Matthew 21:23-32. "Is Christianity an Ethical System?"

This Sunday sermon, based on Matthew 21:23-32, was preached at Grace of God Lutheran on October 1, 2023. Scripture selections come from the New International Version. 

Our services are at 9:30am on Sundays mornings, at our campus in Dix Hills on Long Island. Visit our website for more information, at www.graceofgod.church.

Transcript

Is Christianity an Ethical System?

Matthew 21:23-32

Grace and peace to you in the name of Jesus, friends. Amen.

This conversation we read earlier takes place on Tuesday of Holy Week. Some Bible scholars have pegged the date as March 30, year 33. There’s differences of opinion as to exactly what year in history Jesus died, which is not uncommon in dealing with history so far in the past. The question historians ask isn’t whether the event took place, but precisely when. 

Regardless - Jesus is three days from hanging on his cross here. And over those last few days, we see that Jesus is concerned for the Church and her preaching and teaching.

Let me explain what I mean by “church” there. We often think of “church” as a building. I usually work out of my office at home, but sometimes I’ll let my wife know, “I’ll be working over at church today.” The building.

When I say, “Jesus was concerned for the Church and her preaching and teaching,” I don’t mean a building. As our text notes, he went “to the temple” in Jerusalem that day to teach and preach. That was their “church” building. But it’s not the building that concerned Jesus. It was the people who worshiped there. That’s really what church means; not a building, but a congregation, a group of people gathered around God’s Word. That’s a church. And more than “a church,” Jesus is concerned for the Church. 

People may belong to this, that, or another visible church. Our second reading was a letter dictated by Jesus to one particular church, a congregation in the Greek city of Ephesus. But behind and above every visible church is the invisible Church. Everyone who believes in Jesus as their Lord and Savior belongs to that Church. I am a fully convicted Lutheran - that is to say, I am convinced that the Lutheran tradition’s theological conclusions properly reflect the Bible’s teachings over other theological traditions - and because I am a fully convinced Lutheran, I am convinced that Lutherans aren’t the only ones who belong to that invisible Church. 

Lutherans have never claimed that. Other groups have claimed and do claim it. Many American evangelicals will insinuate that Catholics aren’t Christians, for instance. For their part, Catholics hold that they are the only true church to which believers should belong.

Lutherans, in contrast, have always held two assertions in tension. One, the only criteria for belonging to the invisible Church is faith in Jesus, not denomination. Yet two, correct teaching is important, and a Christian should seek out preachers and teachers and churches that teach the Bible rightly. Because while the only thing that brings someone into the invisible Church is faith in Jesus, any improper teaching in the church can and does overshadow Jesus.

That’s what concerned Jesus during the last days before his death. His life, death, and resurrection had been prophesied for centuries beforehand. He would be fulfilling the promises God had made to Adam, four thousand years before; Abraham and Jacob, two thousand years before; David, a thousand years before. Promises made to them, and promises made through others as well. Through Moses, Isaiah, and Micah. And only three years prior, these promises had been made once more through the last prophet, John the Baptist. 

What were these promises? God had promised to send forth a man who would live perfectly and die a horrible death in total innocence. God had promised that this man’s death would be a blessing to all people, of all time. And God promised that he would not force this on one of his creatures. What a monster God would be, to create someone whose only purpose in life was to suffer! Instead, God himself would be this suffering man. 

If you feel that God has it out for you - that your only purpose in life is to suffer - know that this is not true. Only one person in history has ever had such a life, and God would not, could not, subject any of his creation to such a thing. Rather, Jesus, the Son of God, God from God, Light from Light, as we’ll speak in the creed after today’s message - he was God’s suffering servant. 

The whole Bible attests to him. He is witnessed to on each and every page. On some, he is prophesied. On others, our need for him is laid bare. Because this is what God intended to work through Christ, this is the blessing which he would be to the whole world: His death, for our sin. His innocence, credited to us sinners. That message, that promise of that particular blessing, of salvation, that’s the Bible’s message. We call that message, the Gospel.

The Gospel hinges on Jesus. Without Jesus, there is not a Gospel, a good-news message. And in particular, the Gospel hinges on his death and resurrection. Without those events, there is no good news from God for us. There is no promise to which we can cling. There is only the fear of judgment for our sin.

If you remove Jesus from Christianity, it becomes nothing more than an ethical system. There are two versions of this. First, there’s what I’ll call modernist Christianity. This is Christianity without God stepping into our flesh and blood, Christianity reduced to the “best way to live life.” If you hear someone preaching that Easter teaches us to recycle, that’s modernist Christianity. If you hear someone preaching a seven week series on Steps to a Happier Marriage, that’s modernist Christianity. I think you should recycle; I think the Bible has powerful things to speak into every marriage. But to make Christianity into that is to remove Jesus.

The other ethical system which removes Christ from Christianity is legalism. This is Christianity with God stepping into our world not to save, but to judge. It denies Christ’s statement about his mission in John three: “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” When you hear someone who can’t stop asking, “Is this a sin? Is that a sin?” you’re hearing someone struggling with the legalist ethical system, not Christianity. And when the religious leaders barged up to Jesus in our reading today, badgering him by asking, “By what authority are you doing these things?” you’re hearing the words of people living under legalism.

Legalism had totally overshadowed Jesus in the Church during his time on earth. The teachers and the preachers proclaimed an ethical system. “Do this, and thou shalt live.” The promise-message of a Savior coming to give his life as a ransom for his creatures was lost. But the common people - the people in the pews - hungered for that promise. So they devoured Jesus’ preaching, because he brought that promise forth. Where they had been attending church and hearing a steady drumbeat of “do this” and “avoid that,” Christ came preaching not works, but faith. Every congregation which had him as a guest preacher during his ministry was blown away by his focus not on ethical behavior, but on the promises of God regarding the Messiah. They were used to that message being entirely overshadowed.

Then, the day before what we’re reading, on Monday of Holy Week, Jesus had come to the temple in Jerusalem and found that the message was literally overshadowed. The temple’s courtyard was entirely filled with vendors; people hawking animals for sacrifice, others exchanging money for the particular coins required to pay the temple taxes. This was to be a place testifying to God’s promise of ultimate forgiveness through shed blood, and instead it was like scrolling a low budget news website. Advertisements everywhere.

So Jesus cleared the place out. Overturned the tables, knocked over the benches. Ethically very murky! What ethical system gives a private citizen the right to disrupt others engaged in lawful commerce? And to be clear, during his life on Earth, Jesus was a private citizen. Not a king, not a law enforcement professional, not the building’s landlord! So - the next day, the teachers and the preachers showed up to confront him. “‘By what authority are you doing these things?’ they asked. ‘And who gave you this authority?’” 

Jesus’ reply: “I will also ask you one question. If you answer me, I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. John’s baptism—where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?” 

I don’t know what to call this answer. Profound isn’t the right word. Maybe clever is better. I think the best word might even be something like, cheeky! He’s almost taunting them! He’s thumbing his nose at them in front of the crowds. But it’s not just a cheeky, clever non sequitur. He’s pointing out something important. They want him to explain the source of his authority. He’s telling them, “Even if I told you, you wouldn’t be qualified to judge that answer!” If they can’t judge for themselves what right preaching and teaching in the Church is - if they can’t honestly evaluate the ministries of himself or of John the Baptist - then they have no business questioning him. Because they ought to know better. They are the teachers and the preachers. They are the ones who should know that he is the central message of their Scriptures. They ought to be pointing the people to him; proclaiming and extolling him. Instead, their concern is for their ethical system.

So Jesus tells the teachers and preachers, “The tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you.” Why? Because the teachers and the preachers have completely overlooked what God asks of them. 

God asks of the teachers and the preachers the same thing he asks of the tax collectors and the prostitutes. “Go and work today in the vineyard.” Christ says that this request symbolizes repentance. The leaders were probably baffled by this assertion. What could Christ identify in their lives that needed changing? They were not like the average tax collector of those days, who would tell citizens they owed one amount and tell the Romans that a lesser amount was due, and keep the change for themselves. They were not like sexually immoral prostitutes. And God, to be clear, did not approve of the activities of those groups; not the theft of the one, not the fornication of the other. But the issue which the teachers and preachers failed to identify in their own lives was their failure to proclaim Christ. 

Expect that your preachers and teachers reliably and regularly deliver over to you the promises of God regarding your Savior. I am not here to deliver over an ethical system to you. If you consistently hear an ethical system from me (“vote this way” - “avoid these things” - “seven tips for your marriage” - “recycle”), tell me to get back in my Bible. Because I do not need to deliver ethics to you. I need to deliver Law and Gospel.

There is a distinction to be made between ethics and the teaching of the Law which I do as a preacher. Ethics can be satisfied. Ethics is the Law-lite, an easy Law to fulfill. The Law which your preacher must deliver over to you needs to crush. Needs to kill. Needs to tell you that no matter how good you are, it is not good enough! The Law is the proclamation to both prostitutes and preachers that there is no hope for them. That is not ethics! That is tables being overturned.

Then your preacher needs to proclaim to you the Gospel. God’s own Son was born into this world to live perfectly in your place and die innocently in your place. His innocence and his perfection are delivered over to you as a gift, for you to possess, by no merit of your own. How are they delivered over? Through this proclamation. Through this water. Through this bread and wine. By these means, God delivers over to you what he has promised; forgiveness and salvation in the righteousness of Jesus. And through these means, God’s Holy Spirit comes to dwell in your heart. And he takes you beyond ethical systems. Ethical systems can really only answer this question: “What should I do?” But you are turned by God’s Spirit outside of yourself to your neighbor; to everyone whom God places before you each and every day. And the question you ask in this new life which is faith is no longer, “What should I do?” but “What do they need?” That’s not ethics; that’s love. Amen.