Romans 8:12-25 “When It Hurts – Who Do You Call?”  7/20/08

John Calvin, founder of the Presbyterian Church, began every worship service with the words of Psalm 121:2- “Our help is in the name of the Lord who made the heaven and earth.”  Why did he choose these words?  There are many good words in the Bible- “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son” or “Love the Lord God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and your neighbor as yourself.”  Why did he begin each worship service with a reminder that God is our help? 
                The answer is found in Calvin’s commentaries, but it is found more importantly In real life.  Calvin said we are always more anxious than we should be, but we need to be reminded that “there is no assured help but in God alone, and no salvation apart from Him.”  I think one of the basic things we need to remember spiritually is that we need help.  We cannot do this by ourselves.  It is a little foolish to wait until we reach the end of our rope, the end or our strength, the end of our hope and then we call to God saying, “Okay God, I can’t do anything else- so will you please help me now?” 
                We look for help today in many different quarters.  If we want information we look to books, to the internet and to experts.  If we are looking for medical help we look to those in the medical profession.  I have to say we are improving rapidly at giving temporary help to people.  This is as it should be.  We need to try to make the world a better place to live.  But we need to remember that secular professional help from even the greatest educator, lawyer, and doctor is temporary help.  We have a tremendous need to see that real help comes from God.  Paul proves this in our passage in Romans 8:12-25.  He is earnestly trying to get the Christians to put their  hope in God.  He makes his point in a couple of different ways.

I. GOD IS OUR FATHER- Paul gives us the amazing command to call out to God as a Father- Abba (similar to the word “daddy”).  Our Father will help us if we call to Him.  We are adopted by God into His family.  Though we have been part of an abusive and dysfunctional family called the human race, we are adopted into a loving and caring family of God.   I knew an older couple in Asheville who had raised two kids and then adopted two more.  The two they adopted were amazed that they went from no home to a wonderful mansion- the same as the children who were raised there.  They were helped, they were set free by their adoption.  Have you ever been exposed to someone who has been abused or terribly hurt and wounded by life?  They have a hard time trusting others, and they have a hard time believing they are lovable.  This is our problem with God.  So many, if not all, have been hurt by the pains and ravages of human beings and of life, that we have a terrible time believing that God loves us as a father.  Much less do we have a hard time calling out to God as our protector, our guardian, our friend and father.  Paul is saying here (vs. 14) all who have the Spirit of God are a part of God’s family and can call out to God as our Abba- our father. 
If you call to God for help, He will answer you for He is your Father.

Another very important thing to remember is that God is our provider.  We have a great inheritance from Him (vs. 17)- in the life to come. But frankly, His blessings are not limited to the life to come.  This is an especially important thought when we hear of economic turmoil and we hear the secular folk speaking words of fear.  Our passage says in verse 15 that we are not slaves to sin or to fear anymore.  It is easy, frankly, to look at the world and believe that we have no hope.
One of the things that happens when we are adopted is that we give up our claims to our old name and our old way of life.  We are not in the family of sin and fear anymore.  When that old way of life comes back in your mind, say to yourself you are a child of God adopted by Him.  That old dysfunctional family of sin and fear have no claim on you.
  But let me reiterate- the world can never give ultimate hope.  The hope the world gives is a smokescreen to death.  It is as makeup to aging- it can hide the age spots, but it doesn’t keep us from aging.  The world might even persuade you if you eat right, diet and exercise to live an extra 25 years on this earth, but it cannot keep anyone from dying.  But Paul is saying we have an eternal hope that not even aging and death can take away.  In fact, here he speaks of our inheritance.  The stock market may take away your confidence and monetary security.  We hear of banks and trusts that people put their confidence/trust in that are now in trouble.  The ultimate trust can never be taken away.  Paul speaks in another place of our bodies being tents.  Tents and shells are never permanent.  Paul was a maker of tents, and legend has it that his father made tents for the Roman generals that passed through Tarsus.  Paul knew that tents had a limited life, and were meant to be temporary.  We all know that.  Tents offer very little protection.  Last week in Oconee County a black bear tore through a tent trying to get food.  Tents are temporary shelters.  Today’s State paper has an article about those who think that tents are permanent shelters- they are wrong.  Another early Christian image of our body is a shell.  Shells offer some protection, but the animal outgrows the shell and has to form a new shell.  Our bodies are tents and shells.  But we have a heavenly house not made with human hands.  The columbarium is a reminder that though our final resting place for our bodies may be here, our eternal resting place is in heaven.  Our inheritance is not in this life.  We are children of God and heirs of God’s fortune and heirs of the eternal life and eternal blessings God offers us. 

II. WE SUFFER IN THIS PRESENT TIME- BUT THERE IS HELP
A. This life is not what it is meant to be.  It is too easy to focus on the negative things of this life- whether it be politics, the economy and work, family problems, or even the earthly church.  Paul was trying to get the people to not be so weighed down by these things. 
I am a huge Norman Rockwell fan.  One of his paintings shows people walking hurriedly in from of St. Patrick’s cathedral in New York City.  They all had their heads down, hands in their pockets, not even looking at each other.  The marquee above them that is being changed reads, “Lift up your heads.”  Our help is in the name of the Lord.  Paul says our present sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory about to be revealed.  The world suffers.  As Christians we are called to care for our suffering world and those who are suffering in it.  Jesus visited, cared for and cured the sick.  We may not be able to cure as readily as he, but we can offer care and help – that is our calling in following the example of our Lord.

B. Creation is groaning too.  You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to know that there are problems in our environment.  The problems are readily seen from trash on the side of the road to trash in the lake, to poor air quality.    In 1989 I visited Taiwan and South Korea I was amazed that in both Taipei and in Seoul people were wearing masks over their faces.  I had never seen these masks until that time.  They were wearing the masks because the pollution was bad.  It hasn’t gotten better there.  Creation is groaning.  I lived in Georgetown for 9 years and I can tell you there was a terrible pollution problem.  I knew it because I became sick about every other week there.  Everyone knew you didn’t swim in the Sampit River and you didn’t eat the fish that came from there either.  But it is far worse in other places. Lexington County is ranked by the EPA as the tenth most polluted (of 45 counties) in South Carolina (Richland is number one), and Lexington is in the top 10% in the country of air polluters.  I know people over-react about the environment.  To some, environmental care is their God.  But just because some are consumed by this cause that doesn’t mean that as Christians we shouldn’t care for our groaning world.  The Lord who provides the ultimate help to our groaning world, has placed us here in part to tend the garden- to be good stewards of the world.  In some ways we are called to sooth our groaning world until the full redemption of it.   The word “groaning” here is a pregnant word, literally.  It is as if the world is in labor to give birth to a new life.   In this image it is as if God is the doctor delivering the baby of a world free of sin, hurt, and harm- where the lion will lie down with the lamb and the world is at peace with itself.   The world is groaning to be free from the pains of sin and death.  We groan with it.  And we are also called to ease the groaning by showing the love and care of Jesus to those around us and also to our world.
                I knew two sons who were adopted into a wonderful home.  These boys, adopted as babies, went to two of the most patient, blessed people I have ever known.  They were church goers who loved them with patient discipline.  They also saw to it that they had the opportunity to go to college and good jobs afterwards with the potential to inherit millions of dollars.   One of these boys started following in his former parent’s ways. He started using drugs, dropped out of college, and gave real grief to the loving parents who adopted him.  But the other succeeded and held onto their love and kindness.  We have been adopted into God’s family. You have a choice about how you want to live, and if you will accept that adoption and love or not.  He is there to save you, to rescue you, to adopt you, and yes Our Help is in his name too.