Grace and Peace to you from God our Creator, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ, Amen
This story is one of my favorites for many reasons. It happens in all four of the gospels, each writer telling a slightly different story. In the other three, the story is more about feeding the poor with the money that would be spent on the ointment poured on Jesus. This version is more about the sins of the woman, rather than her wealth, or lack thereof.
All four gospels point out the difference between the people of the house, and the people around them - how there’s a dramatic difference between them in some regard. And, if you think about it, many of the Gospels’ stories… are about exactly that. One group holding power over another group… and somehow, Jesus fits in the middle of it all, and brings peace.
Jesus takes the inequality of the woman’s sins, and negates them. Whatever sin she had, Jesus canceled them out. For that is the Gospel. That right there. That truth - that no matter who you are, where you come from, what you do, what you’ve done… Jesus cancels the debt seemingly owed to people and society… Jesus sets us free.
So… what is sin anyway? Can it be quantified like Jesus makes an allusion to in his parable? I’ll share with you the definition found in this little handy book, called Crazy Talk: A Not-So-Stuffy Dictionary of Theological Terms - edited by one of Luther Seminary’s Old Testament professors, Rolf Jacobson. In it he says -
Sin - “Theologically, people [are bad] at being human the way God intends humans to be because of a condition known as sin. Also known as ‘fallenness’, ‘brokenness’, and ‘the human condition’; sin refers to the state of who we are, the condition we are stuck in. The biblical story goes like this: God created everything and it was good (Genesis 1); God created human beings to play a special role within Creation (Genesis 1-2); sin entered into the world because of the rebellion of the first human beings (Genesis 3); ever since then, God has worked to cure the disease of sin (see the entire rest of the Bible).
The condition of sin has many unfortunate side effects. Instead of trusting and taking God at God’s word, we place our trust in other gods - most often the one who wears our face and clothes. Instead of trusting our neighbors, we distrust them and drive them away.” (p. 161)
Dr. Jacobson’s point - is that sin permeates who we are, no matter who we are… we are sinful beings. Sin is in our nature. It is Christ who set us free from that sin - so that we may go out into the world and worry about many other things that need to be worried about - rather than our own perceived sin.
Sin is a troubling thing. A complicated thing. We think we know what sin looks like. We call actions, feelings sin - where there is none. Sin is bounced about like candy at a parade. Placing blame, pointing fingers at other people for their perceived sin helps no one. Pointing the sin inward - pointing out our own sin - our own misgivings - our own troubles… There - there powerful work can be done. When we start to look inside at who we really are, deep inside… but we can’t do that too much either.
The last time I preached, I talked about humility and confidence. Humility is what keeps us grounded and confidence is what keeps us going… So. I noted that if we have too much of either, nothing works correctly. Thus - if we look deep inside, and see too much sin - think we’re not good enough or whatever… then shame comes into play - and that’s a very dark place to be.
How much shame do you think the woman had in the Gospel this morning? Jesus describes her as woman with many sins… like baggage carried around with her. How much shame does it take to kneel at the feet of her lord, and wash his feet - with her tears. Because of her perceived sinfulness - She felt ashamed enough to wash his feet with her tears and hair. And then Jesus does the unthinkable - something no one expected him to do. Jesus forgives her of all her sins. Just as the man in the parable forgave all the debt. Jesus forgave this woman’s sin. All of them.
I asked in the beginning if you could quantify - or count sins. How many sins does it take to qualify for ‘many sins’? What kind of sins? Let’s go with an easy one that all of us do probably on a daily or weekly basis. Lying. Now, you may not actively go about lying to everyone you see… but… think of it this way. Most of you have smart phones, computers, or other devices that help you connect with the modern world. And if you don’t that’s okay too. For every program you install on a computer, there’s what’s called an ‘End-User License Agreement’ or ‘EULA’. They’re usually really long, pages and pages and pages of things that dictate how you use the program. Most of them basically boil down to: don’t steal this program and claim that it’s yours.
Well, guess what - How many of you have ever read every single word of every one of those agreements? But you click on the ‘I have read and fully understand everything that I’m agreeing to’ button… and your program installs. Now, all you did was click a button. But that’s still lying, even if it’s to a computer. Lying is a sin. You have committed a sin.
Like I said, we probably do it on a daily or weekly basis. Sometimes, we just can’t help it, or think it’s not really a big deal. Honestly, all sin is equal under God, and we all fall short to the glory of God… We are all sinful people. But we are also saints. Luther had a famous saying, that we are all simultaneously sinner and saint. You see, like I keep saying, God’s got this taken care of.
In fact, God had this taken care of long before you were ever born. The hope and promise found in the Good News of Jesus the Christ is what took care of our sin for us. Our Christ, our Messiah lived among many sinners of many sins, man and woman alike. Jew and Gentile alike. Jesus taught, caught, walked, talked, preached, fed, healed, cured, resurrected… and died for us all, to save us all from ourselves. From our many sins. For it is this salvation - this grace from God that permeates our sin, our brokenness, our reality as humanity. God’s grace, that was poured out from God and is freely bestowed to all of us in the name of Christ… This grace, love and mercy from God - they’re unwinnable, unattainable… and there’s no amount of sin that will ever take that promise away. There’s absolutely nothing you can ever ever do - to make God love you less. God’s got this taken care of.
God’s love is more powerful than your sin. God’s love overtakes anyone’s perceived sin, and washes it clean. In the waters of baptism, we are made clean, called and named children of God and we are tasked from that moment to live into the Gospel - to learn the commandments of the church, to read and get to know the Holy Scriptures… So that we may one day go out into the world and make the world a better place for us all. God’s love, God’s forgiveness, God’s salvation… sets us free from the chains of sin that weigh us down, and sets us up to live out our calling.
Christ died for you, for me, for us all. Whatever sins you carry around with you, however many sins you carry around with you… know that you are loved, and saved from the burden of that sin.
Earthly sins are divinely forgiven, but still earthly punished. Sins against ourselves are between ourselves and God. Sins against another person are sins that require apology, repentance, forgiveness, and in some cases, consequences. Like the quote from Dr. Jacobson said, we are terrible at being human the way God intends humanity to be. So we rectify that. We learn from other’s mistakes, and try to make the world a better place for us all.
Sin abounds, and grace abounds. We are simultaneously sinner and saint. We live in the grey of life, and we try to make that grey a little brighter for us all, through the work of God and the Good News. This is our calling. This is who we are.
God’s mercy endures forever.
Amen.
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