July 12, 2026                  Seventh Sunday after Pentecost

Isaiah 55:10-13; Romans 8:1-11; and Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our Redeemer. Amen.

Please be seated.

Welcome to our second major heat wave of the summer. We got through the first, we’ll get through this one, too. The heat reminds me of a joke that I heard when I was a student working summers in my father’s car dealership. The driver who delivered parts loved to tell jokes. One went like this: “We shouldn’t complain about the hot weather. It’s the Almighty’s way of getting us ready for eternity!” Now, what makes the joke work is the implied assumption that we’re all destined for Hell, which in turn relies on the common assumption that “good people go to heaven, and bad people go to the other place.” I’m not going to talk about whether there really is a Hell or, if so, how high the temperature is. But if we believe what Paul writes, we know that the joke doesn’t apply to us, if we’re in Christ Jesus.

We All Have Sinned

Paul wrote the letter of Romans toward the end of his third missionary journey, probably around 58 AD. He was planning a journey to Spain and wanted to use the Church at Rome as a starting point and so wrote the letter to introduce himself and explain his understanding of the Gospel. As in most of the early churches, there was a division between Jewish and Gentile Christians, which Paul worked to overcome. This was one of his purposes for writing the letter: to teach all Christians, Gentiles and Jews alike, that they are not saved by keeping the Mosaic Law, which they can’t do fully anyway, but are saved by grace through faith in Jesus, who died on the cross for our redemption.

Paul begins by claiming that all people, Gentiles as well as Jews, are guilty of sin. He quotes the Psalms to say, “There is no one who is righteous, not even one” (Rom 3:10). He then promises “the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe” (Rom 3:22). This righteousness, imputed to believers, comes through Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross. And so “we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom 5:1). Accordingly, we are no longer slaves to sin. Now, for the libertines in his audience, Paul asks the question, “Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it?” (Rom 6:1-2). Being able to do something does not mean we should, especially considering the sacrifice made for us! But can we then fulfill the law? Not on our own. Even Paul struggled with sin. “For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do” (Rom 7:18-19)” Paul, like all Christians, is pulled in different directions. “So then, with my mind I am a slave to the law of God, but with my flesh I am a slave to the law of sin” (Rom 7:25). Now comes the good news, found in today’s epistle reading.

There Is No Condemnation for Those in Christ Jesus

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death” (Rom 8:1-2). What comforting words! While we should strive to obey God’s law, there is no condemnation even when we fail. On the cross, sin was condemned in the flesh, “so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit” (Rom 8:4). The result for us is forgiveness of sin, hence no condemnation, if we are in Christ Jesus. What does it mean to be “in Christ”? It means to be in a personal relationship with Jesus. The great Anglican preacher John Stott writes, “To be ‘in Christ’ does not mean to be inside Christ, as tools are in a box or our clothes in a closet, but to be organically united to Christ, as a limb is in the body or a branch is in the tree. It is this personal relationship with Christ that is the distinctive mark of his authentic followers.”[1] We trust in Jesus as our Savior and strive to follow Him as our Lord.

We Should Live by the Spirit

God gives believers His Spirit to sanctify us, so we can increasingly live like He wants us to live. While we cooperate in our sanctification, we cannot do it on our own. New Testament scholar Robert H. Mounce writes in his commentary on Romans: “Yet does not experience teach us that every attempt to live the Christian life apart from the empowering presence of the Spirit of God ends in defeat? We lose the battle only when we engage the enemy without the resources supplied by the Spirit.”[2] So, we should follow Jesus, trusting in the Spirit to remake us to be what God intends us to be. Theologian N.T. Wright explains it this way: “There will be a time when I – even I, sinner that I am! – will be totally sinless, when God has completed the work of grace within me. But I already enjoy, in anticipation of that future fact, forgiveness in the present and the new life of the Spirit that is made available precisely when Jesus has been ‘glorified’ by being ‘lifted up’ on the cross (John 7.39; 20.22).”[3]

Benefits of Being in Christ

Some might wonder why we would want this? An obvious benefit is eternal life with Jesus. Paul concludes our passage with this promise: “But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you” (Rom 8:10-11). John Stott adds some more immediate benefits: personal fulfillment as a human being, brotherly unity, and radical transformation. Personal fulfillment: being in relationship with Jesus gives far more satisfaction than the pursuit of money, power, or prestige. Brotherly unity: we are brothers and sisters with Christians throughout the world, regardless of race or nationality. Radical transformation: the Spirit will work to sanctify us already in this life, as N.T. Wright explains in the quote above.

Of course, many people do not find these benefits attractive and would prefer to follow their own path. Many theologians argue that, without the prompting of the Spirit, people do not want to accept the Gospel. This prompting of the Spirit is called “regeneration,” rebirth. This is why Jesus told Nicodemus that we must be “born from above” (John 3:3) to enter the kingdom of God.

Be Good Soil!

Jesus’ parable of the sower in today’s Gospel reading illustrates why many who hear the Gospel fail to accept it. The seed is the Gospel message. When it falls on the path, the hearer fails to understand it and the evil one snatches it away. If it falls on rocky ground, it springs up quickly but has no root. When trouble comes, the hearer abandons the faith. If the seed falls among thorns, the cares of the world overwhelm it, and it fails to grow. That, I think, is the problem for most people in Western countries today. The seed that falls on good soil takes root and yields much fruit, also because the hearers spread the Gospel to others.

We should make sure that we are the good soil. We should strive to understand the Gospel, stand fast in the face of trouble, and put our relationship with God above the cares of the world. Robert Mounce writes that “to allow the things of the world completely to dominate life is self-extinction; it is spiritual suicide.” [4] Jesus should be our Lord, not wealth, power, or politics. We should nurture our spiritual welfare, especially in community with other believers. Regular church attendance, receipt of the sacraments, and Bible study build our spiritual fitness. And we should put our faith into action by loving our neighbor as ourselves.

May God fill us with the Holy Spirit as we strive to keep Christ’s commandments, grow in sanctification, and share the Good News of Jesus Christ to a world that desperately needs to hear it. Amen.

[1] John R.W. Stott, “‘In Christ’: The Meaning and Implications of the Gospel of Jesus Christ,” Knowing and Doing, C.S. Lewis Institute, Summer 2007.

[2] Robert H. Mounce, Romans, vol. 27 of The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 175.

[3] N.T. Wright, Evil and the Justice of God (London: SPCK, 2006), 59.

[4] Robert H. Mounce, Romans, vol. 27 of The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1995), 177.