Video to come.
Morning Message Text: Ephesians 2: 4-9
4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy,
5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.
6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus,
7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—
9 not by works, so that no one can boast.
Morning Message:
How many of you feel like you have a very big ego? None of us would own up to being egotistical, but the truth is, all of us are to a certain degree. Listen to the definition of ego. “The self of a person. The component of the psyche that experiences and reacts to the outside world”. If our ego is too big, we call that conceited. I was given something to look at this week that is going to take me a while to digest, but I was intrigued by one of the comments in this video. They said that ego is the story that you built to survive your fears. Wow! That is very deep, and I don’t want to take us too deep this morning, but think about what that means. We tend to think of people with big egos as very confident people. We might say something like, “They are just full of themselves.” But maybe it’s just the opposite. Maybe that big ego is not out of confidence but instead it is a facade to cover fears. The bigger the ego the more unsure and fearful the person is. The more mature we become in our faith the less we care about what the world thinks of us. We don’t need ego because Jesus takes away our fear.
Philippians 2: 8 says, “He humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross”. When we look at the actions of Jesus we see no ego. Actually, what we see is the opposite of ego, we see pure humility. I say pure humility because there is a lot of fake humility in our world. There is no hidden motives in pure humility. The two words human and humility share a common Latin root word: humus, which means dirt. Humility is perhaps the most human quality of all, for it points us to our created origins from dirt, and to which, in death, we must return. Reminds us of our Ash Wednesday service. As I make the sign of the cross on your forehead what do I say? “From dust you came, to dust you shall return.”
There is another word that comes from that same root word. Humiliation is the violent act of the proud and arrogant who dismiss or violate others, reducing them to dirt. Such humiliation is a tragic and sinful reminder of our pride. And in it, we fail to realize that the cries of the humiliated reach the ears of God. Even though He was free, Jesus took the form of a slave. Jesus emptied himself of His right to the glory that was His. To all outward appearances, He would be a human being among others. Jesus did not care what He looked like. There was no ego, no self, no retreat or second thoughts. I would have said, “Do you know who I am?” He went like a lamb to the slaughter.
In our human pride, we are tempted to grasp what glory we can and to distinguish ourselves above other human beings. Instead of emptying ourselves, we seek to grasp for money and possessions and to hoard power, privilege, and prestige. We even pigeonhole people and place them into lower castes of life. But in all of this, we are merely slaves to our prideful selves, to our ambitions, to our need to be better that most, to our egos that we have built to protect ourselves. It is a path that leaves us empty and lost, where we are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves.
That is our human condition, but that is not our fate as born again believers in Jesus Christ. 1Peter 1: 18-19 says, “You know that you were ransomed from the futile conduct inherited from your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without defect or blemish.” Martin Luther, echoed the words of Peter’s epistle: “He has freed me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil, not with gold or silver but with his holy, precious blood and with his innocent suffering and death.” This is not only at the heart of the Gospel, but at the heart of the lordship of Jesus the Christ. As our Lord, Jesus is our gracious owner. Through His death and resurrection, Christ purchased us, paying the price for our disobedience, bringing us into right – and – righteous relationship with God – one that we could never earn.
Jesus would know us not only in the truth of our humility but also in the tragedy of our humiliation. He was humbled as a human being, and He bore the great and terrifying humiliation of the cross. Jesus emptied himself in order to redeem us from this sinful reality of our humanity. Bearing our burden on the cross, He poured out His life upon us all, setting us free to be children of God. We place our trust in the cross of Christ by which we are ransomed. Christ gives us His own precious blood so that we may be a new people, without effect or blemish. You are Christ’s valuable possession through the price of His precious blood. And, Christ is the gracious Lord we hold on to in faith! Lord, we give you thanks for ransoming us from our sin through your precious blood shed on the cross. Amen.
In Christ’s Love and Peace,
Pastor Bob
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