Words We No Longer Avoid: What We Discovered When We Stopped Hiding ~ Romans 8:31, 35, 38–39 (Series Summary)

 

For the last several weeks, we've been talking about words Christians sometimes avoid. These words are important but not the ones we generally put on coffee cups or sing about with gusto. They’re words like Sin. Wrath and judgment. Depression. Politics. Sex. Grief. Doubt. Prayer. Mystery. We avoid them because sometimes they're complicated. Sometimes they're wrapped in shame. Sometimes they've been used as weapons. Sometimes we've simply been taught the wrong thing.

So this summer, we've tried something different. We haven't tried to make complicated things simple. We've tried to make them speakable. And I think that's why Romans 8 is such a fitting place to close this series. Paul has spent chapters talking about things we often want to avoid like sin, suffering, and death—all the complicated realities of being human. And then he asks: “What then are we to say about these things?” That’s our question we’ve been asking. What are these things we'd rather avoid? How do we make them speakable? How do we lean in?

And Paul's answer isn't to make things easy or resolve every question. His answer is far more trustworthy and lovely: “Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.” Which means we can afford to tell the truth about difficult things. Because the truth does not threaten God's love. The truth is God loves us and the difficult spaces are the places where God is waiting for us. Not waiting to condemn us. Not waiting to embarrass us. Not waiting to prove that we’re bad Christians. Waiting to meet us. So let’s remember what we’ve learned?

1. SIN & CONFESSION: Name what wounds so healing can begin. (Psalm 32:1-5)

We began with sin. And perhaps there’s no word in Christianity that has been more weaponized. For some people, “sin” immediately conjures shame, condemnation,  fear.  But Psalm 32 gave us another picture. David says, “When I kept silent, my bones wasted away.” The problem wasn't simply that David had done something wrong. The problem was that he was hiding. The Greek word for sin, hamartia, means “to miss the mark.” It’s an arrow aimed at a target that fails to hit. And what is the target? Jesus makes that remarkably clear. Love God. Love your neighbor. Love yourself (Matt. 22:37-39).

So sin is not primarily about breaking arbitrary rules so that God can keep score. Sin is about what happens when we hide from love, when we participate in indifference instead of compassion, when we choose contempt instead of mercy. when we fail to love ourselves or someone else. And confession, then, is not groveling before an angry God. Confession is telling the truth so healing can begin. God does not ask us to hide our wounds. God asks us to bring them into the light.

2. WRATH & JUDGMENT: Love never becomes hatred but God honors our choices. (1 John 4:16b-19; Luke 15:11-32)

Then we talked about wrath and judgment. And this may have been the most important theological question underneath the whole series: What is God actually like? Because if God is love, as 1 John says, then everything else we say about God has to pass through that reality - including wrath and judgment. We looked at Jesus’ theology of wrath in the story of the prodigal sons. There the father never stops loving the son when the son leaves. The father doesn't become his enemy. The father allows him to go and experience the pig pen. That experience of the painful consequences is wrath. Paul describes God's wrath in Romans as God honoring people by “giving people over” to the consequences of their choices.

And judgment, Jesus says, is that light has come into the world. Light doesn't create the dust in a room. Light reveals it. That's judgment. God isn’t actively trying to destroy us. God is bringing what is hidden into the light so that what is destroying us can finally be healed. Jesus does not reveal an angry Father finally getting to punish somebody. On the cross, Jesus reveals what human wrath does to forgiving love. Humanity pours violence, betrayal, hatred and death. And what does God do? God forgives. God absorbs. God rises. Love refuses to die. So perhaps the most memorable thing we can say about wrath and judgment is this: God's wrath is not God becoming less loving. It’s God allowing us to choose our own path but refusing to leave us trapped in what destroys us.

3. DEPRESSION: Sometimes faith means attending to our body and eating breakfast. (1 Kings 19:1-15)

Then came depression. And Elijah helped us here. Because Elijah has one of the greatest spiritual victories in the Bible. Fire falls from heaven. The prophets of Baal are defeated. And then, almost immediately, life falls apart. He runs into the wilderness. He sits beneath a broom tree. And he says, “I've had enough. Take my life.” And God doesn't lecture him. God doesn't say, "Elijah, where is your faith?" God doesn't say, “You need to pray harder.” An angel comes and brings food, water, an encouragement to rest. Before God addresses Elijah's theology, God cares for Elijah's body. Before God asks questions, God offers breakfast.

Sometimes faith looks like moving mountains. But sometimes faith looks like eating breakfast. Sometimes courage looks like getting out of bed. Sometimes hope is simply taking one more step. And sometimes the most Christlike thing you can do for someone who is depressed is not to fix them. It’s to sit with them. Bring a meal. Listen. Stay. Sometimes the journey is too much. You don't have to pretend otherwise. Faith and despair can occupy the very same heart.

4. POLITICS: Jesus is Lord. No nation, party, or ideology gets our ultimate allegiance. No oppressed group should encounter our silence. (Acts 19:1-9)

Then I said the word that probably frightened some of you more than all the others: Politics. But we discovered that politics isn't merely elections or political parties. It’s about how we order our common life. Who has power? Who has resources? Who gets heard? Who gets forgotten? Who gets welcomed? Who gets pushed aside? And once you understand politics that way, you discover that the Bible is deeply political. The early Christians proclaimed the euangelion—the gospel. That word was used politically in the Roman world for announcements about emperors and military victories. And Christians (as even their enemies understood, Acts 17:1-9) took that word and said: “No. The good news is not that Caesar is Lord. Jesus is Lord.” It means no nation gets our ultimate allegiance. No political party gets our ultimate loyalty. No ideology gets our ultimate devotion. And it means our faith can never simply private.

Because if Jesus is Lord, then the way we treat our neighbors and the most vulnerable matters. The way we distribute power matters. The way we welcome the stranger matters. The way we care for the poor matters. Mary’s Magnificat asks: Who is being pushed down? Who needs to be lifted up? Who is hungry? Who has been forgotten? So perhaps our memorable sentence for politics is simply: Jesus is Lord—and the same compassion that saves us is the same compassion that seeks to ensure kids have enough to heat, immigrants are welcomed, the poor are protected.

5. SEX: Our bodies are very good. Sexuality is a longing for connection and faithful belonging. The opposite of lust isn’t purity but reverence. (Genesis 1:26-28, 31; 2:18-25)

Then, because apparently I had decided to make everyone really uncomfortable, we talked about sex. But Genesis surprised us. The Bible doesn't begin with sexual shame. It begins with sexual blessing. Our bodies are “very good.” Desire is not inherently dirty. Our capacity to touch, embrace, connect and delight is not God's embarrassment. And God says something fascinating: “It is not good that the human should be alone.” Notice what God calls “not good.” Not desire. Not bodies. Loneliness is not good because we were created for communion.

Sexuality, we said, is larger than simply having sex. It’s the human longing to move beyond isolation toward connection. To know and be known. To love and be loved. To belong. Sex can be one beautiful expression of that. But the deeper Christian question isn't, “What are the rules?” It’s: Does this help us become more capable of faithful love? And that's why shame is such a poor teacher. Shame says, “You are the problem.” Jesus says, “Treat others as you wish to be treated.” Because shame produces hiding. Love produces honesty. And so the message of Genesis is worth remembering: Your body is not God's embarrassment. Your body is God's good creation. The opposite of lust isn’t purity. It’s reverence.

6. GRIEF: Grief is love after loss. Our deepest grief is never a godless place (Matthew 10:29-31)

Then we talked about grief. And I think this may be one of the most tender words of the series. We live in a culture that is very good at moving on, getting back to normal. But the Bible isn't embarrassed by grief. Job grieves. Jeremiah grieves. The Psalmist grieves. Even Jesus grieves.

And Jesus says something extraordinary about grief and sparrows. “Not one falls to the ground apart from the Father.” The sparrow was almost worthless in the marketplace. But not to God. The world says “disposable.” God says “beloved.” So you don't have to apologize for your grief. You don't have to say, “Other people have it worse.” You don't have to hurry yourself toward closure. Because grief is not failure. Grief is what love looks like when something precious has been lost.

And Jesus doesn't promise us that nothing will fall. He promises that our deepest grief is never a godless place. There is no place where we can fall outside the love and presence of God. Christian hope is not pretending nothing hurts. It’s believing that love is always present and that even in the hurting, God breaks our fall.

7. DOUBT: You can question and still belong. Sometimes faith is simply staying in the room (John 20:24-29)

Then came doubt. We noticed how John doesn't call Thomas “Doubting Thomas.” He calls him: “Thomas, one of the twelve.” After his doubt, he still belongs. After his doubt, he is still a disciple. After his doubt, he is still in the room. No one tries to throw him out. No one shames him. No one tells him he isn't a real Christian. They keep him close. And a week later, he’s still there. His questions haven't all been resolved. But he continues to belong.

And perhaps that’s one of the most important things the church can say to people who doubt: You can question and still belong. Sometimes faith is simply staying in relationship when clarity disappears. Sometimes faith is just showing up. And when Jesus comes into the locked room he says, “Peace.” Not an argument. Not a lecture. He shows Thomas his wounds. Because sometimes our deepest doubts aren't answered by better arguments. Sometimes they are met by wounded love.

8. PRAYER: Prayer is not performance or persuasion; it is paying attention to the God already paying attention to us. (Matthew 6:5-15; Ephesians 3:14-21)

Then we talked about prayer. And we discovered that prayer can become another place where Christians feel like failures. “Other people pray for hours.” “They know exactly what to say.” But Jesus says something wonderfully freeing: “Your Father knows what you need before you ask.” Before you ask. God is already paying attention. So prayer isn't getting God's attention. Prayer is paying attention to the God who is already paying attention to us.

Mary Oliver said: “I don't know exactly what prayer is. But I do know how to pay attention.” That’s it! Prayer is noticing God, yourself, another person, creation. Prayer isn't performance. It isn't manipulation. It isn't trying to persuade God to love us. It’s presence, attention, awareness that God is already, lovingly paying attention to us. So perhaps the simplest prayer of all is: “God, I am here. And I notice that you are here, too.”

9. MYSTERY: Mystery is not a way to silence hard questions. It’s to awaken to the boundless goodness of God still being revealed in Jesus. (Ephesians 3:1-12)

And finally, we came to mystery. A word that ties everything together. Mystery is often used as an excuse. Something terrible happens and we say, “It's a mystery.” A child suffers. “God has a plan.” Someone dies. A marriage falls apart. “God's ways are higher than our ways.”

But  Paul uses the word mysterion very differently. Mystery isn't something God is hiding from us. It is something God is revealing. And what is the mystery? That outsiders become insiders. That strangers become family. That Gentiles become fellow heirs. That people who thought they were outside God's purposes discover that God had been making room for them all along. Mystery is not: “Why did God allow this terrible thing?” Mystery is: “How much bigger is God's love than we imagined?” Every time we think we've reached the edge of God's mercy, there is more. More grace. More love. More beauty. More welcome. More God.

So what have we learned? Nine uncomfortable words. Nine lovely invitations:

Sin taught us: Aim for love and tell the truth so healing can begin.

Wrath and judgment taught us: God's love never becomes hatred but honors our choices.

Depression taught us: You don't have to pretend you're okay, and sometimes faith looks like eating breakfast.

Politics taught us: Jesus is Lord. Follow Him first and remember that justice is what love looks like in public.

Sex taught us: Our bodies are very good, and we were created for faithful connection.

Grief taught us: Love is worth the risk, and we never suffer outside God's presence.

Doubt taught us: You can question and still belong.

Prayer taught us: Pay attention to the God who is already paying attention to you.

And mystery taught us: God’s love is not less than we understand. God is more merciful than we imagined.

 

We’ve discovered that we don't have to be afraid of “these things,” Paul tells us. Because the Christian story is not the story of people who have figured everything out. It is the story of people who have discovered that nothing needs to be avoided because nothing can separate us from God’s love. So tell the truth. Ask the question. Admit the wound. Name the grief. Acknowledge the doubt. Talk about sex. Engage the world. Pay attention. Because God's mysterious mercy is greater than our fear, and God's boundless love is stronger than our shame. The places we fear are often where healing begins, and the doors we hesitate to open are where grace is already waiting. Amen.

 

Words We No Longer Avoid: Mystery ~ Ephesians 3:1-12

 

There are some words we’ve learned to avoid. Not because they answer questions but because they seek to stop them. These are words that stop making sense. They leave a bad theological taste in our mouth or often hit painfully below the belt. They’re often good words but they’ve been misunderstood, misused, and leave deep bruises in our relationship with God and others. Mystery is one of those words.

And the strange thing is that mystery belongs in Christianity. We worship a God who has mysteriously been revealed, Paul says.  But often, when many Christians use the word they mean something very different from Paul. Someone dies unexpectedly, and we say, “It’s a mystery.” Someone gets cancer, and we say, “We just don’t know why God allowed this. It’s a mystery.” A child suffers. A marriage falls apart. A wildfire destroys someone's home. A terrible thing happens to a good person. And people say, “God’s ways are higher than our ways,” because we don't know what else to say. As if God is somehow the architect of misery but can’t be held responsible.

Mystery becomes a way of protecting theology or, even worse, protecting God. “God is in control,” they say to the parents whose child has recently died. “God has a plan,” they say to a tear-filled friend faced with divorce. If you ask why God didn't stop it? Mystery. If you ask how this could possibly be compatible with the goodness of God? Mystery. Listen there’s nothing wrong with questions. Nothing. But saying “mystery” in the face of real tragedy is not the answer.

Mystery is not a get-out-of-jail-free card for God. It becomes a way of silencing the very questions that suffering ought to make us ask. It’s a religious way of saying, “Don't look too closely.” And that's not what the New Testament means by mystery at all.

In fact, I think Paul wants to rescue the word for us. Because when Paul uses the word mystery in Ephesians 3, he isn't talking about why terrible things happen. He isn't talking about cancer, earthquakes, death, or suffering. He isn't saying, “God has a secret explanation for all the horrible things in the world, and someday we'll understand.” He says something much more beautiful: “The mystery was made known . . . it has now been revealed.” And what is that mystery? “The Gentiles have become fellow heirs, members of the same body, and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.”

That's the mystery. And once you see that, the whole word begins to change. The Greek word mystērion doesn't mean exactly what our modern English word mystery means. When we hear mystery, we tend to think of Agatha Christie. A dead body. A locked room. A collection of clues. A puzzle to solve. Who did it? What happened? Can we solve it? But that's not Paul's word.

For Paul, the divine mystērion is something that was hidden and has now been revealed. It's not a puzzle that human beings are clever enough to solve. It’s something awesome that God has been doing all along that human beings could not see until God pulled back the curtain. The mystery Paul is talking about isn't “Why did God allow this terrible thing to happen? The mystery is: “Look at the amazing goodness of the God revealed in Jesus Christ.”

And that God is bigger and better than anybody imagined. Gentiles are included. Outsiders are brought inside. Those who were once strangers become fellow heirs. Those who were divided become members of the same body. The people who thought they were out discover that God has been making room for them all along. The mystery is the “boundless riches of Christ.” That’s God's “eternal purpose.” And Paul says that his job is to make everyone see it. That's what mystery means. Not something God is keeping from us. Something unfathomably good that God is revealing to us.  Richard Rohr gets at this beautifully when he says that mystery isn't something we cannot understand but goodness that is “endlessly understandable.

Mystery isn't the locked door. Mystery is the open door of goodness that keeps graciously leading somewhere, with doors that keep opening. It's not that God is unknowable. It's that in Jesus Christ God's mercy is inexhaustibly more. More grace. More beauty. More love. More truth. More of God than we have yet imagined.

I often encounter people who use a false sense of mystery to explain some terrible thing that has happened, in order to silence questions or to keep insisting that something cruel or heartless or terrible is somehow compatible with God or God’s plan. They claim that an understanding of “boundless” love is naïve. They love to quote Isaiah 55:8: “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways.” And they use that as a way of saying: “I know this looks bad but it isn’t. God does mysterious things.”

But if you look at the context of Isaiah 55, God’s “thoughts” and “ways” are not about being harsh, or mean, or arbitrary. It’s about God having mercy. God forgiving the wicked. God calling people we never expected. God offering material abundance like wine and milk for free. God's goodness being wildly more expansive than anyone imagined. According to Isaiah and Paul, the mysterious thing, the higher way, is not that God sometimes engages in problematic behavior. The mysterious thing, the higher way, is that God is always, astonishingly, good. The mystery is not that God is worse than we thought. The mystery is that God's love is bigger than we imagined. Let me be clear. I’m not saying that there aren’t real questions around suffering, evil, human existence, and God. I’m saying that the concept of mystery must never be used as cover for bad behavior that is supposedly attributed to God. Mystery says, in the face of tragedy and suffering, that we can bring all our questions precisely because we trust that God is fully revealed in Jesus Christ and God is good.

Think about how radical that would have been for Paul's first readers. There were stark boundaries everywhere. Jew and Gentile. Insider and outsider. Clean and unclean. Us and them. And Paul says: You thought those boundaries were permanent? Look again. You thought God was only interested in your people? Look again. You thought you read Scripture rightly? Look again. You thought you understood who belonged? Look again. The Gentiles are fellow heirs. They are members of the same body. They share the same promise. The mystery is that through Jesus God's purposes are boundless riches.

Christian faith does not give us a God whom we can finally contain. Every time we erect a border around God Jesus forces us to look again. He keeps surprising us with the mystery of God inviting us to look again. We thought God was primarily interested in the righteous. Jesus eats with sinners. Look again. We thought holiness meant keeping our distance from the unclean. Jesus touches them. Look again. We thought power meant domination. Jesus kneels and washes feet. Look again. We thought enemies were people God wanted us to defeat. Jesus tells us to love them. Look again. We thought God's answer to violence would be greater violence. Jesus absorbs violence without returning it. Look again. We thought death had the final word. Then Jesus walks out of the tomb. Look again. This is the mystery of Christ. And this is why mystery belongs in our series: Words We No Longer Avoid.

Christian faith isn't about knowing everything or explaining everything. Christian faith is about learning to trust what we know—and what we don't know. And what do we know? God is Christlike and better than we could hope for or imagine. It doesn’t mean we can’t ask questions. It doesn't mean we can’t wrestle with deep pain. It doesn't mean we just shrug our shoulders and give up. Paul is not advocating intellectual laziness. Quite the opposite. He has encountered something so profound that he commits to spending his life trying to understand it and help other people see it.

But he also understands that he does not possess God. He has received a revelation. He has not received a cage in which God can be kept. And maybe that's the humility that mystery gives us. We can say: I trust love. And: I don't understand everything. We can say: I believe God is good. And: I still have questions. We can say: I’m confident in Jesus. And: I am still willing to be surprised.

Because there is a difference between certainty and trust. Certainty says, “I have figured this out.” Trust says, “I don't have to figure everything out in order to keep walking.” And perhaps that is what Paul means when he says that the mystery has been revealed. God hasn't given us every answer. Through Jesus, God has given us enough revelation to know the character of the One with whom we are walking. A God who has been revealed. A God of Grace. Of Love. Of Inclusion. Of Sharing. Of Reconciliation. A God who is creating a new humanity. A table with more seats than we expected. A kingdom larger than our boundaries. A God whose mercy keeps surprising us. That is the mystery.

And there is one more thing in Ephesians 3 that I don't want us to miss. Paul says the mystery is not merely something we are supposed to know. It is something we are supposed to live. He says that God's wisdom is being made known through the church. Through us. We are part of the revelation. People who mysteriously should not naturally belong together belonging together. People with different histories, cultures, assumptions, and ways of seeing the world become one body in Christ who share the same boundless love. The mystery becomes visible. It takes flesh. It looks like hospitality. Reconciliation. Forgiveness. People making room. It looks like somebody saying, “I thought you were outside the circle. And now I know that God has already invited you in.”

Maybe that is why mystery is not an escape from reality or a cover for God. It is an invitation to see God and reality differently. To look at the world and wonder: What good thing is God doing here that I cannot yet see? Not: “What horrible thing is God secretly responsible for?” To look at the world and wonder: “Where is grace unfolding that I haven't noticed?” “Where is love breaking through?” “Where is reconciliation beginning?” “Where is God making a way where I assumed there was no way?” “Who have I mistakenly placed outside the circle?” “What if God's eternal purposes are larger than my imagination?” That is a different kind of mystery. And a mystery worth recovering.

Because the Christian claim is not that God has mysteriously hidden the truth from us. Or that God is somehow responsible for every terrible thing. The Christian claim is that God has mysteriously revealed God’s self as incredibly gracious and kind. God is Christlike and in God there is no unChristlikeness.

So maybe we don't have to be afraid of mystery anymore. We don't have to use it to shut down questions. We don't have to use it to justify suffering. We don't have to pretend that every terrible thing must secretly be God's will. We grieve what is terrible. We name what is wrong. We ask our questions. We say, “I don't know.”

And then we turn toward Jesus. And listen. And look. And pay attention. Because there is still more. More grace to receive. More love to imagine. More people who belong than we have been willing to welcome. More beauty than we have noticed. More of God than our little explanations can contain.

And we don’t solve it. We receive it. Enter it. Live inside it. Let it change the way we see God and one another. Because mystery isn't where faith ends. Mystery is where faith finally becomes spacious enough to breathe and capable to trust. And maybe the most faithful thing we can say is not, “I always understand God.” But: “I have encountered the goodness of God in Jesus Christ—and know that there is still mysteriously more.” Amen.