There’s an old saying that carries a lot of truth, “Life is hard, then you die.”  We joke about it, but that’s because there’s more truth in there than we like to admit. Sometimes life is harder for one person than it is another and we see in this how unfair life can really be. 

Another cliché that we like to through around is that the grass is always greener on the other side. Again, we joke about it but it’s because it’s all too true in how we feel. Husbands have roaming eyes. Wives dream of picture perfect husbands.  Children wish for better parents.  Parents wish for better children.  People look for better pastors.  Pastors look for the perfect church.  None of it has ever been found, but that doesn’t stop our coveting and wandering hearts. We all shop for happiness as if we lived in a cafeteria with a menu of choices.  Sin has given us longing eyes but not wise ones.  We want what we do not have, what is easy, what satisfies our desires. 

It is no different when it comes to matters of faith. One of the biggest issues in the church over the last couple of generations is how people shop for religion the way we shop for everything else.  Denominational loyalties do not run as deep as they used to and all too easily people go from one church to another looking for that one thing, that one pastor, that one program that fits into what we think God and His church ought to be. 

Part of what drives this is nothing else than our fear.  We see that in our Gospel reading.  This comes right after a rich man asks Jesus what He must do to inherit eternal life.  Jesus answers him by speaking of the 10 Commandments, then by telling him to give up all that he has in this life to the poor and to come and follow Jesus.  The man walks away sorrowful, disheartened of how difficult that would be.

We fear the Lord’s way is too hard.  We are not wrong.  In the Gospel those closest to Jesus are amazing and disheartened just the way we often are.  This is too hard!   Who can do it?  You want an easy faith with all the right answers and only the amount of commitment you’re comfortable with.  That is what I want too.  But you will not find it here.  Jesus gives us no easy faith with easy answers but the hard truth of sin and death, of the cross and suffering, of salvation purchased with His blood.

And so Jesus speaks of this to His disciples, “‘How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!’  And the disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said to them again, “‘Children, how difficult it is to enter the kingdom of God!’”  And it’s true, isn’t it? This is the problem for us.

Being a Christian is too hard.  Of course it is.  Any time we surrender control and will to God we run the risk of disappointment, of prayers not answered, and of sins that still have consequences. But faith has no other way than the hard path of trust, of repentance, of the mystery of water, bread and wine, and of the promise of life already bestowed yet not fully realized.

Doctrine is too complicated.  Of course it is.  Not all churches offer the same Gospel.  Too many offer manufactured hopes crafted by the words, wisdom, and dreams of men.  But Christ gives us truth. A truth that has been revealed. A truth that can be known, believed, and confessed.  The Creed confesses this hard truth but does not explain it.  His truth is the Word made flesh, the Son of God who comes as the Son of Man, of righteousness bestowed instead of earned, and of salvation purchased in suffering and death. 

Truth is too offensive.  Of course it is.  We want some generic truth that everyone can tailor for personal preference. We want a broad truth that is like an umbrella to cover all our mistaken ideas of God.  Instead we get exclusive truth that is inclusive for all people, of all time, of all places.  Every one of us wants an easier faith and an easier Savior than one who leaves us destitute of our riches and our efforts to gain the kingdom of God.

If this is so hard, what can we do?  We certainly can’t thread a camel through the eye of the needle, much less do the 10 Commandments perfectly.  We hear of the vanity of trusting in our wealth and our goods, of the greed that keeps us from sharing the gifts that God has already given us. And the harm that our evil causes.  And no matter how hard we try when one temptation is overcome then another takes its place.  Who trust in our wealth, who trust in our stuff, who trust in our efforts and abilities will be sorely disappointed when death comes knocking at the door.  Death does care how much you have or how easy or hard life has been for you.

Then who can be saved?  What are we to do because it sounds like we can’t do anything!  And that’s exactly the point.  The wisdom of man cannot purchase salvation or cleanse the guilty or tame the wandering desires within.  You cannot reason yourself into the kingdom of God, you cannot buy your way into the kingdom of God, you cannot earn yourself into the kingdom of God, you cannot keep yourself in the kingdom of God.

But Jesus can, and Jesus does.  What is impossible with man is not with Christ, because He is that perfect Son of God.  But make no mistake, this too is difficult.  Jesus took all the suffering of the world and all the difficulties of life to Himself upon the cross. He would be first made Himself last so we who were last might become first in His kingdom.

The life of a Christian is a life of difficulties, of human impossibilities, of suffering.  The Christian has faith in God, but also an idol in which one is bent upon reliance upon the will of the sinful flesh.  When you grow in Christ, the battle against that sinful flesh will not get easier, but more difficult.  The struggle against self-righteousness, against the devil, against the sinful world will increase. The devil wants to you to see the difficulties of life, the difficulties of faith and to question and to despair. God wants you to see the difficulties of life, the difficulties of faith and to see the suffering and death and Jesus. God allows the difficulties, He allows the pain and suffering to draw you away from yourself and your vain pursuits and to bring you closer to Him in His Kingdom.

Yes, life is hard and then you die.  That is the difficult truth of living in this sinful and corrupt world.  But the difficulty of life and of death is not for you.  It is for Christ. For you, O people of God, there remains a Sabbath rest through faith in Christ. The Christian faith, the way of the Kingdom of God, the very cross of Christ is hard but it offers us the only outcome and answer for our sin, our guilt, our despair, and our death.   As hard as it is, Jesus is the only God we can know, the cross is the only place where sins are forgiven, and His salvation is the only hope for life beyond death.  May the Lord give us this faith that we may endure until He ushers in the age to come unto eternal life.  Amen

*This sermon was heavily modified by a sermon prepared by Pr. Larry Peters.