Title: Dying to live

All of you, who are as least as old as I, might remember the Fram oil filter commercial in which the auto mechanic warns that if you don’t change your filter in time, you’ll wind up paying way more in the end. His line was, "You can pay me now or pay me later."

This is the point that the Holy Spirit has Paul make to Timothy, regarding life and death. To keep it in the terms of the Fram pitchman, "You can either die now or die later."

The Fram guy wanted you to change your oil filter so that your cost would be kept to a few bucks. If you don’t change your oil filter, and wind up with engine trouble, you are going to feel the hurt, infinitely more.

The Lord wants you to die now so that your cost will be kept to this life. If you won’t die in this life, and wind up dying for eternal life, you are going to feel the hurt, infinitely more.

That’s why Paul is urging the Timothy—which is to say, this is the Lord’s way to urge you and all Christians—to die, now, so that you don’t die, later, and suffer an eternity of regret.

Everyone should be acutely aware that the reality of life is death. Indeed, it has become an important theme in my preaching because, well, Christianity is a life-and-death religion.

Christianity is centered on life and death. God created life, and man created death. God gave Adam and Eve everything to live, and Adam and Eve chose death by disobeying God. God the Son took on the flesh of sinful man, and He chose death in order to obey God the Father.

Adam and Eve died, and they are still dead—physically, at least. Jesus Christ died and, well, that physical death couldn’t hold Him is the reason we are here. Since the ultimate reality is life and death, and Jesus beat death with His resurrected life, that makes Jesus Christ the object of your faith, your love, your worship—your hope to beat death.

So, Jesus had you baptized into His death so that He could raise you in His resurrection. Romans 6:4: "We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life."

Who enlisted you into the Christian faith? The Holy Spirit called you by the Gospel of Jesus Christ so that you became a child of the heavenly Father. Therefore, you no longer belong to the world—that’s the civilian pursuits of which Paul wrote—but you belong to the Lord’s, um, Salvation Army.

Ask yourself: are you doing the work of a soldier for Christ or are you after civilian pursuits? Are you caught up in living for the now—eat, drink, and be merry, like the rest of America—or, are you dying to these pursuits in obedience to the command of your Leader?

Again, Paul writes: "An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules." By whose rules do you live? Here is the great concern of this age: we live by our own rules. God says this, we do that. God tells us what is important, we shrug it off as trivial. God calls us Christians to fight the good fight and run the race, and we argue that it’s better to be a lover than a fighter, and the only race we want in on is wherever NASCAR is racing.

Don’t you ever wonder if anyone will be among the sheep, on Judgment Day?

Again, Paul writes, "It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops." You folks understand about hard work. You get this, that the farmer has to be making hay while the sun shines. What kind of farmer has been sitting back and relaxing, these past warm, sunny days, which have been perfect for harvesting a bumper crop?

I like how the Lord had Paul wrap up his exhortations: "Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything." Of course, you have to put the two parts together: the Lord will give you understanding, but He expects you to think over what He says. Engage your brain, not only for this hour, but the rest of the day, and tomorrow, and the next day. Consider who you are—one for whom Christ died, and one for whom He lives, and one who has died with Christ and lives with Him—consider who you are when it comes to how you act, what you say, and what you do.

You can pay me now, or you can pay me later. You can die to sin now, or you can die to sin for eternity. You really don’t want to mess this up.

These ifs can be scary:

Paul wraps up the ifs with one that turns our ugh! to aaaaahhhhh: "If we are faithless, he remains faithful—for he cannot deny himself."

Christ remains faithful to you. Even when you let sin reign, go AWOL from Christ’s Salvation Army, sit out of the race, and refuse to go into the harvest fields with the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Lord and Savior remains the faithful Lord and Savior.

When you repent of your sin, He is there to forgive you. When you return to His camp, He returns you to His troops. When you get back onto your feet, He lets you back into the race. When you see a crop that needs harvesting, He gives you His Holy Spirit’s sharp blade so that your words cut down the devil and lift up your Lord.

The Good News is that you have already died with Christ; He killed your sin in Holy Baptism. The Good News is that you already live with Christ; He keeps you fed and nourished with the eating and drinking of His Holy Communion. The Good News is the Good News, the Gospel of Jesus Christ which strengthens your faith to fight the good fight and run the race of life to its completion.

You can pay the Lord Jesus Christ now, or you can pay Him later. You don’t want to pay Him later, with the damnation to eternal hell, by neglecting your faith, giving a cold shoulder to repentance, living as if Jesus Christ is no more to you than anything else in your life.

No one else, in the history of the world, has done for you what Jesus Christ has done: He paid for you with His holy, precious life and innocent suffering and death, so that you don’t have to pay God for your sins. So that you count it a privilege to stand up, stand up for Jesus—dying with Him, enduring with Him, never denying Him, striving to be ever faithful to Him.

Jesus Christ has paid for you, now; you are privileged to pay Him your praise, honor, and worship, forever. Amen.