What Regular Sermons Sound Like To Me

I know this isn't fair. Real pastors spend hours preparing messages, and most of them sincerely love Jesus. They are not secretly plotting in underground volcano lairs while petting white cats and laughing about how they're going to ruin grace for everybody. And yet, sometimes when I’m  sitting through a sermon, my brain hears something completely different than what is actually being said.

Giving credit where it is due, the pastor begins well enough by paying lip service to Jesus having done everything. An unambiguous "Friends, we are saved by grace alone. Jesus paid it all. Nothing can be added to the finished work of Christ," would have been better, deserved an Amen, and been an excellent start, but I’m admittedly picky.

Instead, he quickly turns to Exodus 4, and that's where things get weird.

God tells Moses to throw down his staff. The staff becomes a snake. Moses picks it back up, and it becomes a staff again. In my Bible, this appears to be one of many miraculous signs God gave Moses to authenticate his role in Israel's story. Moses gets signs, Elijah gets signs, Elisha gets signs, and Jesus gets better special effects than all of those: He’s way better at raising the dead, healing the blind, calming storms, walking on water, forgiving sins, and coming back from His own funeral. The point seems fairly obvious: Moses points forward, Elijah points forward, the Law points forward, the Prophets point forward. Everything points forward to Jesus.

But somehow we land on: "God can only transform what you're willing to let go of." The congregation nods. I blink. The pastor continues: "Moses had to release what was in his hand." More nodding. I begin looking for emergency exits, because I know what's coming next.

"What's in YOUR hand today?"

There it is, right on schedule, and now we're off-roading through the wilderness with only a handful of verses and without a theological map. “Maybe your staff is fear. Maybe it's pride, or comfort, or your television, or your Dr Pepper habit, or your fantasy football team…” The possibilities are endless, and by the time he's done, Moses' staff has become a universal symbol for literally anything.

Then comes the application: "If you'll let go of what's in your hand, God will transform it." This sounds spiritual. It is also suspiciously close to motivational speaking. The pastor says "Release your staff," and my brain hears "DO SOMETHING." The pastor says "Take a step of faith," and my brain hears "DO SOMETHING." The pastor says "God is waiting on your obedience," and my brain hears "DO SOMETHING HARDER." The pastor says "Your breakthrough is on the other side of surrender," and my brain hears "HE DIDN’T DO ENOUGH; WE'RE GOING TO NEED YOU TO DO SOMETHING."

Then we arrive at the offering, which is where my imagination really becomes unhelpful. The pastor says "What's in your hand?" and I hear "Money." He says "Release it," and I hear "Definitely money." He says "Watch God transform it," and I hear "Apparently, when the money hits the offering plate, it’s gonna become a snake."

At this point I am deeply interested — not spiritually interested, scientifically interested. If we're throwing twenty-dollar bills into a brass plate and watching them become reptiles, attendance is either about to diminish or increase dramatically. Fox News is coming. National Geographic is coming. The Discovery Channel is coming. Some guy is showing up with a bucket asking whether snake-money reproduces. Children would be selling tickets to services. That would at least be memorable.

Instead, what usually happens is that the money disappears. On an entirely unrelated note, six months later the pastor arrives driving something with more chrome.

Now before anybody gets mad, let me clarify: I don't actually think every pastor is spending your offering money restoring antique cars. I don't even think most are. I just think the average church member has heard approximately 47,000 sermons whose central point was "Jesus did everything... Therefore, here's a list of things for you to do." That's the part that wears me out.

When I read Scripture, I don't see Moses as the final destination. Like the author of Hebrews, I see Moses as a giant flashing arrow pointing at Christ. The signs authenticate Moses. Moses points to the Messiah. The Messiah accomplished redemption. The Spirit comes to live inside believers. The dead are made alive. Sinners become saints. Children of Adam become children of God.

Honestly, a stick turning into a snake is impressive. A sea splitting in half is impressive. Fire from heaven is impressive. On the other hand, a person with God's Spirit living inside of them forever because of grace alone — that's the miracle. Moses threw down a staff, but the same God that made it into a snake took a spiritually dead sinner and made him alive in Christ. The greatest miracle isn't that water became blood; it's that enemies of God became His sons and daughters. The greatest miracle isn't that a prophet carried signs of God's presence; it's that God now lives in ordinary believers. You. Me. All of us Christians.

That's astonishing.

The New Covenant is not God standing at a distance saying, "Show Me your obedience and maybe I'll bless you." The New Covenant is God saying, "I have blessed you in Christ. Now live from what I've already given you." One starts with your performance; the other starts with His. One starts with your sacrifice; the other starts with His sacrifice. One starts with your work; the other starts with His finished work, and the good works He set up for you in advance flow naturally from your new identity.

If we're going to spend forty-five minutes talking about a staff, a snake, and a shepherd standing barefoot in the desert, let's at least follow the giant neon arrow where it's pointing. The Bible isn't mainly about Moses. The Bible isn't mainly about you. The Bible is about Jesus. And unlike the offering plate illustration, that's not a snake oil sales pitch.

That's the Gospel.

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