2026-06-14 Romans 05 01-08 Access Granted
“Therefore … we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
A long time ago, in a galaxy named Texas Instruments, in my first career, I wrote computer software for the Department of Defense.
I was a tiny cog, a yellow-skinned minion on a Top Secret project, so ridiculously expensive even the Reagan Administration said, “Whoah, let’s cut back on the budget.”
I can’t tell you what it was, but I can say it did NOT involve extraterrestrials.
That would be Steven Spielberg.
Eventually, I left high tech and got into the extra-extra-terrestrial, heavenly tech of Presbyterian ministry.
Could have stayed and become the world’s first trillionaire, but I said, “No Lord, let it be Elon.”
I’ll always be a big nerd.
I love anything with pretty lights that goes “beep-boop” and does what I tell it.
Makes me feel like a god.
“Alexa. Tell me today’s schedule and turn on the coffee maker.”
“Yes, James. I live to obey you.”
Such power.
But – there are times – when these machines invoke my wrath.
They’re always a nanosecond from demonic possession.
I forget a password, the wifi goes down, I mistype a 42-digit security code for the third time.
Makes me want to scream.
And sometimes I do.
“Siri. Call my cardiologist.”
“Did you say, Carl Hixon? What would you like on that pizza?”
Auuugggghhhh!!!!
On the other hand, it could be God telling me a Mighty Meaty might help.
Is it just me? Tell me I’m not alone.
This is why Amazon sells prescription meds now.
“Here’s your new computer. And a box of Prozac.”
All it takes for me to go ballistic is those two little words:
Access Denied.
And whether it’s computers, or a traffic stoppage, or a teenager that’s turned off Life 360, or a parent that refuses to wear her Life Alert, or a boss that tells you “No” because she lives to make your life miserable –
High tech, low tech, no tech –
Whenever we’re denied access, our angry inner two-year-old wakes up.
And the peace of God that passes understanding – passes us right by.
You can see it.
You know it’s right there behind the door.
What you want, more than anything else, is the green light, the release of the buzzer, the click of the lock, the holy words, “Access Granted.”
—
OK, I know, I’m whining about silly things.
“My phone won’t work right. Wah, wah.”
In our brains we know this stuff is silly.
But in our guts, they sure do get us twisted in a wad.
The little annoyances stack up into afflictions.
So, maybe when I’m whining, I’m obeying scripture.
I’m boasting in my afflictions.
According to the Bible, that's a good thing to do.
Paul says:
but we also boast in our afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame
So… what?
When our car doesn’t start, should we thank God and post about it on Facebook?
Behold how much character I’m producing!
When I read how Paul sits down and writes to the church in Rome about how he “boasts in his sufferings,” I wonder:
I wonder – when talking to God, did he ever have to listen a message saying,
“Your prayer is very important to us, please hold for the next available angel representative.”
“Hang up and dial 911 if you’re having a medical emergency.”
It makes me want to say, “Well, I’m about to!”
And I know – I know – there are times when we’re praying to God for relief, for healing, for safety for our children, for our parents,
When, like David in Psalm 42, we’re praying for some big angelic drone to lower a crane claw to lift us out what the Bible calls the “miry bog” – the big ball pit of life we’re stuck in –
I know there are times when we’re lifting up those prayers and it feels like all we’re getting is a computer voice saying, “I’m sorry, Dave. Access denied.”
And how much more, when a big, terrible, unspeakably tragic thing happens like it did in that swimming pool down the street the week before last.
How much more does the silence of the angels twist us and confound us, and make us want to scream at the top of our lungs, “Why?”
“Why do things like that happen?”
To produce character?
Nobody needs that much character.
It feels like God’s Customer Service Department has all been fired.
And maybe they should be.
It sounds like, “I’m sorry, but your claim has been denied.”
When something like that happens, I don’t want some smiling idiot preacher telling me, “Your suffering is producing hope.”
Sorry, but I’ll gladly deny that garbage.
—
When you read your Bible, I mean really read it, like Paul did –
You see that the Bible was written by people with long, long memories.
We suffer for five minutes and think it’s a catastrophe.
We think the movement from affliction to endurance to character to hope takes about as long as an an answer from your AI bot.
And that speed is great if you’re Googling a recipe for chicken soup.
But our souls need way more than a bowl of chicken soup.
When we get a real affliction – and some of you know this personally – when we get a real affliction even the best soup doesn’t last long.
A real affliction doesn’t produce endurance, character, and hope as much as it shows us how little we have of it.
The peace of instant answers disappears as soon as the dopamine fades.
But through our anger, through depression, through absence, we learn.
We learn how desperately we need our Creator to help us create endurance, and character, and hope.
We don’t know what we have until we’ve lost it.
That doesn’t mean we should aim for suffering - of course we shouldn’t aim for it.
Great artists don’t get great because they suffer; they get great because they turn their suffering into a pathway.
A rocky pathway through hell that slowly, one step at a time, steps forward, steps backward – slowly fills the emptiness with a drop of endurance, a pebble of character, a nanosecond of hope.
With help, with friends, with a church, with a good therapist, with a few sneaky little angels offering a hand –
Over time, what has been denied will be granted.
The Apostle Paul may have had a bright moment of conversion.
But it took him years before he could write his letter to the Romans.
You may have a bright moment of conversion – and good for you if you have.
But for those converting moments to become transforming takes us, and takes God, more time than we want to grant.
Our souls might not need chicken soup, but our bodies do.
And sometimes a quiet friend with a casserole is better than all God’s angels put together.
—
Paul says “we have access.”
He says, “we have access to this grace in which we stand.”
That’s kind of an odd thing to say, when you think about it.
I mean, if you’re already standing someplace, of course you have access to it.
You're standing in it.
It’s not like,
“It’s over there. It’s miles away. It’s out in space.”
No. You’re already standing in it.
Does the place where you’re standing look like lovely grace?
Like peace, love and understanding?
Or does the place where you’re standing feel like sinking sand, a “miry bog,” a slippery ball pit?
Sometimes when we talk about church, or family, or our nation, we talk about how we’re standing on the shoulders of giants.
Standing on the shoulders of the men and women who came before us, generations before us, ages before us.
We’re not standing because of what we’ve done;
We’re standing on the promises (as the song goes), standing on the grace that they discovered THEY were standing on.
And realizing this IS a conversion, an awakening.
Grace is a gift.
Grace is a gift made accessible because someone else laid the groundwork.
Our suffering, our endurance, our character, our hope will pass on that gift to generations yet to come.
I believe that as sure as I’m standing here.
Someday the kids of Sunday School, and VBS, and youth trips to Orlando will stand on the grace that slowly turned our afflictions into hope.
And – as Paul said – Hope does not disappoint.
We’re granting THEM access, right now.
And they don’t even know it.
Church people of every age get all angry when things change.
When things don’t work the way they used to.
When our technology of people misbehave.
When the next generation takes us for granted, like those ornery whippersnappers do.
There’s always suffering in church.
We call it committees.
We think demonic forces are trying to deny us access to the good-old-days.
But – good news – we’ve got access to the grace in which we stand – right now.
And that grace will be here all day long.
And then, tomorrow, we’ll do as the Psalm says, and “sing a NEW song to the Lord.”
And we’ll hear the echoes of grace there, too.
Tomorrow, we’ll have a whole new portal of access, a whole new technology of grace, built on yesterday’s slow progress.
And, as the scripture says, we will not be put to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
We’ve already got all the access we need.
Access granted.
You may enter now.
Let’s pray: God of open access. God of reckless love. God of limitless mercy – grant that we might live as reflections of your unqualified grace. Relieve our frustration when things don’t work the way we think they should. May we learn your ways of welcome, to everyone, and to ourselves – and may we grow in our endurance, our character, and our hope – through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
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