Pasadena Presbyterian Church Sermon Text
April 6, 2003

"Whatever Happened to Sin?"
Preached by The Rev. Dr. Barbara Anderson

Scripture:  Psalm 51: 1-12

(1) Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. (2) Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.  (3) For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.  (4) Against you, you alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are justified in your sentence and blameless when you pass judgment.  (5) Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me.  (6) You desire truth in the inward being; therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.  (7) Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.  (8) Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones that you have crushed rejoice.  (9) Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities.  (10) Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.  (11) Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me.  (12) Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain in me a willing spirit.

- Psalm 51: 1-12

My father died of cancer four years ago.  Because for 23 years he had lived with heart problems, my family assumed he would die one day of a heart attack, probably while on the roof fixing his ham radio antenna.  Never in our wildest nightmares did we think we would have to deal with cancer.  Yet there he was, living the final agonizing six weeks of his life in a gracious hospice facility set beside a beautiful pond, with bird feeders outside each window.  The staff helped patients and families through the changing seas of life, death and grief with humanity, grace and dignity. 

I was fortunate to spend a week there with my father, spelling my mother and sister who had been with him around the clock.  He was restless through the night, sleeping a little, and then waking up.  Each time he'd awaken, we'd talk a bit, then I'd read to him until he fell asleep again. 

One night, after I had been reading to him from the Psalms, we fell quiet and sat together in a deep silence.  Eventually he asked the question that nearly always comes at such a time of agony: "What did I do to deserve this?  I must have done something really awful, but I can't remember what it was.  I just know it must have been something terrible for God to punish me like this."

My heart ached for him.  My father was a good man and had done his best to live as a faithful Christian.  His anguish was not only physical, but deeply spiritual as well.  His eyes pleaded for an answer from his daughter, the pastor.  With all my theological education and years of pastoring behind me, I prayed desperately for God's help to speak to the deepest needs of my father's heart. 

As often as I have preached about God's role in human suffering, my father and I had never discussed it.  So first, I said that I do not believe God sends illness or hardship as punishment for our actions. I said, quietly, that death comes in many ways, and some of them, like his, are very difficult and the pain lasts longer than we wish, but that none of these illnesses, even when prolonged, is a punishment from God.  "God is giving you the strength to withstand it," I said, "and the family to be with you until the end comes. That's where God is in this. I don't believe God wants this suffering any more than you do."

But I knew the underlying question was still not answered. After a moment of silence, I remembered a story I had read in Space for God by Don Postema earlier that night when my father was dozing. It is a saying from the Desert Fathers. 

"Abba Mios was asked by a soldier whether God would forgive a sinner.  After instructing him at some length, the old man asked him: Tell me, my dear, if your cloak were torn, would you throw it away?  Oh, no! He replied, I would mend it and wear it again.  The old man said to him: Well, if you care for your cloak, will not God show mercy to his own creature?" (Yushi Nomur, "Desert Wisdom: Saying from the Desert Fathers," pg.11)

God loves you, Dad, and would never throw you away, nor make you go through this torment for some sin you can't even remember.

My father and I never broke our gaze.  He smiled weakly, nodded a little, and squeezed my hand.  Then he asked me to read to him again and drifted off into a peaceful sleep.  I wiped tears off my cheek, tears of love for my father and gratitude to God for a prayer answered. 

I hope that the story of the cloak was a comfort to my father until the end.  It has been a comfort to me in the years since.  Like the torn cloak, my life and yours are torn by sin.  When we sin, we do that which is contrary to the will of God, and our relationship with God and one another becomes ruptured and broken. 

"You shall love the Lord your God with all you heart, soul, mind and strength, and your neighbor as yourself," says Jesus.  Love God, love neighbor, love self.  Everything contrary to that commandment fits under the definition of that old fashioned word, sin.

Some of our sins are small and easily repaired.  We speak harshly to our mate or to a friend.  So we ask forgiveness and begin again.  We know someone needs our help and we have both the time and resources to respond if we wanted, but we choose not to.  Then our conscience nudges and we reach out gingerly, praying forgiveness for our selfishness. 

Some of our sins are larger and need greater action for remedy:

• we fritter our money away while people are hungry and homeless;

• we fritter away our time while children need tutors;

• we nurse grudges against individuals and groups and even nations;

• we squander earth's resources for our selfish convenience;

• we neglect our covenants with spouse or partner, stop working at the relationship, or let our attention and affection wander elsewhere. 

Each of these sins, small and large, are not only against the person we have wronged or the creation we have injured.  Each of these sins, small and large, is, as the psalmist says, a sin ultimately against God.   Each and every one of us - whether we bristle at the notion of confession or not - has, in both small and large ways, as the Apostle Paul says, has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. 

We may not want to acknowledge it.  We may not want to see the impact of our actions.  We may try everything in our power to defend our ourselves, blame the other person or the circumstances of our life, blame our parents or our boss, pretend we have no responsibility, claim that we are powerless to do anything different. 

But here in this sacred space we name the truth, in the pages of scripture we read the truth, in the stillness of our hearts, God speaks the truth: all of us have sinned and fallen short of what God creates us and wants us to be.  This is why we are so deeply grateful for the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.

Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.

For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.

Against you, you alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are justified in your sentence and blameless when you pass judgment.

Our cloaks are torn.  Our lives are torn and our relationships damaged.  The earth is growing frayed and our world is ragged this day because of our human sin, both small and large.  In this season of Lent, our Lord's death demands that we examine our own sin and complicity in evil.

Unless we tend to these tears in the cloak of human life, acknowledging and addressing them, they become more and more ragged and difficult to mend. 

Barbara Brown Taylor writes of a: "Lebanese Presbyterian classmate who threw a theological temper tantrum during his first semester in seminary. 'All you Americans care about is justification!' he howled.  'You love sinning and being forgiven, sinning and being forgiven, but no one seems to want off that hamster wheel.  Have you ever heard of sanctification?  Is anyone interested in learning to sin a little less?'" (from "Speaking of Sin: The Last Language of Salvation")

We sin, we ask for and are given forgiveness, we try to sin less, trying each day to grow more and more into the fullness of Christ.  Always, in this endless pattern of sin and forgiveness, justification and sanctification, we pray to God,

Teach me wisdom in my secret heart. 

Wash me and I shall be clean. 

Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. 

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. 

Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain in me a willing spirit.

God does not throw us away, but washes away the dirt off our soul and mends the torn places of our life.  We stand beneath this cross because we dare to trust that God does not throw away us away. 

We dare to trust that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.  While we were still sinners, Christ was raised for us.  And while we are still sinners, Christ prays for us.  Christ died because of our sin, and Christ raised so that we would know God reaches across the chasm of our sin with eternal love and victory over evil.

Torn and dirty with our sins and the sins of the world, we walk with Jesus to Calvary and kneel at the foot of his cross, that his tears and blood may wash us clean and mend our lives.  "Create in me a clean heart O God, and restore to me the joy of your salvation."

Sin is real, in my life and yours.  So too, are mended cloaks.  So too, is the love of God in Christ Jesus, our crucified and risen Savior.  Amen.

(c) Copyright 2003 by Barbara A. Anderson.  All rights reserved.  Permission granted for non-profit use with attribution.