Trinity VI 

 

A senior citizen drove his brand new sports car at 100 kmph down the highway. Looking in his rear view mirror, he saw a police car behind him. He floored it to 120, then suddenly, he thought "I'm too old for this nonsense!" So he pulled over to the side of the road and waited for the police car to catch up to him.

The officer walked up to him, looked at his watch and said, "Sir, my shift ends in ten minutes. Since today is Friday and I'm taking off for the weekend, if you can give me a reason that I've never heard before for why you were speeding, I'll let you go."

The old man looked very seriously at the police man and replied, "Years ago, my wife ran off with a policeman. I thought you were bringing her back."

 

   We all need to remember that excuses, no matter how clever or well thought out, will be of no use when we someday stand in the presence of God.

 

   With that in mind we should carefully consider what Jesus was telling us in our Gospel today.

 

Matt. 5:20 “Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.”

 

   The scribes and Pharisees lived, what to most men of that time, seemed to be almost blameless lives. They prayed regularly, tithed, fasted, and followed the letter of Jewish law. Jesus on another occasion however called them “whited sepulchers”, because as they appeared to be pious, they had blinded themselves to the true meaning of God's laws. They trusted in their own righteousness and felt they were not as other men were - sinners.

 

   We should all realize however, that our fellow men can easily find fault with our outward living and we certainly know that our all knowing God can detect even our most secret sins.

 

   We cannot justify ourselves by saying that we are better than some others we may see around us that we may see openly breaking God's commandments. Neither can we justify ourselves by doing good works to somehow balance the scales and make up for our misdeeds.

 

   Jesus does not tell us here that if we keep part of God's law or if we have had really good intentions that we can be assured of a place in God's kingdom. He tells us that we must have righteousness that “shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees” to “enter into the kingdom of heaven”.

 

   How then, if we can offer no excuses for our sins, can we ever hope to enter into God's kingdom?

 

   Our only hope is Jesus. He is, “the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world”. All of the sins, whether of thought, word, or deed.

 

   His resurrection gained a complete victory over sin. He died on the cross for the sins of the whole world and that includes yours and mine. If we repent and confess our sins “he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins”. In the blood of Christ we are washed clean.

 

   The righteousness gained for us by Jesus becomes ours, by the grace of God, when we through faith repent and believe on him.

 

   We will then need no excuses if we remain faithful to Jesus until our life's end. We can then someday hear those words in the 25th chapter of Matthew to the good and faithful servant.

 

“Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.”