“Worth Dying For?”
Text: Romans 5:1-11
2-25-2024
Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. In verse 7 of the Epistle Lesson today, St. Paul says, “For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die…” That got me to wondering: Is there anyone you would be willing to die for? I’m confident that if I had to, I’d gladly give up my life to save my wife. And I’d willingly die to protect my children or grandchildren. That’s not bragging. The deep love I have for my family would compel me to do it. And I think most of you would be willing to do likewise. But what about your extended family? Would you be willing to die for your parents or brother or sister? How about your aunt or uncle or cousin? Now the tricky one for some of you: Would you be willing to die for your mother-in-law or father-in-law? I certainly hope you could say yes.
But maybe that’s too easy. Let’s step a little further outside of our circle of intimacy and see what happens. Would you be willing to die for a friend? Or how about just an acquaintance? Hmm... I sense a little bit of hesitation. Yeah, maybe for a good friend we’d be willing to die. But someone we barely know? Maybe, maybe not.
We can all be thankful that there are people who willingly do this on a regular basis. Think of all the soldiers who have fought for this country. They laid their life on the line for people they never met. And yet, as they fought for our country’s freedom, it wasn’t just a faceless cause or some high ideal they were willing to die for. I’m sure, that in their minds, they saw the image of their wife, children, Mom and Dad, or brothers and sisters. That’s who they were fighting to protect.
We can also be thankful for another group who regularly lays their life on the line for complete strangers. It’s Police Officers. Many people don’t understand why cops are such a tight-knit bunch but it’s simple. There’s an unwritten code of loyalty among officers that says, “I’ll protect your life with mine. And I know you’ll protect my life with yours.” I can give you a vivid example of this from my time as a cop. Late one night while I was working the streets of North Omaha, my partner and I were outside talking to a citizen who had witnessed some teens breaking into his neighbor’s car. All of a sudden, I heard a voice yell something from the dark shadows about ½ block away. Then came the crack of a rifle and I heard the bullet whiz through the tree leaves overhead. Do you know how hard it is to dig a foxhole in concrete? I sure tried because I was totally exposed to the gunfire. As I scrambled for cover, I was worried about my partner’s safety and she was worried about me. And we were both worried about the safety of that citizen. Thankfully, we all walked away without a scratch.
Now in each of these examples that I’ve given you, we’ve been asking a critical question: “Is this person worth dying for?” And the answer was, “Yes!” But you know what? That’s still too easy. Because you see, in all of these scenarios, we’ve been talking about presumably “good” people. Sure, we’d gladly die to save our family. We’d die to save our friends. And like St. Paul says, it may be rare, but there are people willing to die in order to save an innocent stranger. But what if that person was “bad?” What if they were your enemy? What if they were actively fighting against you? Now would you be willing to lay your life on the line for them? Our human instinct would answer with a resounding “no way!” It goes completely against our grain.
And yet, that’s exactly what Jesus did for us. In verse 6, Paul says, “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.” In other words, when God looked down on this world, He didn’t say, “Hey, now there are some people who have great potential! They’re not as bad as all the rest. I’ll send my Son to save them, but not the others because those bad apples aren’t worth dying for.” On the contrary, when God looked down all He saw was an evil and hopeless mass of humanity. In His divine love and mercy, He had pity on us. And that mercy was shown regardless of your race, gender, age, intellect, or status in this world.
But Paul takes us to an even deeper understanding of the great sacrifice of love that Jesus made for us. He says in verse 8 that “while were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Let that sink in for just a minute. Because it totally destroys any thoughts of good works saving us. Jesus didn’t wait for us to make ourselves “good enough” to deserve His salvation. If that were the case, He’d still be waiting and we would be dying in our sins. Trying to solve the problem of our many sins with our good works would be like trying to drain the ocean with a thimble. It would be a lot of wasted energy. So, Jesus had to take the action to save us.
But it’s even worse than that. Up to this point, it only sounds like we were helpless sinners who passively found ourselves in this regrettable predicament. Paul makes it clear that we were much more than that. He says in verse 10, that we were “enemies” of God. An enemy isn’t just someone who falls a little short of being a friend. No. An enemy is someone who is opposed to you. We were far from passive about it. We were actively fighting against God. In our sinful condition we hated Him. And we gladly joined forces with Satan to work against God’s will. Human reason would tell us to turn our back on an enemy like this. An enemy like this is certainly not worth dying for. But God didn’t think so. Even though we were helpless, even though we were ugly with sin, and even though we were enemies, fighting against God, He decided we were worth dying for. Our human minds cannot comprehend a good reason for doing that. But in verse 8, Paul tells us why God chose to do so. He says it was simply because He loved us.
As Jesus hung on the cross dying for the sins of the world, I suspect that the devil was busy taunting Him. Looking down on the religious leaders and the Jews who were mocking Christ, I imagine the devil saying, “Well now, Jesus, are they really worth dying for?” Our Savior’s answer was, “Yes!” When Christ looked down and saw the Roman soldiers who had cruelly beat Him and nailed Him to the cross, the question again was, “Are they worth dying for?” And Jesus answered, “Yes!” When He thought of His disciples who had deserted and denied Him, the question again was “Are they worth dying for?” Still the answer was “Yes!” As He hung there dying, the thought of you and me and every rebellious sinner that ever lived passed before His holy eyes. With a mocking jeer, Satan asks “Are they worth dying for too?” And Jesus answered, “Yes, because I love them!”
Jesus willingly laid down His life for His enemies, so that we could be reconciled to God. In other words, because of the death of Jesus, we are no longer enemies but rather, we are friends with God. But we’re more than just friends. We have now been made to be His precious sons and daughters. And because we are God’s children, Paul tells us that something special has happened. In verse 5 it says that “God’s love has been poured into our hearts.” With that divine love in us, we are now able to do what was impossible for us before. We can now look at the people who have hurt us and love them instead of hating them because we know that Jesus said they were worth dying for. This divine love also inspires us to reach out to our family and friends who have fallen away from the Church. When we look at them, we no longer see someone who has rejected God. Instead, with God’s love in our hearts, we see hurting souls that Jesus said were worth dying for. So, we keep trying and reaching out to them.
I hope you can see how this divine love of God changes our hearts and our outlook on the world. Instead of just seeing it as evil and going to “hell in a hand basket,” we can now look at the world with the same loving pity which was in the heart of Jesus as He hung on the cross. There are still lost souls out there that Jesus said were worth dying for. May God fill us with love and compassion for all those souls that Jesus gladly died for. And may we be willing to sacrifice our comfort, our pride, our everything for the sake of the Gospel as we share it with other sinners who, like us, desperately need it hear it. Amen.
Soli Deo Gloria!