Christian Obedience: Promise vs. Performance

Matthew 21:23-32 October 2, 2005

Audio Link: Promise vs. Performance

When I was a senior in high school, I fell in love with a girl. Since it was puppy love, we wanted to spend as much time together as possible. (Do not worry about Sunae, I already told this to her and was forgiven.) After I broke up with this girl, I met Sunae, my future wife. Unfortunately, my parents didn't like my girl friend and since the senior year is a very important time for preparing to go to college, they were strongly against my dating. They gave me advice, scolded, and sometimes even threatened me to quit the relationship with her.

At that time, I continually said, "Yes, mother I will do what you want me to do and study hard." Of course I didn't. I kept promising them to quit the relationship, but never did. (I am glad that I am sharing this story in English so they don't find out about it.) So, I told them I'd do something, and then failed to follow through. Today's sermon is about promise and performance.

Jesus paints a scene where a father asks his two sons to work in his vineyard. The first son says he will not go, but later thinks better of it and does go to work. The second son says he will go, but then does not go. Jesus asks the listeners: "Which of the two did the will of his father?"

The son who said he would obey and then didn't represents the chief priest and the elders. They are the people who said they would obey God and then did not. They always said they wanted to do God's will, but they constantly disobeyed. They were phony, just going through the motions. Jesus applied this parable directly to the chief priest and elders, and contrasted their response to God's messenger, John the Baptist, with that of those they most despised, the tax collectors and prostitutes. Because these sinners had believed John's authority was coming from God, they would go first into the kingdom of God.

First of all, this simple story of the two sons illustrates the difference between saying and doing and indicates that God is more impressed by our performance than by our promises. This parable of the two sons tells us that there are two very common classes of people in this world. In the first class, there are people like the second son, whose talking is much better than their practice. They will promise anything; they make great protestations of piety and fidelity; but their practice legs far behind.

It is dangerous to pretend to obey God when our hearts are far from him because God knows our true intentions. Our actions must match our words. Promises can never take the place of performance, and fine words are never a substitute for fine deeds. The son who said he would go, and did not, had all the outward marks of manners. In his answer he called his father "Sir", with all respect. But a manner, which never gets beyond words, is an illusion. Having true manners is to have obedience, willingly and graciously given.

There is only one way in which a man's sincerity can be proved, and that is by his practice. Fine words can never be a substitute for fine deeds. There is only one proof of love, and that proof is obedience. There is no point in saying that we love a person, and then keep on doing things, which break that person's heart.

When we were young we sometimes said to our mothers, "Mother, I love you." And our mother sometimes smiled a little wishfully and said, "I wish you would show it a little more in the way you behave." Too often we confess God with our lips and deny him with our lives. It is not difficult to recite a creed, but it is difficult to live the Christian life.

A husband and wife were discussing the possibility of taking a trip to the Holy Land: The husband said, "Wouldn't it be fantastic to go to the Holy Land and stand and shout the Ten Commandments from Mount Sinai?" The wife replied, "It would be better if we stayed home and kept them."

The second lesson that we can learn from today's parable is that the most important thing is what they finally did and said. The two sons both ended up doing the opposite of what they said they would do. The sons' first answers were meaningless. Each changed his mind. The emphasis is not on the initial statement of intention, but on the final act of obedience or disobedience. What they finally did and said mattered most.

Here is a man. He had so great a passion that he could give up his life for the kingdom of God. He was chosen as one of the 12 disciples. He was very intelligent and reasonable so that he kept the moneybag for the expenses of the disciples. His name is Judas Iscariot. Judas expected Jesus to make the right political moves. When Jesus kept talking about dying, Judas felt varying degrees of anger, fear, and disappointment.

Although Judas followed Jesus for a long time, he did not obey Jesus' will. His will, plan, and decision was always ahead of Jesus'. As we know well, he betrayed Jesus in the end. Judas started as a disciple of Jesus, but he finished as a puppet of an evil spirit. His beginning was seemingly glorious; his last moment of life was tragedy. In spite of being a chosen disciple, he is called "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) because he was never saved.

Here is another man. He was a robber and died next to Jesus. As this man was about to die, he turned to Christ for forgiveness, and Christ accepted him. Probably he had lived an ugly life-perhaps sometimes he beat people, took their money by force, and perhaps even killed people. Probably he had never gone to temple and probably never heard about Jesus in his lifetime. However, in his last moment of life, fortunately, he met Jesus on the cross, and he received forgiveness from Jesus.

However, today's Scripture doesn't encourage us to believe that we are OK to be a last minute rider on the train heading to the kingdom of heaven. Surely even those who repent at the very last moment will be with God in the kingdom of God, but our lives will be much more useful and fulfilling if we turn to God early. The best thing our Father wants for us is to accept Jesus as our Lord for as long as possible. The lesson we have from the first son is that the Father wants to see his son change his mind and obey his command as soon as possible. The sooner the better.

Most parents are familiar with the words: "I will do it in a minute, but first…" Our heavenly Father often receives a similar response from His children. We have to know that delayed obedience is only a step away from disobedience. Let me say again, delayed obedience is only a step away from disobedience.

The key to the correct understanding of this parable is that it is not really praising anyone. It is setting before us a picture of two very imperfect sets of people, yet one set was, none the less, better than the other. Neither son in the story was the kind of son to bring total joy to his father. Both were unsatisfactory; but the one who obeyed in the end was, without a doubt, better than the other. The real point of this parable is that, while the second situation is infinitely preferred to the first, neither is perfect. The ideal son would be the son who accepted the father's orders with obedience and with respect and who, without question, fully carried the orders out.

Our choices didn't have to be either say "yes" and fail to go, or to say "no" and then repent and go. Our best response to the grace of God should be to say, "Yes, I will go Father," and then go.

Today's parable is a story of two sons, both are ordered to work in their father's vineyard. The first refuses to go but then changes his mind and obeys his father. The second agrees to go, but never fulfills that agreement. Even the chief priests and elders were perceptive enough to answer Jesus correctly when he asked them, "Which of the two did the will of his father?" The first son, they answered-the one who eventually changed his mind and obeyed.

What about us? Do our words and actions match? Are we the people whose promises meet performance? Are we the people whose actions show the convictions of our speech? Are we the people whose professions meet practice? Too often our actions are far different from our pious speech, and our speech is "Godly" yet our actions are not. What really matters is not how much time we devote to Bible Study, but how we apply the Bible's teaching into our daily lives. The important thing is not just knowing, studying, acquiring more information, and providing lip service. No, the important things are acting, applying, and practicing. We, as Christians, should be the people in who promise and performance meet and match.

We know how difficult it is to live up to the promises we make to God and to each other. We also know how easy it is to mouth pious phrases, but then fail to live out the promises in our daily lives. We have to remember what Jesus once said regarding those who are quick with promises and slow with performance. "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?' Then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers'" (Matthew 7:21-23).

Actions are more significant than words. The kingdom of God, Jesus affirms, is made up of such individuals who truly believe and act on those beliefs, even if they are tax collectors and prostitutes and others who defy the expectations of religious insiders. God's bottom-line concern is not a person's verbal claims but what one actually does. There is no place in the kingdom of heaven for those who declare their faith with their lips, but who do not proceeds to true belief that results in action.

Non-believers will not be fascinated by how many Bible verses we memorize or how familiar we are with the Bible stories. They will be impressed, moved, and changed by what we do. The Gospels tells the stories of how Jesus acted and lived his life among the people. As followers of Jesus Christ, I believe we can write our own Gospel. Each chapter describes not the promise we make but the performance we do.

Let me finish my sermon with Francis Bacon's saying, "It's not what we eat, but what we digest that makes us strong; Not what we gain, but what we save that makes us rich; Not what we read, but what we remember that makes us learned; Not what we preach or pray, but what we believe and practice that makes us Christian."

Christian Obedience: Promise vs. Performance

Promise vs. Performance, Obedience to God - Audio Sermon On-line - Reverend KyungMo Koo