Luke 20: 27-38

(Sermon by Pastor Michael D. Schultz 11/18/07)

INTRODUCTION:

Fishing for bullheads with a bamboo pole... Pulling a pie out of the oven and serving it to afternoon guests...  I remember a grandfather who could put a worm on a hook seemingly without thinking about it or even looking at it, a man who tagged at least one deer (sometimes more) for fifty years straight.  I remember a grandmother who always had hugs and smiles for us, even through years of poor health.  Like everyone, they saw their fair share of trouble and had their fair share of problems and heartbreak.  But even if, by today’s standards, their net worth was on the lower end of the scale, they were some of the happiest people I’ve ever known.

As things worked out, I wasn’t in attendance at either of their funerals.  We lived a country away and a combination of circumstances didn’t really allow for it.  But in our extended family we knew that being at a funeral or even having a funeral is not the most critical thing.  We also knew how outrageously short of the mark it falls to think, as is sometimes said, that our grandparents would live on in our fond memories of them.  I have fond memories of them, but they’re not living in my memory.  They’re living in heaven with the Lord of Hosts.  They are among the saints triumphant.

At the end of the day, that is what it’s all about, right?  It’s not all about enjoying football season or having the nicest house or houses that you can afford or putting kids in the best programs available or being insulated from all forms of terror and crime or paying off a mortgage or being able to travel after you retire.  It’s about wearing the victor’s crown of gold, crossing the finish line and receiving the completely undeserved gracious gift of life with God forever through faith in Jesus.  If you strain your ears a little, you can hear Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and a good many others singing the distant triumph song.  The brief time we have on this earth was never given to us so we can be fixated on things here. 

THE GOAL OF IT ALL:
Taking Your Place Among The Saints Triumphant

That’s why there are church services and Bibles.  That’s why there’s Jesus, born in Bethlehem, nailed to a tree, risen from the grave and ascended into glory – so that after feebly struggling through this life, we can shine in glory in the life to come.  When taking your place among the saints triumphant is the goal of it all, pursuing that goal will lead you to compare this age with that age.  It will lead you to compare being worthy with being counted worthy.  Those comparisons will make you long for heaven and will make you confident that you will be there.

It’s so hard to describe, though, because this age is nothing like that age.  There’s so much death here and there’s no death there – no caskets, no cremations, no funeral homes, no funeral services, no grave markers, no grief, no fear of death, no mention of death.

And no marriage?  (No snickering or elbowing between husbands and wives right now!)  Yes, marriage is only for this life.  When marriages produce children, people who have died are, in a sense, replaced.  In a place where people don’t die, there’s no longer a need to replace them by having children.  It is certainly true that when grandma and grandpa die in the Christian faith they are together again in heaven, but they are no longer husband and wife. 

In the age to come, family relationships as we know them will have ceased.  The people of heaven are children of God – one family.  They are related to and friends with everyone equally – no partiality, no favorites, no cliques, no dividing into groups by family or age or gender or race or interests or hobbies or where you grew up or what team you cheer for.  In God’s good time there is the resurrection of the body, when God’s people are again and forever body and soul together, and glorified like Jesus.  There’s recognizing and knowing everyone and there is without a doubt an equality of bliss because all the saints triumphant are with the Good Shepherd.  

The goal of it all is taking your place among the saints triumphant, because when this age and that age are placed side by side, it’s like, “Why are we even making this comparison?!” This age should hardly even be mentioned in the same breath with that age.

Being there has an importance to it that trumps everything else.  If you had one opportunity to demonstrate that you were worthy to stand among the saints triumphant in the presence of the holy God, what would your presentation include?  Could you show the Lord the home movie of your whole life and smile and say, “That ought to get me a place.”  Or would the captioned thoughts and the spoken words and the observable actions on that movie bury you forever in the place where God is not?  We are not worthy to take part in that age or to have our bodies raised to live with the Lord.

Praise God Almighty that Jesus didn’t say “those who are worthy of taking part in that age.”  He said, “those who are considered worthy.”  There’s a big difference between being worthy and being counted worthy.  Jesus didn’t live a life without sin for himself.  He lived it for you, to give it to you.  He didn’t die for his own sins because he didn’t have any.  He died in payment for yours, to rid you of sin.  He is now alive and will never die again, and neither will you because of the promise he makes you: “My Father counts you (considers you, regards you, declares you) worthy of heaven, because all that he sees when he looks at you is me - my holiness that covers you, my death that paid for you.  He loves you like he loves me.”  Being so unworthy but being counted worthy of heaven because of Christ - what in all the world beats that?

When an 80-year-old Moses stood before the burning bush and the Lord told him to go down to Egypt and lead the Israelites out of slavery, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had been dead for around 400 years.  In reality, they hadn’t been dead that long at all.  That whole time they’d been living with the living God, as they are right now, as are all who have died in the confidence that Jesus alone is the way and the truth and the life.  Grandma and Grandpa Schultz, not dead for x number of years now, but living with the living God that whole time, no longer husband and wife but happier than ever to be rubbing shoulders with the patriarchs/prophets/Mary/Joseph/ Peter/Paul, and happier than anything to be living with Jesus where there is no death.  People you’ve known and loved who’ve died in the Christian faith are living with the living God.  And the goal of it all – to take your place among the saints triumphant.  Jesus has given you a place among them.  He will bring you to that goal.

(Top Of Page)

(Back To Archive)

(Current Worship Page)