Rev. Dr. Joel D. Biermann
Luke 17:11-19
Thanksgiving - November 23, 2016
“Prof., I know that I’ve got an exam in your class tomorrow, and I’ve been studying for it, but I just found out that my grandmother died; can I reschedule the test for later in the week?” It is, of course, the classic “grandmother’s funeral” excuse, and on campuses of higher learning, it’s considered tried and true. College students have a well-deserved reputation for concocting excuses for late or sub-standard work. Possessing newly-acquired and expanded gifts of creativity, verbiage, and practiced sincerity in conjunction with a proclivity for immature and irresponsible behavior, they are ideally positioned for perfecting the art of the excuse. In one study done on a college campus, 25% of the students admitted that they had used the grandmother’s funeral excuse, and 87% of professors reported having heard it at one time or another. It’s an old excuse—but it’s effective. Most of the professors in the study conceded that it is an excuse they generally accept at face value.
Excuses play an integral role not only in the world of the academy, but in all of our social interactions. Their significance and importance are such that excuse-making actually has been the subject of focused psychological and sociological study since at least the middle of the last century. And why not? Our lives are filled with excuses—a day does not go by that you don’t hear several excuses. They are so part of our lives that we hardly notice them. “Sorry, I’m late, but traffic was worse than I expected.” “I’m not sure what happened, but my alarm didn’t go off.” “My battery died.” “I couldn’t get a signal.” “My car was in the shop.” “I wasn’t feeling well this morning, and got a late start.” “We weren’t prepared for such a big turnout.” “This isn’t my area of expertise.” “I’m not in charge.” Genuine or fabricated, compelling or flimsy, honest or embellished, they are all just excuses, and they are a key part of our social and relational fabric. Some of them are trivial and insignificant—a throw-away phrase lacking substance. Others are carefully crafted and articulated, meant to change minds and influence behavior. Excuses are an essential part of life. We depend on them to keep our interactions with one another working smoothly.
People need excuses because they need some way to deal with their own frequent failures. We cause so many disappointments to so many people, we inflict so much hurt and create so many difficulties, that we need excuses just to deal with the unpleasant nastiness of it all. “I’m sorry I snapped at you, but I have a pounding headache,” is far more palatable than, “Sorry I’m so crabby, but you just bug me to death and make me ill.” “I didn’t mean to be late, but I had a minor family emergency,” is a lot easier to say than, “I’m late because I wanted to see the end of the football game and frankly would rather still be at home than here with all of you.” Excuses help to smooth over the rough places in our interactions. Excuses help human society become a bit more civil and tolerable. But, as useful and as commonplace as excuses may be, they are still a glaring mar, a screaming witness to our own human frailty and failing. Excuses are part of our lives only because messing up, falling short, and causing hurt are part of our lives. If there were no sin, there would be no excuses.
But, sin there is, in abundance, and excuses there are, in abundance. So, we get used to them and we begin hardly to notice them. Most excuses we take in stride—the way we learn to take sin in stride. And, because they are so common and so readily accepted, we are expected to accept them as well. And should you have the audacity actually to question the excuse that is offered, then suddenly you are the one with the problem; you have broken the rules, you haven’t played your part in the excuses game.
In the story from Luke, Jesus gives ten men a gift: a miracle of healing from the gruesome living death of leprosy. These men were resurrected by Jesus; they were given their lives back. Nine hurried off to get on with their new lease on life. One turned back to offer thanks. But, hey, we can understand how it must have been for the nine can’t we? Picture it: there’s the group of thirteen, Jesus plus the twelve watching and grinning as the ten used-to-be-lepers, heading in the direction of the priest, suddenly discover their new baby skin. Ecstatic, they quicken their pace, but then one stops and turns back while the rest hurry on. Now, Jesus isn’t smiling. And Peter, who can’t miss Jesus’ displeasure, is saying, “They were so excited, Jesus, they just forgot to come back to say thanks.” And then Andrew tries to help, “Right, they aren’t snubbing you, Rabbi, they’re just so eager to see their families that they can’t think of anything else. You can see their thanks by the joy in their faces.” Of course, Luke records no excuses; but we have no trouble supplying them—we are, after all, experts at the practice. Jesus, though, isn’t so ready to make excuses for the nine men who failed to speak their thanks, and he appears altogether unwilling to accept the excuses we might offer.
You and I may learn to accept excuses, and even to expect and welcome excuses, but God is not so easily persuaded. Excuse-making and excuse-accepting breeds mediocrity. It cultivates the ideal environment for the growth and spread of sin. And while you may be perfectly willing to accept that, and learn to get along with it, God is not. God is no more willing to accept excuses than he is ready to accept sin. When nine newly-born men failed to do what they should have done, Jesus did not hide his disappointment. He did not cut them some slack, overlook their failure, and let everyone revel in the wonder of the miraculous moment. He didn’t make excuses for them in order to minimize and marginalize their failure. No, he faced it, and addressed it. So, it makes you wonder: are you really doing your brother a favor when you accept his excuse and dismiss his sin? It seems that there are times when such action would, in fact, be the antithesis of grace.
God doesn’t look kindly on excuses. Nevertheless, with all the confidence, or perhaps naïve stupidity of a professional college slacker, we go to God and offer him our excuses. When we should be opening our mouths, and uttering only repentance, we too quickly, almost instinctively, open our mouths and let the excuses flow. “Lord, I know I’ve fallen short of your expectations, but I tried, and after all, I’m only human.” “But, Lord you have to understand, I’m just one person, you don’t expect me to be the only one to speak the truth, do you?” “I know it wasn’t the best thing to do, but what else could I do…I had no choice.” The tired litany drones on and on. With infinite variation and creativity, we spew our excuses to God. But to God they all sound pathetically and scandalously alike: just excuses. He hates them all. They reek with the gagging stench of sin.
How absurd for us to offer God excuses. God does not operate in the realm of excuses. He doesn’t speak the language of excuses. God has no reason for excuses. He never makes excuses…he never makes mistakes. He never fails. He never falls short of the standard. God is the standard. He has nothing to excuse. He owes nothing to anyone. God does not need to make excuses. But, he does…he makes one. God who never disappoints and never fails, and who has no use for any excuse, does make one excuse.
It’s like the boy who’s getting over some illness and can go back to school, but can’t get overexerted yet. Following the scheduled routine, he goes to gym class, but while his classmates run laps, sweat through exercises and get clobbered with dodge balls, he sits in the bleachers. He’s got a note written and signed by his doctor. He’s golden. The authority has spoken. He’s excused. My friends, you have been given your excuse from the ultimate authority. Your excuse is written in blood. God who needs no excuses, chooses to make one excuse. He makes one for you. He sends Christ for you, and for you, Christ willingly drains his blood. With that blood, he writes your pardon, your excuse from the guilt and condemnation of your sin and failure. Jesus’ excuse is the only one you need.
You spend your life making excuses, trying to cover your tracks, making up for your failure. You are desperate to make yourself look good to other people, proving that you are worthy of their praise and love. But, you can’t do it, and you can’t offer any excuse to make up for it. You can’t excuse your sin. But God can, and he does. In Christ, God gives you the excuse. In Christ, through his perfect life and perfect sacrifice, your Father pardons you. You are set free, excused completely for every failure. That’s what grace is all about. And, it’s yours. In baptism, God wrote your name at the top of the pardon. You have been excused. God doesn’t just overlook the sin or act like it’s not there. He meets it head-on. He covers it with his blood. That’s how God makes the only excuse that counts. He deals directly with sin. He defeats sin.
God gives you the only excuse that you need. He gives you Jesus. Next to the pardon offered in Christ, all of your excuses look pretty pathetic. They are sorry and useless—any excuse you create is always worthless. The pardon you have been given in Jesus is valuable beyond estimate. God’s excuse doesn’t just smooth over bad feelings and defuse angry reactions. God’s excuse actually does something. It makes you a new person. You are a person born all over again, and made brand new. The excuse God gives you removes the sin and its stain of guilt. With God’s pardon, you don’t need any other excuse. With God’s pardon, you can live more and more like a new person—a man or woman of integrity who doesn’t spend time concocting excuses, but instead spends time celebrating God’s excuse and the difference it makes in your life.
We usually consider people who are without excuse to be the lowest of the low. Bad enough for someone to do some horrendous thing—but if they have no reason, and are without excuse, it is so much the worse. In Christ, though, holding onto the written excuse that he provides, you become a person without excuse—you don’t offer reasons for your actions. You don’t supply explanations for your words. You don’t try to make people understand where you’re coming from. You don’t mess around with any of those excuses anymore, because you now have the one and only excuse that matters. You’ve got God’s pardon, and clutching that pardon, you go forward into life doing the things that a pardoned man does. You’ve been given new life. You become a person known not for your good, legitimate excuses, but for your consistent integrity as you live with God’s excuse at the center of your life and your actions.
God has given you what you do not deserve. Don’t offer him reasons and explanations for your failures and shortcoming. There’s no point in going to God with your excuses. God already knows you inside and out. He knows your motives and your sin better than you do. And yet, in spite of that, he loves you and holds out his excuse, his pardon, to you. Go to him and receive from him his incredible pardon. Armed with that pardon, what grace you have, my friend. What a God you have. What a Lord and Savior you have. Don’t offer him excuses. Offer him what he delights to hear. Offer him the only thing you can offer: offer him your thanks. Be done with excuse-giving, and get busy with Thanksgiving. Amen.