“You Need Purgatory!”
Text: Mark 1:9-15 & 2 Cor. 7:8-10
2-18-2024
In the name of our God who calls us to sincere repentance, dear friends in Christ. You may have noticed that sometimes I use a provocative sermon title to tweak your interest. If you’re a dyed-in-the-wool Lutheran, and you bothered to read the title today then I’m confident you’ve been sufficiently “tweaked.” The title is: “You Need Purgatory!” Now before anyone accuses me of preaching false doctrine, hear me out. You and I really do need purgatory. Not the purgatory that the Roman Catholic Church teaches, but a purgatory that takes place right here and now.
Let me explain. The Roman Catholic Church recognizes that we commit sins in this world; lots of sins. They believe you can do certain acts of penance which will remove some of those sins. The problem is that the guilt of all the rest of your many sins remains. And the guilt of those sins makes it impossible for you to get into heaven. So, according to their doctrine, after death you must go to a waiting area called purgatory where you sit as a punishment for thousands or even millions of years depending on how bad you’ve been. It’s called “purgatory” because it is a place of “purging.” You are supposedly purged of all your sins there, purifying you, and making you ready for heaven.
Obviously, as Lutherans we reject that whole concept because it brings into question the absolute effectiveness of Christ’s atoning death on the cross. If we must (or even can!) pay a price for any of our sins, then that means the death of Jesus wasn’t sufficient, which is something the Bible absolutely rejects. Instead, we believe and teach that the blood of Jesus paid the full price of all of our sins. Therefore, we don’t need a place called purgatory.
Okay, Pastor, then why did you say to us, “You Need Purgatory”? Well, think about the meaning of that word. Every single one of us is a sinner and we will not be able to enter heaven unless our sins are “purged” or removed from us. But you don’t need some imaginary place to go to be punished at for that purification to happen. No, your place of purging from your sins is right here on earth. It began on your Baptismal day when you were washed clean spiritually. There, the Holy Spirit purged all the sin from your soul. So, in this sense, your Baptism was your purgatory.
But that’s not the end of it. Since we live in a sinful world, we are constantly surrounded by and contaminated with sin. We have a sinful nature within us that wants to engage in all those sins. Therefore, we are constantly in need of being purged of our sins. The question we’re faced with is: What do you do with the guilt of those sins which you’ve committed after Baptism? Jesus supplies us with the answer. He says in verse 15 of the Gospel Lesson, “repent.” It is through the process of repentance that we are purged of all those sins.
Sadly though, repentance is misunderstood by too many Christians. It’s a whole lot more than just saying “I’m sorry” to God. David describes God’s process of repentance in Psalm 32. We can flesh out like this: The Holy Spirit shows you your sin and convicts you of it. A sincere believer is alarmed by this and goes to God in humble sorrow. We then confess our sins to God and beg Him for forgiveness. Just as He has promised, God is merciful and announces that our sin has been purged from us because of Jesus’ death on the cross. Then we ask the Holy Spirit to help us change our lives so we don’t fall into those same sins again. The problem is that we regularly mess up some vital areas of repentance, which brings into question whether the guilt of our sins has been truly purged from us.
The Waodani tribe is an indigenous people who live in Ecuador. This tribe was a murderous people who killed their enemies with spears. When Christian missionaries were sent to evangelize them, one of the major problems in relating to these people is that in their language there are no words for “I’m sorry.” To be quite blunt, many times we act as though we don’t have the words “I’m sorry” in our vocabulary. We have trouble saying it to our parents, spouse, children, and friends. We often simply refuse to say it. And if you have trouble saying “I’m sorry” to other people then rest assured you will have a problem saying it to God.
St. Paul addresses this in our Epistle reading. In verse 10 he says, “For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.” In other words, a shallow “I’m sorry” won’t cut it with God. For us to experience true “repentance that leads to salvation” it must be sincere sorrow over our sin. When the Holy Spirit shows a Christian the ugliness of their sin, that brings about the genuine, godly sorrow that Paul speaks of. However, another problem we face is that we don’t know how to confess our sins before God. We act as though we can just trot out a few sins and lay them before God when we say the Confession here in worship, as if that’s good enough. It’s not. God wants and expects “full disclosure” if you want to be completely purged of your sins. That doesn’t mean you have to name every last one of them. But it does mean humbly submitting your whole self to His purifying power.
In the book, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, C.S. Lewis tells the fictional story of a boy named Eustace. This lad was mean, hateful, greedy, and selfish. Mysteriously he was turned into a dragon. He literally became the monster that he was on the inside. After seeing himself for who he really was, he was sorry. He wanted to change but he didn’t know how. Well, Eustace is visited by the lion named Aslan who encourages him to remove the dragon skin from himself. Like a snake shedding its skin, Eustace scratched away layer after layer. But after each layer he found that he was still that ugly old dragon underneath. Then Aslan offered to remove the skin for him. When he did, his claws cut so deeply that Eustace thought he would die. As the layers of dragon skin were peeled away, it hurt him terribly. But the intense pain quickly gave way to the beautiful sensation of finally being totally free from all those layers that he could never remove. Suddenly he found that he was changed back into a boy again; but a different boy than the nasty one he had been before.
Lewis was trying to convey the concept of confession and true repentance in this story. You see, if we dilly-dally around trying to remove a layer of sin here and a layer there, we’ll be unsuccessful. We’ll find that we’re still the same monster of sin underneath it all. That’s because we can’t remove any of our sins. God has to do it. If we humbly come to Him without holding anything back, He will cut deeply and thoroughly remove every last sin. Yes, it’s painful. But if we want to experience the freedom of being totally purged of our sins, it’s the only way.
That’s what’s so powerful and beautiful about the Confession of Sins that we spoke earlier in the service. It takes us through that process of repentance. Did you pay attention to the words you spoke? “I, a poor, miserable sinner, confess unto You all my sins and iniquities with which I have ever offended You and justly deserved Your temporal and eternal punishment.” Some people don’t like saying “I, a poor, miserable sinner.” But that’s what we are! We’re acknowledging the ugliness of our sins and our pitiful condition. We go on to confess ALL our sins and iniquities by which we have EVER offended God. As you say those words, I pray that you visualize your heart being laid open before God in humble repentance as we also recognize the damnable, eternal consequences of our sins.
Then we express the Godly sorrow that St. Paul was talking about when we say, “But I am heartily sorry for them and sincerely repent of them and I pray You of Your boundless mercy and for the sake of the holy, innocent, bitter sufferings and death of Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ, to be gracious and merciful to me, a poor sinful being.” That’s our only hope– that God would graciously forgive us for Jesus’ sake.
I have the best job in the world, because after your sincere confession I have the privilege of publicly announcing that by God’s grace He has purged all your sins from you. In the Gospel reading Jesus didn’t just say, “Repent!” He said “Repent and believe in the Gospel.” The Gospel is the good news that through sincere repentance you’re clean again. Your soul is just as fresh and clean as it was on your Baptism Day. Martin Luther reminds us that we can have the joy of that forgiveness daily as we humbly confess our sins before God. St. Paul says that true repentance “leads to salvation without regret.” God’s desire for all of us sinners is to receive His total and free forgiveness which leads to a life with no regrets. So, open your heart to Him. Repent and confess your sins, knowing that for Jesus’ sake you will be purged of every last one of them and able to stand holy and pure in God’s sight. To Him be the glory now and forever. Amen.
Soli Deo Gloria!