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Pentecost 7 2025, Proper 12
Immanuel Lutheran Church, Hamilton, Ohio
Pastor Kevin Jud
July 27, 2025
Psalm 138:1-8, Genesis 18:20-33, Colossians 2:6-15, Luke 11:1-13

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            There is a lot of talk lately about debt.  We hear about how college students are graduating with a mountain of student loan debt that financially cripples them for many years as they try to pay it off.  We hear about young people and families that borrow and borrow and borrow to get the things they want and then end up so deep in debt that they cannot see a way out. Recently Doordash offered an option to buy now and pay later for food delivery.  Debt is accumulated in big ways and in little ways.  With big purchases like houses and cars and with every small purchase that is charged to a credit card that doesn’t get paid off. Every month the statements come and the mountain of debt just grows and grows and is always there accusing you of being a financial failure who will never be able to pay back what you owe to others.

            Sin is like that mountain of debt.  The record of your sin goes back to earliest childhood; a mountain of sin.  How big is that mountain?  Walk around it and gaze up at its height.  Look closely.  Read some of the pages all piled up.  There are some big sins in there.  Ignoring God’s will and following your passions.  Shameful things.  Big sins and little sins.  It is all there.  Sins of anger; sexual sins, sins of greed, sins of broken promises, sins of laziness, sins of gossip, sins of rebellion against authority.  Pondering your mountain of sin is shameful and humbling. You want to try to ignore the mountain of sin; you want to pretend it’s not really there…or not really yours… or not really so bad.  But there it is.  It is a record of sin and shame all piled up in one place.  It is horrible and humiliating to see.  The mountain of sin gets in the way of praying to God. 

The devil knows the power of this mountain of sin and he weaponizes it against you.  He uses it to accuse you.  The devil points at that record of sin and failure and tells you that God cannot love someone with that mountain of sin; God does not listen to sinners; God wants nothing to do with such shamefulness.  Your mountainous debt of sin is overwhelming and you cannot get rid of it. 

            For those with a mountain of financial debt, what would it be like for someone to come along and pay it all off and erase that mountain?  Now, working hard, you can conquer financial debt by following a plan like Dave Ramsey’s baby steps or something.  Through sacrifice and hard work, little by little, day by day you can become financially debt free.  You can conquer financial debt, but you cannot pay off the debt of sin.  The debt of sin just grows and grows.  Folks will work hard to try to make atonement for their sin.  Unfaithful pastors will try to give you a step-by-step improvement program.  Some churches will try to get you to earn an indulgence to get rid of your sin…but none of that works.  It is impossible.  As you struggle with sin and guilt and shame the holy God seems so distant and unapproachable while you are so unholy and sinful and alone.  If only someone would come and pay off that mountain of the debt of your sin. 

            And then you remember.  You remember that night in Bethlehem so long ago; a baby born to a virgin visiting from Nazareth.  This baby appears to be just a normal baby, but this baby is God in flesh.  His birth is announced by angels.  God sent his Son to take on human flesh.  This baby grows to be a man who shows His divine powers by performing great miracles demonstrating His authority over disease and disability and nature and food and wine and even death.  We celebrate the birth of this baby because in this baby born in Bethlehem the whole fullness of God dwells bodily.  We celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus because this baby is God in flesh.  John 1:14 (ESV) 14 … the Word became flesh and dwelt among us…”   

God in flesh does not make sense.  How can the infinite God be contained in the confines of a 7 pound baby boy?  It does not make sense, but God does not have to make sense.

            God takes on human flesh and dwells with His people. He is baptized into your sin and He carries that sin to the cross.  Jesus takes your entire mountain of sin upon Himself.  2 Corinthians 5:21 (ESV) 1 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” 

Jesus takes responsibility for your sin; He takes ownership of it.  Jesus takes the record of your debt and pays the price.  Jesus takes the record of every last one of your sins and He cancels the record of your debt, nailing it to the cross.  Jesus wipes your slate clean.  Your mountain of sin is gone. 

            The devil’s greatest weapon against you is taken away. The devil is disarmed.  He wants to accusingly point to the mountain of your sin, but the mountain is not there.  There is nothing with which to accuse you.  Jesus pays the price of your sin on the cross and declares, “It is finished.”  He triumphs over the devil and puts him to shame by rising from the dead.  He descends to hell to preach a sermon of victory to make the devil’s shame complete.

            The devil used to be able to accuse you because of your sin, but Jesus has paid for those sins.  There is now no barrier between you and God.  What an amazing thing this is for God to have done for you.  You are a lowly human who is here in this life for a short time and then gone and yet the Jesus cares so much about you that He died in your place.  He cares so much about you that He removes all barriers between you and the Holy and perfect creator of the universe and invites you to call Him “Father.”  Because of what Jesus has done for you, you have direct access to God.  You can come to God in great boldness and ask for what you need. 

            In our reading from Genesis, we see the boldness of Abraham who, as someone in God’s covenant, is shameless in asking God to spare the city of Sodom for 50 righteous people, or 45 or 40 or 30 or 20 or 10.  It sounds like Abraham is negotiating with God, but Abraham is not negotiating because he is not offering anything in return; he is simply making bold requests to the God of the universe.

            The disciples ask to be taught to pray and how does the prayer start that Jesus teaches them?  “Father.”  Jesus himself teaches you to pray to God and call Him “Father.”  This is incredible.  How can you, a natural born sinner, come into the presence of the Holy God and address Him as Father?  You can do this because you have been baptized into Christ.  You can do this because your sins have been forgiven; your record of debt has been cancelled.  You have been made righteous in the blood of Christ.  You are justified in Christ.  You can do this because, even though you are a natural born sinner, Jesus has paid the price for your sins and set you free from the accusations of the devil.

            Now, strangely, the devil tries to continue to use the record of your sins to indict you and get you to pretend that that mountain of sin is still there accusing you.  The devil wants to convince you that you are still a shameful sinner who has no access to God.  But that is just a lie of the devil.  When the devil tries to accuse you of your sins you tell the devil, “My sins have been forgiven by the Lord Jesus.  Be gone Satan!  I don’t belong to you; I belong to Jesus.”

            Now, the devil is tenacious.  He does not give up easily.  Stay alert for the devil’s lies and beware of the spirits of the world. Living life in this world is dangerous for followers of Jesus.  The world wants to take you captive by philosophy and empty deceit according to human traditions and the elemental spirits of the world.  So many false teachings sound so wonderfully sensible and plausible.  Did God really say?  So many want to make God make sense, but God doesn’t make sense.  God does things that we would never do.  God is not of this world.  And as a child of God you don’t belong to the world because you have received Christ.  As you received Christ, so walk in Him.  Jesus redeems you; He feeds you with His very Body and Blood in Holy Communion.  You have an intimacy with the creator of the universe that is beyond explanation.  Lose yourself in the love of God in Christ Jesus. 

            And pray boldly.  Pray boldly to God.  Pray shamelessly.  Pray for salvation for those who do not know Jesus.  Pray for the Holy Spirit to work on their hearts to bring them to faith so that they too may know that their sins have been taken away.  Pray that all people will know the incredible peace that comes from believing that Jesus has removed your mountain of sin.  Pray that daily the Lord creates in you a clean heart and a right spirit to walk in Christ. 

Jesus has cancelled the record of your debt.  Jesus has triumphed over the devil and put him to shame.  The devil no longer has power over you because you are a baptized child of God.  “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, 7rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.”   Walk in Christ.  Your debt has been paid.  You are free.

            Amen.