13th Sunday in OT 2020 - Dead to sin and living for Christ

Last week, we reflected  upon St. Paul’s treatment of original sin in his letter to the Romans: how Paul traces all the evil and sin and suffering in the world back to the sin of Adam. Because of sin, suffering wreaks havoc throughout human history; we can see sin’s effects all around us. Just yesterday, a young boy in our own neighborhood, on west 100th, was shot in a driveby shooting—in the brokenness in our families, our addictions, the moments where we lose control of our tempers, our arrogant refusal to ask for forgiveness when we’ve made mistakes and our arrogant refusal to grant forgiveness when we should.

After identifying the origins of sin and death, Paul, spoke last week about the remedy for sin and death. Do want healing for your mind and your soul? Do you want peace with God? Do you want eternal life? Do want any hope of justice—or a just society in this world? Turn to Jesus Christ. Believe and follow Jesus Christ. Though death entered the world through one man, life is available through another.

In this week’s reading from Romans, Paul explains how we can actually receive that remedy, that saving grace, new life: we must die to ourselves and rise through the waters of baptism. We must stop living for ourselves and put an end of sin; after all, that’s what got us in trouble in the first place.

In that first generation of Christians, baptism was such a critical point. Adults and whole families would prepare months for baptism, receiving instruction in the Christian faith. They’d learn and take to heart what it means that Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man, that he died for us and is risen and will come again to judge our souls. What does it mean to follow him? They’d study the scriptures and the teaching of the Apostles. They would renounce the old gods, the gods of the world, of Rome and Egypt. And they’d renounce their false idols: promising I will no longer make money or pleasure or power my ultimate aim, I will live first for God in Jesus Christ.

Yes, baptism meant membership in a community of like-minded believers, but baptism meant a real change of one’s behaviors and beliefs. Making a break with the sinful past, with those attitudes and behaviors which contradicted the teachings of Christ. And it meant a new beginning of embarking on a new mission where living the Gospel and spreading the Gospel was now to be life’s most important task. It meant striving to engage in the works of mercy as often as possible.

So, in today’s reading, Paul is not so much addressing those who were preparing for baptism, but those who have already baptized, like most of us here today. He writes, “Don’t you know that we who were baptized” were baptized into the death and resurrection of Christ, so that we might live in newness of life? Paul wants the already baptized to reflect upon what baptism entails—how their new identity in Christ is meant to shape and direct everything they do. Paul wants Christians to recognize that something which was dead in them is now alive and is able to accomplish mighty wonderous things.

And yet, Paul also recognizes that baptism isn’t magic; it does not take away our free will. The powers of sin and death are always going to be trying to take back control—the devil is always going to be trying to win his territory back. And we need to remain vigilant and exert tremendous effort to live consistently with our baptism.

“You must think of yourselves as dead to sin and living for God in Christ Jesus” he says. There’s your thought for when you wake up in the morning, dear Christians, to wake up, and say, I am dead to sin and living for God.

Centuries later, Pope Saint Leo the Great would give special post-baptismal instruction to the new Christians of Rome, saying "Christians, recognize your dignity and, now that you share in God's own nature, do not return to your former base condition by sinning. Remember who is your head and of whose body you are a member. Never forget that you have been rescued from the power of darkness and brought into the light of the Kingdom of God."

Never forget, he says. Recalling that we are baptized should bring joy when we are sad, direction when we are confused about what path to take in life, and strength when we are tempted. A powerful way to fight off temptation is to recall our baptism.  To say to ourselves, “wait, I’m a Christian, I’m not supposed to do that; I’m not supposed to talk like that. I’m supposed to act like Christ.”

During Ordinary Time, one of the spiritual practices that ought to be incorporated into our ordinary day to day life, is to recall our baptism, to recall our Christian dignity, and to ask God, what does my baptism demand of me today? What does mean to be a good Christian neighbor? What does it mean to be a good Christian grandparent? What does it mean to do business as Christian, or to date as a Christian, or use the internet as a Christian, to control my temper when I am angry, to control my eyes when I am lustful, to practice Christ-like humility when I want to be the one in change or the center of attention? What are the powers of death and evil which are trying to creep back into my life?

Until we make Christian faith, hope, and love the primary motivators in our life, there will be something missing in our relationship with God. We won’t get what we need out of going to church, we won’t consider daily prayer to be all that important. Why pick up the bible and read, if tv and sports and video games and gossip and shopping are more important?

Put God before all other allegiance. “Whoever loves father or mother or son or daughter more than me” is not worthy of me. Even family, that most precious relationship, is to be secondary to fulfilling one’s duties as a Christian. But whoever loses his life for my sake, who puts all the sins and vices and coldness and selfishness of our fallen natures to death, shall receive a newness of life that changes everything it touches.

Before leaving Church today, we do well to consider deeply, what needs to be put death in me? Where is the Holy Spirit urging me to live more fully for Christ? For the glory of God and salvation of souls.