March 14, 2010 Luke 15:1-7 2

Corinthians 5:16-21 “What’s

New? Everything!”
Dr. Ted H. Sandberg

“Whether apocryphal or not, there’s a splendid story that illustrates the centrality of [today’s sermon
text to Lent]. It’s reported that Karl Barth, [the German theologian who urged the German church to
stand up to Adolf Hitler], Barth was once asked what he would say to Adolf Hitler if he ever had the
chance to meet the monster who was destroying Europe and who would ruin the whole world if he
were not stopped. Barth’s [questioner] assumed that Barth would offer a scorching prophetic
judgment against the [dictator’s] awful politics of destruction. Barth replied, instead, that he would do
nothing other than quote Romans 5:8: ‘God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners
Christ died for us.’ Only the unparalleled mercy and forgiveness of God, the unstinted gladness and
grace of the gospel, could have prompted the Führer’s genuine repentance. To have accused him,
though justly, of his manifold abominations would have prompted Hitler’s self-righteous defense, his
angry justification of his allegedly ‘necessary’ deeds, [Barth suggested].”1
This is a wondrous message that we as Christians are to proclaim. No matter what a person has done
or hasn’t done, Christ died for that person. No matter how great the sin, God is willing to forgive.
And vice versa. Even if we feel our sins are small in comparison to the sin of someone else, we still
are in the need of God’s mercy, because we don’t forgive ourselves. God forgives. When we’re
forgiven, as Paul tells us, we’re made new, or as Jesus told Nicodemus, we’re reborn.
But what happens when we’re made new? There are a myriad of answers to that type of question, but
the answer we’ll focus on this morning is that when we’re reborn, God asks us to see the world in new
ways, with reborn eyes. Our new birth in Christ calls upon us to see the world differently, to see the
world as if it had been turned upside down. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “From now on, therefore,
we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point
of view, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation:
everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”
So what does this mean, our world is turned upside down? To a large degree, it means that we’re to
see the world differently from those who don’t know Jesus as their Lord. In the movie, Dead Poet’s
Society, John Keating, played by Robin Williams, is an English professor at a boys prep school in
1959. He wants his students to “Seize the day.” To do this, it’s important that they look at the world
from a different perspective. Williams jumps up on his desk to illustrate this. The students are very
reluctant to do the same. It’s hard to change how we do things, and how we see things for lots of
reasons.
Yet this is exactly what Jesus asks of us. We’re to see things not through human eyes, but through
God’s eyes. We’re to act, not out of our own desires, but out of God’s desires. We’re to live, not for
ourselves, but for God. But like the students in the movie, we’re just as reluctant to jump on to our
desks to see the world differently, because the world doesn’t like people jumping on its desks.

1 1. Wood, Ralph C., “Theological Perspective on 2 Corinthians 5:16-21,” Feasting

on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year C, Volume 2, David L.
Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, Gen. Ed., Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville,
KY, 2009, p. 110.
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However, over and over again, Jesus tells us to do things God’s ways, not the world’s ways. For
example, as Christians, we give thanks to God from whom all blessings flow. What does the world
do? The world takes credit for itself rather than giving thanks to God, or even giving thanks to others
sometimes. As Christians, when we wake in the morning, we raise our hearts to God and say, “Thank
you God for being with me as I slept. Thank you for refreshing my body, and for refreshing my mind.
Thank you for letting me sleep, and thank you now for allowing me to wake. As I go through this
day, please go with me so that I may do not my will, but Your will. Help me that I may see You at
work in this Your world and not be blinded by my own desires and my own needs.”
Do those who don’t know God give thanks? Do they recognize that they wake because God’s Spirit is
with them and has been with them through the night? Do they give thanks for their talents, for their
abilities, for their accomplishments, or do they take credit only for themselves? How many in the
world believe that they’ve raised themselves up by their own bootstraps? How many in the world are
unwilling to give much, if any, credit to those who have gone before them for their place in society, let
alone to God? We live in a selfish world, don’t we? We live in a world where it’s necessary to take
credit for all one can in order to move up the ladder. We live in a world of individual
accomplishments, rather than in a world of group success. That’s the way of our society. That’s the
way of the world we’re called by Jesus himself to see differently.
“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation.” People laugh at those who get up at the Academy
Awards and make great long speeches, thanking everyone from their 2nd grade teacher to their hair
dresser to the director of their movie. People laugh, perhaps, because the thanks may not ring true.
Perhaps the actor or actress doesn’t thank those people except when he or she wins the Oscar. Other
times, perhaps all those other people are taken for granted.
If that’s the case, it might be well to laugh. But if the thanks is genuine, then it’s good for someone to
recognize that they didn’t win the Oscar by themself. That 2 nd grade teacher was important in their
life, just as the hair dresser and the other actors and the director were important. But the world is on a
time schedule – got to move on to the next award, the next commercial, the next program. We don’t
have time for all that mushy thanks. We as Christians are called upon to see differently, to give thanks
– to God and to all who are a part of our lives because we know we in need of God and neighbor.
A second example of the world’s priorities is the stress placed on “stuff,” as Tony Campolo labels it.
The world continually tells us we need more stuff. Our houses aren’t large enough to store all our
stuff, as big as our houses are. We stack our stuff to the tops of our garages. We rent storage units so
that we’ll have more room for the new stuff we want to buy. We’re bombarded with commercials for
new cars, new furniture, new clothes – in the latest styles, of course. “More, more, more” is the
mantra of the world.
Jesus teaches us to see differently. Jesus says, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life,
what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more
than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor
gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?
And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about
clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you,
even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the
field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you –

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you of little faith?”2
Look at the world differently, Jesus says. Look not for ways to get more stuff, but look for ways to
share what you have, share it with those who have such great needs, share it with those who are
hurting. Share it with those who are different. Share it with neighbor, those who are close and those
who are far removed from us.
“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has
become new!” Perhaps our biggest challenge as Christians is to love one another instead of loving
only our own. William Sloane Coffin, Jr., former pastor of Riverside Church in NYC, wrote, “Love
measures our stature: the more we love, the bigger we are. There is no smaller package in all the
world than that of a man all wrapped up in himself!”3
Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But
I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of
your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the
righteous and on the unrighteous.”4
This is seeing the world differently. This is the world turned upside down, isn’t it, even if we don’t
like to hear this message. We don’t need to be told how the world reacts to threats, and attacks. The
world isn’t interested in turning the other cheek. The world isn’t interested in love. The world is
interested in power. The world strikes back when attacked.
I’ve shared this with you before, but it bears repeating. Jesus taught the Golden Rule: “Do unto others
as you would have them do unto you.” The world teaches distinct variations. It teaches a Silver Rule,
“Do unto others after they do unto you.” The Iron Rule, “Do unto others as you expect they’ll do unto
you.” The Copper Rule, “Do unto others before they do unto you.” The Tin Rule, “Do unto others,
and cut out.”5
The world isn’t into talk. The world is into action. The world doesn’t turn the other cheek. The
world strikes back – if it doesn’t strike first. “We can’t have any sign of weakness,” we’re told.
“Better to fight and be wrong than to talk and wait to see if we’re right.”
Jesus, however, teaches a different point of view, a view expressed in the poem “Hug O’ War” by
Shel Silverstein. Silverstein wrote, “I will not play at tug o’ war. I’d rather play at hug o’ war/ Where
everyone hugs Instead of tugs, Where everyone giggles And rolls on the rug, where everyone kisses
and Everyone grins, And everyone cuddles, and Everyone wins.”6
That’s seeing the world differently. That’s turning the world upside down, hugging instead of
tugging, doing to others as we would have them do unto us, rather than doing to others and then
2 3. Matthew 6:25-30
3 4. Coffin, William Sloane, Credo, Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville, KY,
2004, p. 24.

4 5. Matthew 5:43-45
5 6. I first heard this many years ago in a speech by Martin Marty.

6 7. Silverstein, Shel, “Hug O’War,” Where the Sidewalk Ends, HarperCollins,

1974.
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running. That’s love instead of hate, love instead of war, love instead of violence, love instead of
revenge. That’s what Paul means when he said, “From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a
human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him
no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed
away; see, everything has become new!”
What’s new? Everything! Everything is new in Christ, and we’re called to see the world with new
eyes and act in new ways. And most importantly, we’re called to share this message with a world that
is stuck in its old ways. What’s new? Everything! Thanks be to God.