Sermon Title: Breaking Free from Guilt

Scripture Reference: Romans 6:3-11

Sermon Summary: This sermon explores the profound impact of guilt on our lives and presents the Christian perspective on overcoming it through faith in Jesus Christ. It contrasts worldly attempts to deny or redefine guilt with the biblical solution of finding redemption through baptism and faith in Christ's death and resurrection. The sermon emphasizes that true freedom from guilt comes not from our own efforts, but from God's forgiveness and the new identity we receive in Christ.

Key Points:

  • Guilt is a powerful force that can enslave and define us
  • The world often encourages denial or redefinition of sin and guilt
  • God's law is immutable and reflected in human conscience
  • Attempts to deny guilt ultimately fail because we cannot escape our conscience
  • Baptism into Christ's death and resurrection gives true freedom from guilt
  • Our new identity in Christ supersedes our old identity defined by sin
  • We are called to consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ

Transcript:

Guilt is a very powerful thing. It's like an anchor on your soul, something that we carry about on our necks or drag behind us for a long time, sometimes seemingly forever. When we're guilty of something, it's hard to shake the feeling of shame and regrets. We often let that guilt define us even, or define our neighbor. Maybe we even refer to it with that strong, definite article: "Ever since the divorce." "Things haven't been the same since the accident." "I've been trying to learn from the mistake."

Whatever it might be that we're guilty of, everywhere we go, it follows us. It's on our minds and on everyone else's. It's like that one little moment owns us.

What we usually think of as nagging guilt, St. Paul describes in the book of Romans as being a slave to sin. That's a powerful way to define sin, isn't it? As hard as you struggle against your sin and against the guilt that comes with it, as much as you want to put it behind you, it owns you. It holds you captive as a slave. It defines you. There's two ways that we might try to sin and guilt. The first is quite common, and that's to try to just simply deny it. To pretend like sin really isn't that big of a deal. That's the way the world would have us deal with guilt and shame, and loudly try to persuade others to do the same. "Are you feeling guilty about something that you've done, or something that you are? Don't feel guilty. That's just you being you. You can't change it anyway. Why should you be guilty? Why should you be guilty? Why should you be guilty? Why should you be guilty for just doing what's inside you?" Oh sure, maybe there's some acknowledgement of wrongdoing. Say things like, "Well, you've made mistakes, of course. Who hasn't? That's just being human." We're told especially that those who disagree need to get with the times. Especially as Christians, we're told that our beliefs are outdated and ill-suited to modern life. But that presupposes that we can get rid of our guilt by simply changing God's law. Like a country club might change its bylaws or membership requirements.

As Christians, we know that's not how it works, though. It's not our law. The Ten Commandments weren't decided by some early convention of Christians. It's God's law. God is the one who spoke. God is the one who made the world in this way. God is the one who defines justice and mercy and love. And his law is actually not arbitrary.

God's law is not a culturally conditioned set of rules that made sense in some faraway time and place, but not today. God's law is immutable, unchangeable, woven into the very fabric of the universe. And that's because it's a reflection of God's own love and goodness. The Ten Commandments are a summary of that law, but not its origin. In fact, God has built his law into the conscience of every person. Every single person, Christian and pagan alike. Even before Israel ever received the Ten Commandments or ever heard it from their God, they each knew that it was wrong to steal and to kill and to commit adultery. Even a lost Polynesian tribe on some deserted island somewhere in the middle of the South Pacific who has never heard of the Bible still understands those basic things and what's right and wrong.

The effort to deny our guilt and our shame by denying our sin against God's commandments is an effort to assert our control and power over sin and guilt, because it's hard to admit that we're enslaved. It's hard to admit that guilt has a chokehold on us. It's hard to admit that we're weighed down by something that we cannot rid ourselves of, no matter how hard we try. The problem with trying to deal with guilt and sin that way, by pretending it doesn't really exist, is that in the end, we can't really live a lie. Have you ever wondered why those who are guilty tend to be the most angry and vocal? You ever wonder why people feel the need to shout their abortion? Why there are so many pride parades? Why those who dishonor father and mother want to be seen as good and right people and won't hear any criticism against their actions? You ever wonder why those who don't believe the Ten Commandments possess any moral authority in the 21st century still insist that you must agree with them, that they are right, and that if you don't, they're going to shout you down in silence? When you know the truth, that your actions are just and right, you can tolerate it even when people are lying about you. It may hurt to hear, to be sure, but your conscience comforts you by reminding you that you are, in fact, acting in accordance with the truth. But when you're caring about that weight of guilt and shame, it is intolerable to have others speak the truth to you. It doesn't just hurt, it's unbearable, because your own conscience confirms that what is being spoken is true. And that's where all of mankind's efforts to finally end the guilt of sin, to finally evade it by denying it, leave. We cannot escape ourselves. We cannot escape our conscience and our heart, which tells us that we are indeed guilty of concerning God's law. No matter how we might try to dress that up or evade it, the guilt does not truly go away. But there is another way to deal with the guilt and shame of sin, not to run away from it, not to try to redefine it away, but to lay it down at the feet of Jesus.

Guilt and sin, cannot be redefined or denied, but they can be transferred from us to Jesus, to the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, to the one who came to bear our sins to Calvary. We cannot erase the claim that sin has on our lives, but we can be given a new life.

That is what St. Paul says has happened in our baptism: "Do you not know that all of us who have baptized in Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? We were therefore buried with him by baptism into death..." You cannot erase the guilt of sin that has laid a claim on your life, but in your baptism, you have laid down that life. It is dead. It is buried. And with it, all of the sin and the guilt. The end of sin is death. That death was suffered by Christ on the cross. And by you and your baptism, or rather the application of Christ's death and suffering is extended to cover you and your sin. God has spoken over you and your baptism, your sin and your guilt are not your identity any longer. They have been crucified and buried with Christ. St. Paul says it this way. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. And so even if you still feel guilty, those feelings of guilt are not a reflection of reality. Your guilt, your slavery of sin has been brought to nothing, God says. It is gone because it is crucified with Christ the Redeemer. And the thing that now defines your life is not your sin. It's not your guilt. It is your baptism. You are baptized into your Savior, tied to a real cross, where Jesus suffered and died to forgive you all of your sins and to free you. You are baptized, tied to the real resurrection of Jesus that has set you free and made you new. That is your identity. That means that there is actual salvation for you, not if you manage to free yourselves from the chains of sin, but because Christ has already freed you by his death and resurrection.

You are no longer a slave. You've been set free by the blood of Jesus. You are forgiven and made new. Just as Christ has risen from the dead, so too you will rise with him. And this is real freedom, not the kind of fake freedom that comes from lies and redefinitions and escape, but one that comes from the very mouth of God, who speaks and things come to be. So you also must count yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus, Paul says.

You are baptized. Count yourselves forgiven, dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus, our Lord. When you can't forget your sin, remember what Christ has given you in your baptism. Forgiveness and life. The anchor of your guilt is cut free. The chains of sin have been broken. Remember who you really are. You are loved and redeemed by the Father that you might live in his freedom, life and joy forever.