Proper 22C (6-7 October
2007)
Luke 17:5-10
Pr. George L. Murphy
St. Paul’s Episcopal
Church, Akron OH
“INCREASE OUR FAITH!”
“The apostles said to the Lord, ‘Increase our faith!’” Jesus has just told them that they should be prepared to forgive other believers who sin, even when that sin is repeated. It’s a hard saying. He goes on to talk dramatically about what even a little faith can do. So between those attention-getting sayings of Jesus the appeal “Increase our faith!” tends to get lost. Many of the commentaries pass over that verse quickly. But it poses the crucial question: How can we have a faith that will keep us going?
Maybe you don’t pray, “Increase our faith” very often but I suspect that many of you sense that need even if you can’t put it into words. You come to church, you pray, you try to do what Christians are supposed to do, but a lot of it is kind of on autopilot. And maybe you seldom pray anything at all – which is a sure tip-off to a need for faith, because faith is the basis for prayer: What’s the point of praying if you have no confidence that prayer is heard and makes a difference.
“Increase our faith” – but what is faith? Part of our problem is that we tend to think of faith as a special ability, a kind of super power that some people have. “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” Wow – I wish I could do things like that. Think of all the great things I could accomplish if I had psychic powers!
But a moment’s thought will show us that that probably isn’t what Jesus is talking about. Uprooting a tree and planting it in the ocean – what’s the point of that? What good could it do? As he sometimes does, Jesus is speaking in dramatic and exaggerated language about a different kind of power – about what makes it possible to love and forgive others and to persevere in God’s service even when there are no rewards. It isn’t about performing physical miracles. Perhaps there is a special “miracle working faith” which can move mountains. God can give that to people who need miracles – and as C.S. Lewis reminded us, times of miracles and times of martyrdom often go together. Be careful what you wish for.
What we need in our daily lives is not miracle working faith but just plain old faith, simple trust in God. We need it especially when trusting God seems counterintuitive – when we’re called to do things that seem to have no payoff for us, and when we don’t have any evidence that the God in whom we’re supposed to trust is doing anything.
The challenge
to our faith is usually not theoretical doubt about the existence of God. It is rather the question of whether God
cares anything about me. Is reality at
its most basic level hostile or indifferent to me, or is it really true that “God is love”?
The basis of that claim that God is love is Jesus Christ. Faith in Jesus Christ is faith in God. And that faith is not something we can summon up or grow on our own. “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit” Paul tells us. Then how can I say, and believe and trust in Jesus as my Lord? The catechism explanation of the Third Article of the Creed that I memorized in confirmation class put it this way:
“I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my
Lord, or come to him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith; even as He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth, and
keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith.”
“Called me by the Gospel” – by the Word of Jesus Christ, crucified and risen. The key is that God’s Word, the Word of love and forgiveness and promise is a living, powerful creative Word that does what it says. “God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light.” “Is not my word like fire, says the LORD, and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?” And it is that living, creative Word, the Word which was made flesh, which gives rise to faith and sustains it.
Where does that Word encounter us? It is the Word of Christ and is present in the proclamation of Christ. “Faith comes from what is heard,” Paul says, “And what is heard comes through the word of Christ.” The living Christ is present in the power of the Spirit when he is proclaimed, and faith in him is created, nurtured and strengthened.
That proclamation can happen in many ways and in strange places, sometimes from people you wouldn’t expect. But it is definitely supposed to happen in preaching.
That means that I have to tread a fine line here. Since a sermon is supposed to point to Christ, it shouldn’t be about the mechanics of preaching: A sermon about sermons misses the point. But some people don’t know what to look for in a sermon and don’t get it even if the sermon does point in the right direction, so some guidance may be helpful.
The basic purpose of a Christian sermon is not condemning sin, or telling people how to behave, or drumming up support for some program. Those may be parts of it, but there is no point in telling people what they should do if they have no will and no strength to do it. The source of spiritual energy is faith in the God who is made known to us in Jesus Christ, and the primary task of preaching is to proclaim Christ as the living Lord and savior, as the one who takes sinners by the hand and raises them up. When that is done, and when faith is created and strengthened, then along with it Christ is present as the pattern for the kind of people we are to be and the kinds of things we should be doing.
“Yes, we know all that” some will reply. “We learned that in confirmation class.”
Sure – but I’m not talking about knowing the basic facts and teachings of the Christian church. Preaching is not primarily a matter of conveying information but the proclamation of news. The New Testament’s word for proclamation refers to the task of a herald, the one who comes running into the city square cries out breathlessly that the invader has been defeated or that the king is on the way. we conquer!” The Gospel, the kerygma, is the cry “Christ is risen! Sin is defeated! You are forgiven and accepted by God!” And it is news today, even though you heard the same information last Sunday, and the week before that.
“The apostles said to the Lord, ‘Increase our faith!’” And the Lord responds in many forms. They are all in one way or another the Word of God, but God wants it to be as available and accessible as possible, precisely because it is meant for everybody in every condition of life.
First of all there is the appeal itself: “Increase our faith.” Increase my faith. It is a gift of God, and one that we should pray for. If your faith is weak, pray in that weak faith for stronger faith.
Listen for proclamation of Christ. You should hear it in the scripture readings and from the pulpit and other parts of the service. But you may hear it at other times – in some word from a friend or a stranger.
Read the Word and reflect on it. Let the news sink in. Try to understand it more deeply.
Be open to
what
Maybe the preacher botched up the sermon and there was no clear proclamation of Christ. We have done that on occasion. Fortunately it’s hard to botch up the Lord’s Supper, precisely because it’s the Lord’s Supper and not our property. “This is my Body, which is given for you. This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which is shed for you and for many, for the forgiveness of sins.” Those are not first of all the words of the celebrant but of Jesus Christ, and they do what they say. You can trust them.
You can
trust in God for the renewal and strengthening of faith, even when that faith
is confused or weak. That is because it
does not finally depend on any power of our own, but on the faithfulness of
God.