming evil with good.
Paul tells us about self-sacrificial love in the first five verses. He encourages us to develop this type of love with these sayings. So what is a self-sacrificial love?
It is a genuine love. It is a love that cares for others and their needs. It does not focus on our own needs or demand anything in return for what it does for another. Simply put, it puts others first. It is a love that does not seek to harm or avenge oneself. A self-sacrificial love also is one that shows a brotherly love to others. A brotherly love sees people as all alike and on the same level. It does not have favorites. This love transcends our immediate family ties and does not depend on natural or ethnic bonds. In fact, it does not even consider it! Isn’t this what our world needs?
This love, according to Paul, shows honor and respect too. It doesn’t wait to be honored, but it makes the first move in honoring others. It considers others better and more important than oneself. He writes that a sacrificial love obviously includes a love for God that comes from the Holy Spirit. This love leads one to serve God with the talents and gifts that one has been given. A sacrificial love looks out for the needs of others and shows hospitality. It looks for opportunities to serve, and it goes out of its way to do so.
This is what I would call the “quiet servant” type of love. It is impactful, certainly, but is noticed by only those involved or impacted by these actions. It isn’t something that gets broadcasted to the people around an action of this type of love because they are not involved in it.
During the recent outage after the storm, I saw many types of this love being displayed as neighbors cared for and supported each other, checked in on each other, and helped to keep each other’s spirits up. Quiet acts of love and service abounded as people brought out the best of themselves in a time of affliction.
Maintaining a self-sacrificial love can be a challenge though, and these challenges stem from a variety of things. In our lives, we are often told to focus on ourselves first and foremost. We hear outrageous things like “You need to learn how to love yourself before you can love others.” Or “Love yourself, then love others.” This ordering of love focuses on us. Who knows if it will ever extend to others when it begins at and focuses on us? I’m not saying we shouldn’t love ourselves – we should! But we should love others just as much and try to put ourselves in other’s shoes to help us show our empathy and love.
Continuing the challenge is the nature of our love. Our love can be conditional or based on what we can get in return. It is easier to love those who are nice to us and who serve us, than it is to those who aren’t nice to us. A self-sacrificial love can also produce fears and concerns for us too. One of the scariest things about showing love to others is that it can go unappreciated, unnoticed, or it can be misused.
Complicating matters though can be our definition of love. As Americans, we more naturally see love as emotionally based. We can understand it as a feeling. We hear it with phrases like “Oh, I just love Pumpkin Spice coffee”, or “I love that show!” By using the word love in these descriptions, it takes away from the true meaning, it weakens our understanding of love. Or maybe you’ve heard someone say “I just don’t feel love for them anymore. Its all dried up.” Once a person falls out of love then that emotion wears out, and some people can struggle to show love afterward. It can be hard to keep an open, loving heart when one is wounded. But this is what Paul – and Jesus - is expecting of us.
We don’t often see love as an action like Paul and Scripture do. Love that accepts hurts and pain but doesn’t stop loving and wanting to show love to others, to recognize the wounds we all share and to show love despite them.
As Paul talks about self-sacrificial love, we cannot help but be pointed to Christ’s self-sacrificial love for us. Jesus once said: “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down His life for His friends.” Jesus loved us so much that He willingly gave up and laid down His life for us, so that we could have His. He put our need for grace and salvation first, and let Himself endure beatings, torture, pain, and suffering for us. He did what it took to save us. We only love because He first loved us. This self-sacrificial love that Paul talks about is produced in us through the Holy Spirit. When we share this kind of love with others, it points them to the greatest act done for them, Jesus’ death and resurrection.
After encouraging us to have a self-sacrificial love, Paul moves on to encourage us to overcome evil with good. The second premise, overcoming good with evil is shown in verses 14 – 21.
But like earlier, this can be a challenge. When we are wronged or hurt, we can carry wounds with us. We can endure a heavy heartache, a piercing pain, and deep distress. We can be scarred mentally, emotionally, and perhaps physically from people’s misdeeds and harmful words against and to us. When people wrong or hurt us, our natural response is to hurt them back, to get even. It seems to be hardwired into our sinful nature. When we get hurt by others, we can want others to feel and know the same feeling. We may want them to feel our pain and suffering. We want to return their evil with evil.
Paul encourages us not to do so. He encourages us to repay those deeds and acts with good. He encourages us to wait for God to act and give vengeance. He writes: “Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.’” The vengeance business is not a space that we are to set up shop in. We leave it in God’s hands. What do we do when we encounter and endure evil? We overcome it with good.
I recently witnessed an example of such grace, while waiting in line to get gas during the power outage. On Tuesday, August 11, I was stuck in a very long line at a gas station that hadn’t lost power. It was a warm, muggy afternoon and there were perhaps 40 -50 cars in front of me when I joined the queue. There were 4 lines of roughly equal length that led to the pumps – and three of them crossed a side street, blocking it.
The side street was being blocked because those in line were fearful that if they didn’t block the street someone would pull in front of them. This actually happened to me as I was trying to be polite and was a little slow to pull forward into the street when it became my turn. My hesitation allowed another car to jump into my line ahead of me, which the driver did without hesitation or remorse. It irked me at the moment, but then I relaxed and smiled and stopped myself from a negative reaction. I didn’t quite give that driver a thumbs up, but I did smile and nod at them. The young lady who jumped my line saw me smile and sheepishly shrugged, then turned away from me.
Shortly after this happened, a car attempted to turn down the street that was blocked by our gas line. A woman rolled down her window and asked the man in the first car blocking the street if he wouldn’t mind backing up bit so she could get through. The man responded to this simple request with profanity and angrily refused to move. I thought to myself – uh oh, this is going to escalate and get ugly quickly. But instead of responding with anger and profanity, the woman calmly explained to this man that she lived just three houses down – and wanted to get home. The man did not change his manner, if anything he more firmly stated his refusal to move his car for her and threw in a couple of expletives again to make sure his point was clear. Once again, the woman remained calm, wished the man well, and backed up to find another way home. As she pulled away, she waved at the man and smiled - it was beautiful! I was so impressed that I wanted to run down the street after her to thank her for her display of grace. It was inspiring! An example of facing evil with good, just as Paul would have us do. This brazen defiance of bad behavior, evil, if you will, was out in the open for all to see. It must have made others in this line of cars think twice about their own anxiety and behavior because the line became more orderly and calmer for a bit – everyone who witnessed this exchange sort of quieted down and became a tad more humble.
Paul encourages us to show goodness and mercy by praying for, blessing, feeding, clothing, and providing for the needs of those who have wronged us. It seems to be the wrong, or opposite thing to do, but it has a purpose.
These acts of love toward our aggressors might drive them towards faith and repentance. The mercy that we show them might lead them to the greater mercy that is found in Jesus. I was blessed to witness this woman’s example of Love to another who wasn’t being kind and can’t help but pray that the man reflected upon her love and grace later that day. Perhaps he is remorseful and will try harder to be kind next time he gets the opportunity.
That is what our God does. He overcomes evil with good. This is depicted by the sacrifice of His Only Son to save us, to redeem us. On the cross, where our Savior was nailed and His blood poured out, God overcame many things. He overcame our sin, the violations and wrongs done to Him, through Jesus’ perfect life and sacrifice.
He repays our sin with mercy and forgiveness, not with wrath and condemnation. He overcame death with, ironically, the death of His Son. Through what Satan thought to be his greatest hour, killing God’s Son, came His greatest defeat with Jesus’ resurrection. We will see His victory fully at the Last Day when His enemies will be defeated, and sickness, pain, and sadness will be overcome.
Our God overcomes evil with good, He overcomes evil with love, His love for us. And so, it is only right of Him to expect us to follow His example. We are to take up our cross and do as Paul encourages us. Paul’s list of encouragements may be challenging for us, but it points us to Christ and His overwhelming grace and love for us. Love is the way to overcome the evils and wrongs in this world, a constant, abiding, love for others, including those who wrong us, or hurt us. Love thy neighbor, and even more, love thine enemies.
IN JESUS’ NAME, AMEN.
