Lenten Midweek 2: The Eighth Commandment (Matthew 26:59-61)

“You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this evening comes from the twenty-sixth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Matthew, which reads as follows: “Now the chief priests and the whole Council were seeking false testimony against Jesus that they might put Him to death, but they found none, though many false witnesses came forward. At last two came forward and said, ‘This man said, “I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to rebuild it in three days.”’” Dear friends in Christ, the courtroom is the home of the Eighth Commandment. There, among judges and juries, defendants and prosecutors, it rules. It is the task of those in authority to provide justice, to make sure that the truth wins out, that the guilty are punished, and the innocent freed. Only the truth should be told in court. No lies—not even little ones! No slander, no falsehood, no tall tales of any kind. A judge must be fearless; he must be consumed by the search for truth. And the witnesses must be the same; they must be upright and trustworthy, for the reputation of their neighbor is in their hands. That’s why, if you are a witness, you are required to swear a solemn oath; you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God. Serious stuff, especially if you happen to believe in the almighty God who gave the Eighth Commandment. The court wants to hear and determine the truth, nothing but the truth.

Surely, that is what the Sanhedrin wants to hear, right? They want to hear the truth about Jesus, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, correct? For the Eighth Commandment, though it rules our entire lives, especially governs the courtroom. These men have been charged with justice, and they will certainly make it their task to ensure that Jesus receives a fair hearing, right? Wrong! “Now the chief priests and the whole Council were seeking false testimony about Jesus that they might put Him to death.” Did you hear that? The Council is seeking out false witnesses! They want the liars, they want those who will willingly break the Eighth Commandment. Jesus will only receive the pretense of justice; He will be tried, but in the middle of the night, and with a crowd of false witnesses testifying against Him. The ones who know the Law subvert it; they want nothing to do with the truth. They lust for liars so that they can put Him to death.

It’s hard to believe that upstanding, ‘good religious people,’ those who pride themselves on their keeping of the Law, could subvert justice in this way. The authorities, those charged with administering justice, would do that—even to an innocent man? Sure, they would, without a second thought, for their hatred blinded them. And so would you. And so do you. Martin Luther teaches us the meaning of the Eighth Commandment: “We should fear and love God so that we do not tell lies about our neighbor, betray him, slander him, or hurt his reputation, but defend him, speak well of him, and explain everything in the kindest way.” The courtroom is the Eighth Commandment’s natural home, but the thing is, this world is a courtroom, everyone is on trial.

And you are an expert in giving false witness. You bear false witness by lying about your friend, saying things you know aren’t true, intending to exalt yourself by bringing her down. You bear false witness by revealing secrets, betraying the trust of another by making what was private public. You bear false witness when you take someone’s sin not to him, but to the entire world. You bear false witness when you explain your neighbor’s action in the worst possible way. You destroy someone’s reputation from a safe distance with your I-Pad or Smartphone, seemingly isolated from the consequences. You don’t give them a fair hearing in the courtroom of this world; your goal is not the good of your neighbor, but his destruction. You see, the Eighth Commandment doesn’t only deal with telling lies, but also with how you use the truth. Even if what you say is true, if it hurts your neighbor’s reputation, you are called to silence. “Defend him, speak well of him, and explain everything in the kindest way.” Public sin should be reproved publically; the Eighth Commandment is not a shield for those living a publically sinful life or preaching false doctrine. But the private sins of your neighbor are to be taken to her privately, seeking repentance, not trumpeted before the world.

For you see, false witness is dangerous. It takes a lifetime to build up a good reputation; only moments are necessary to destroy it. Words can wound, words can destroy; false witness can lead to the violation of numerous other commandments. We saw this last week when poor Naboth was falsely accused on the orders of the king and put to death. And tonight, it happens to Jesus. The false witnesses come against Him, one after the other, but something is wrong. They can’t agree. Even though no one defends His reputation or speaks well of Him, Jesus appears to be winning! But then two last witnesses come forward, and they decide to quote Jesus. They declare, “This man said, ‘I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to rebuild it in three days.’” This clinches it. They have quoted one of Jesus’ most provocative and confrontational sermons, the one where He appears not only to be not only a nut, but a dangerous nut, a terrorist, one who threatens buildings, and the most important building of all—the temple.

Despite this accusation, Jesus doesn’t protest. Why? He did preach this sermon! The false witnesses, desperately sought by the court, have actually spoken the truth! They preach Christ despite themselves, declaring before the whole court who Jesus is and what He has come to do. For Jesus isn’t speaking of Herod’s temple in Jerusalem; He is, as we are told in John chapter two, speaking about the temple of His body. His body is the new temple, the greater temple, the temple to replace Herod’s temple forever—this man, standing before them, is also true God, Immanuel, God with us. “In Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell,” and so it is His body, His own flesh and blood that is God’s new temple; Jesus points not to brick and mortar, but to Himself.

And Jesus is no terrorist; His opponents have twisted His words, for He didn’t threaten to destroy anything when He first spoke these words. Instead, amidst the ruin of His wrath against the money-changers, Jesus calls on His opponents to “destroy this temple,” and He knows that they will. In fact, when these words are repeated in the darkness between Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, the Sanhedrin will set this prophecy in motion. They will destroy the temple of His body; now that they have their conviction, gained by twisting His words, they send Him to Pilate for sentencing, and more false witness will be borne. Then, upon the cross, the temple of His body will be destroyed, thrown down; the false witness of many will end up in murder. The ruined temple will be laid in a tomb. But the false witnesses have spoken more truly than they know; three days later the temple will be rebuilt, Christ will rise, victorious over the false witness of His opponents, victorious even over death.

What the Sanhedrin meant for evil Jesus turned into good; they fulfilled His prophecy despite themselves. He went to the cross as the sacrifice for sin, bearing every violation of the Eighth Commandment, even the ones which sent Him there to die, and He rose in victory over their evil. Now Jesus speaks the truth about you: you, yes you, sinner, are forgiven. The courtroom is a place for truth, a place where the Eighth Commandment is to rule. In the courtroom of God’s justice, there is no way to put a good construction upon it; you are guilty, condemned for your callous and evil disregard for the reputations of others, along with all of your other sins. That is the truth. But there is another truth that is greater. God doesn’t count your sin against you anymore for the sake of His Son. That is the truth, and it is greater than any word of condemnation. 

Now Jesus has only good things to say about you; He declares to the entire world: ‘Do you see these people? Yes, they are sinners, through and through. But they are my sinners—I died for them! I’ve forgiven them. I’ve put my name upon them when I washed them at the font. They are my holy ones!’ Jesus speaks well of you in the heavenly courtroom, freeing you to speak well of your neighbor in the courtroom of this world, to use your words to edify your neighbors, to build up your friends, to stand up for others and explain everything in the kindest way. And you are now free to tell the truth about Jesus, to confess that He is Lord, that His death and resurrection have brought you deliverance. You confess to yourself and to others that this Jesus is ‘for you’ for the forgiveness of your sins. That is His reputation, declared by the Church to the world: He is the Savior of sinners—even you, even me. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Quinquagesima (Luke 18:31-43)

“‘What do you want me to do for you?’ He said, ‘Lord, let me recover my sight.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Recover your sight; your faith has made you well.’” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this morning comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the eighteenth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Luke. Dear friends in Christ: we envy the people of the New Testament, don’t we? We don’t envy their lack of indoor plumbing, their short lifespans or their lack of freedom, but still we envy them. We envy those found in the pages of the Scriptures because they had the privilege of walking this earth with Jesus. They saw Him, they heard Him, they touched Him. “If only I had seen Jesus,” we say, “my faith would be so much stronger!” What a privilege to look Jesus in the eye when He gave the Sermon on the Mount, to sit with Him in the boat, to walk the dusty roads alongside Him, or to eat the miraculous fish and loaves with the rest of the five thousand! We look back on that three-year span with longing, wishing that we would’ve been there to be part of that great story told by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. We even add a beatitude to Jesus’ list: “Blessed are those who have seen!” Blessed are the seeing ones; not us, who stand two thousand years later, beset by doubts, assailed by the world, depending solely on the words that other have spoken. Seeing is believing, and we know that if we had seen, then our faith would be unshakable.

The disciples, yes, they were blessed; more than anyone else in all of history, they had a personal relationship with Jesus. They followed Him from place to place; they witnessed His miracles, they saw His great signs. They heard His preaching, the powerful declarations of divine identity, His expositions of God’s Holy Word. And before the gates of Jericho, Jesus paused to give these blessed men the plainest, clearest sermon He would ever preach: “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished.” The disciples nod their heads—so far, so good. Jesus is going to enter the holy city to bring all that is written about Himself to completion, to end it, to finish it, to conclude all that God said before, putting an exclamation point on the Old Testament. But how will He do this?

“He will be delivered over to the Gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. And after flogging Him, they will kill Him, and on the third day He will rise.” Jesus couldn’t have spoken any more clearly; His journey to Jerusalem will end in death. In graphic detail our Lord describes His humiliation at the hands of the Gentiles. The King of creation, the Son of God in human flesh, will be mocked as an imposter and executed as a common criminal. All that the prophets wrote about Him will come to a bloody end; the exclamation point of the Old Testament will be a cry of agony. This was God’s intent from the beginning; the Seed of the woman must have His foot struck so that the serpent’s head will be crushed. The completion of God’s plan of salvation is the agony of the cross. No one takes Jesus’ life from Him; He gives it up willingly, and with His dying breath, He will preach another clear sermon: “It is finished!”

We simply read these words today, two thousand years later. The disciples—blessed are they!—heard Jesus speak with their own ears; they could see the emotion on His face, they could watch each syllable escape His lips. Seeing is believing—blessed are those who have seen! “But they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said.” The disciples heard. The disciples saw. But the disciples did not believe. And so when the sword struck the shepherd, the sheep were scattered. When they laid Him in a tomb, the disciples did not gather there, waiting for the third day to come, they hid behind locked doors. Even though Jesus could not put it any more clearly, His death and resurrection came as a surprise. It is not hard to surprise a blind man, and the disciples were blind.

The message of the cross is foolishness to man. Did the disciples want to see? No, because all that Jesus had to show them was the cross, the sight from which men turn their heads in shame. Two thousand years of history has perhaps sanitized the cross, as it hangs from rapper’s necks and stands tall on church roofs. But when Jesus shows it to us in all of its gory detail, we recoil. We would rather remain blind. For the cross shows us the high price of our sin; the cross shows us what it took for God to save us from sin, death, and the power of the devil. For sinful man, for you and me, the cross is the death of any attempt to work our way back to our God, and as the disciples understood quite clearly, a cross for Jesus meant a cross for them. The cross always puts men to death. Do you want to see? No, we would rather, like the disciples, remain blind, because all that Jesus wants to show us is the cross—His and ours. Seeing, it turns out, is not believing.

Faith comes not from sight; otherwise, it is not faith at all. Faith instead leads to sight. Jesus stood before a blind man and asked him, “What do you want me to do for you?” An odd question, to be sure. What else would a blind man want? He certainly didn’t need a vacation or a lottery ticket. He needed sight! But did he really want to see? Our sinful nature finds that it is much more comfortable to bury our heads in the sand and remain blind. We can’t deal with the consequences of sight—a cross for Jesus and a cross for us. Jesus asks the blind man if he really wants to follow the Son of Man who goes to Jerusalem to die. How about you: do you want to see? Do you want to see the cross that puts you to death, that calls you to a life of cross-bearing, suffering before glory? Or would you rather remain comfortably blind, living in your sin, going through the motions, believing in the Jesus who is a great pal and a help for your life, but never bloody, never dead? Whether you hear the words from the lips of Jesus or read them on a page, the natural man wants to remain blind; your sinful nature wants nothing to do with the cross.

The disciples see and do not believe; they take offense at the cross. But this blind man who cannot see believes; he cries out to Jesus despite the opposition of the crowd. They simply call this wandering rabbi “Jesus of Nazareth.” They see, but they do not believe; the blind man believes, even though he cannot see, and he names Jesus the Messiah: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Have mercy. The blind man sees Jesus for who He truly is; the Messiah come to save. Kyrie Eleeson. Lord, have mercy. The crowd tells him to be quiet, that Jesus has better thing to do than heal beggars, but this blind man knows His Savior, and he grabs hold of him in faith, begging for mercy.

The blind man knows that Jesus has come to save beggars; that it is only beggars, only those who have nothing to give and everything to receive, who will find mercy. The others around him try to quiet him, they tell him not to badger Jesus like this; but this blind man knows his Lord. He isn’t going to wait until he’s worthy before he asks, but he asks in the midst of his affliction, he clings to the promises of almighty God in faith, and with tenacity he hangs on. What matters is not his sin or his station in life, but God’s promises. The Messiah has come, and He brings mercy, mercy for beggars, mercy for the blind. This man refuses to be tempted by the crowd; he stops his ears and deals with God directly, and his God hears him. “He said, ‘Lord, let me recover my sight.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Recover your sight; your faith has made you well.’” Believing is seeing. Jesus speaks a plain and clear sermon once again. This man sees because he believes. Faith, created by the working of the Holy Spirit through the proclamation of the Word, leads to sight, seeing Jesus for who He truly is: God in the flesh come to bring mercy.

You see, Jesus came to open blind eyes. “And immediately he recovered his sight and followed Him, glorifying God. And all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.” The people saw the great reversal in action; they saw a beggar turned into a believer, a sinner into a saint, a blind man restored to sight, and they believed, they praise God. The blind man sees, spiritually and physically, and his response is the same: He gives glory to God, God in the flesh who has had mercy upon him. And he follows Him; he follows this Jesus on the way to the cross. Faith characterizes the journey to the cross; faith that the One who will be crucified will also rise. Believing is seeing.

On the first Sunday after Easter, Jesus will speak His own beatitude: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” We think that those who walked with Jesus, who saw Him with their own eyes, who touched even the hem of His garments, are the blessed ones. But Jesus consistently and emphatically declares that it is not the generation that saw him the flesh who was blessed; so many saw and yet did not believe. Instead, it is you and me, who did not see but yet believe by the Holy Spirit, who are blessed. Seeing is not believing; believing is seeing. On Easter afternoon, despite the words of Jesus, despite the testimony of the women, the disciples were still blind. But the risen Jesus, disguised from their physical eyes, gave them spiritual sight by opening up the Scriptures and explaining why the cross was necessary for the salvation of the world. And in the breaking of the bread, they saw Him, for only a moment, and He was gone. 

At Emmaus the pattern is set: believing is seeing; eyes are opened by Word and Sacrament. The same Jesus who opened the eyes of the blind man, who gave the disciples spiritual sight, has opened your blinded eyes in your baptism; His cross is seen no longer an offense, but the instrument of your salvation, and even though you bear your cross, by faith you cry out with the blind man, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” You cling to His promises in the midst of affliction, as you carry the cross, trusting that He will have mercy, for believing is seeing. And there will be a Day when faith is no longer needed, for all that will remain is sight: “Now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.” Believing is seeing, until that Day of eternal sight. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Septuagesima (1 Corinthians 9:24-10:5)

“I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this evening comes from the Epistle lesson read a few moments ago from the ninth and tenth chapters of Paul’s first letter to the Church of God in Corinth. Dear friends in Christ: do you want to compete at the highest level? Do you want to win championships? Is it your dream to catch passes in the Super Bowl or hit big-league pitching? Or are your goals more modest, like fighting back the effects of age or achieving greater health? You cannot get there on talent alone; you cannot achieve such lofty goals by sitting on the couch and thinking about it. Every athlete who has reached the pinnacle of their profession will tell you that it takes work; they know that the first opponent you struggle against isn’t on the other side of the line of scrimmage, it is within yourself. It is your own body that will hold you back, because its goals are completely opposed to yours. It seeks the easy way out; if left to its own devices, your body doesn’t desire what is good, it won’t eat healthy or run a mile or lift weights. You must force your body to do those things, and your body doesn’t go quietly. The athlete must go to war against himself, beating and pummeling his body to put it into submission. Your toughest task is to struggle against yourself, fighting your flesh every step of the way in order to achieve your goals.

Every athlete knows this, as does everyone who has ever tried to lose weight or run a marathon; your body struggles against you, it will resist every attempt to make it better. But few stop to ask ‘why?’ The answer is easy: your body is sinful. And the same sinful flesh that resists your every attempt to train it for health or competition is even more stubborn when it comes to spiritual matters. At the Baptismal font you were made a Christian, claimed by Christ Himself; you are truly a saint. But your old sinful Adam still hangs around your neck, and he will not leave until the day when your baptism is fulfilled with your death. So, from the moment that the water touched your head, your flesh has been at war with the Holy Spirit, fighting every attempt to put it under submission. 

Saint Paul writes, “I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.” As a saint, he delights in God’s Law; but his sinful nature goes to war against him, putting him into slavery. And your sinful nature wants nothing else than to drag you to hell; the old evil Adam wants to see you fall into open sin and give up the faith delivered to you at the font. The danger is real; even Paul, the great apostle, speaks of finding himself excluded if his flesh is given free reign: “I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.” And then, as a clincher, he mentions Israel in the wilderness. Even though they had been baptized into Moses in the Red Sea, even though they had received miraculous manna and water from the Rock, even though they partook of Christ Himself, their fate is well-known: “Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.” Paul isn’t kidding around, and neither is your sinful flesh; its intent is to drive you from the faith and straight into hell.

So do battle with your flesh; put it into submission under Christ. Pummel your flesh; beat it down with all of its evil desires; do not let it gain the upper hand. “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable.” The stakes are high; higher than game seven of the World Series; this is life or death, heaven or hell. Keep watch over yourself, recognize when your sinful Adam is exerting himself and beat him back down again. Put your flesh into slavery; no, better than that: put him to death, crucify him each and every day. Saint Paul tells the Romans: “For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”

How? How do we put the old man to death? How do we pummel our flesh and put it into slavery under Christ? For an athlete, the answer is easy: ‘work harder.’ It’s up to you to control that flesh through your own efforts if you want to lose a few pounds or hoist the Stanley Cup. But things are completely different in spiritual matters. Martin Luther teaches us in the Small Catechism: “[Baptizing with water] indicates that the old Adam in us should, by daily contrition and repentance, be drowned and die with all sins and evil desires, and that a new man should daily emerge and arise to live before Him in righteousness and purity forever.” 

You were baptized, covered by the water and the Word? Drown that old Adam each and every day by contrition and repentance. This is the discipline that puts the flesh to death. See your sin, pointed out to you by God’s clear Word of Law; see that sin, and repent of it, turn away from it by receiving the gift of the absolution. Drown your flesh in repentance and faith; cling to your Savior’s suffering and death by running to hear the blood-bought absolution. The flesh isn’t overcome by trying harder not to sin, but by repenting of that sin and trusting in Jesus, receiving His precious words of absolution. So it is Christ who disciplines your flesh and puts it to death; He is the One who proclaims the Law to condemn your sin, He is the One who speaks the Gospel to forgive it.

It is His forgiveness that overcomes the flesh; the forgiveness purchased and won not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and His innocent suffering and death. Luther teaches us: “Fasting and bodily preparation are certainly fine outward training, but that person is truly worthy and well-prepared who has faith in these words: ‘Given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.’” The only true spiritual discipline is faith, the faith created and sustained by the Holy Spirit in the means of grace. The flesh is disciplined by Christ and His work in both Law and Gospel, not by us or our own efforts. But that doesn’t mean that other discipline is without value. Luther praises fasting and bodily preparation, in their proper place. They are tools that can be used against your sinful nature in service of God’s Law, pummeling the flesh and its desires.

You have received the Body and Blood of Christ? Feed the new man on that heavenly food and starve the old Adam, refuse to let him feast on what he desires. Exercise self-control over your passions; rule over them, do not let them rule you. Be deliberate; Paul says, “I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air.” See what enslaves you, what seeks to replace God in your life, and deny those things to your sinful flesh. But do not rely on this discipline, do not think that through it you are earning anything before God, that it is you who are winning the victor’s wreath. The discipline that matters is not external fasting, but the discipline that Christ inflicts: death through the Law and life through the Gospel. So drink deeply from the Rock, which is Christ, feed on His Body and Blood in repentance and faith; that is the only discipline that can put the flesh into submission, because it is Christ’s work in you.

For the wreath comes solely through grace alone. The denarius comes to the workers because they have been called, not because they have worked (although they still do work). It is Christ who has done the work to earn that denarius, and He gives it away as He pleases. He labored under the burden of the cross; He carried the weight of your sin unto death; He earned salvation, and He gives salvation, by putting to death old Adams and raising up new men, first at the font, and then every day after, until that glorious Day when the old Adam in all of His saints is destroyed, immersed and drowned forever, and all that is left is the new man, to live before Him in righteousness and purity forever. In this life, your flesh will resist and oppose you, but these are only the throes of death; your flesh has been defeated, and the day of its doom is quickly approaching. Your sinful flesh will die, but you will live, with a sinless body and a pure soul, forever. You make war against your flesh with the victory already won, by Jesus and Him alone. In His Name, Amen.

Transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-9)

“This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased; listen to Him!” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this Transfiguration Day comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the seventeenth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Matthew. Dear friends in Christ, the mountain was high, the glory was great. A voice spoke of the power and majesty that would belong to Jesus. All the earth and its kingdoms lay before His feet, promised to Him, if Jesus would only be obedient to the voice who spoke. But He refused. He rejected this voice, He rejected its offer, He rejected its promise. Instead, He said, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and Him only shall you serve.’” He refused to transfigure Himself, to grasp after the glory that Satan held before Him; He refused to give worship to any who promised rule over this world apart from the will and plan of His Father. It was the Father who would transfigure His Son, and He would do so at the proper time.

That time came just a couple years later. The mountain was high, the glory was great. A voice spoke of the power and majesty that would belong to Jesus. All the earth and its kingdoms lay before His feet, promised to Him, if Jesus would only be obedient to the voice who spoke. He was clothed in the very glory of God Himself; all that was kept hidden as Jesus walked this earth was brilliantly revealed; the veil was pulled away, if only for a moment. “He was transfigured before them, and His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became white as light.” Although the angels acclaimed Him, all the shepherds saw on Christmas Eve was a baby; although they worshipped Him with great gifts, all the magi saw on Epiphany was a child; although the voice spoke from heaven, all that John saw at His Baptism was a man; but on this day, Transfiguration Day, the three disciples saw the very glory of God, they viewed the unveiled majesty of the Creator of the universe in the flesh. There was no mistaking on this day, on this mountain, that this Jesus is God. As if any additional proof was needed, Moses and Elijah—the one whose grave no man knows and the one who has no grave, the two men who stood on Mount Sinai and conversed with God Himself—appeared in the midst of this glory, talking to the Christ, pointing to Him, as they ever did during their lives on this earth.

The mountain of Transfiguration seems far different than the mountain of self-transfiguration, the mountain of temptation where Satan ever dwells. But Satan is on this mountain, too, still speaking his enticing words: “All these I will give you, if you fall down and worship me.” Take the glory without suffering, Easter without the cross. He doesn’t speak directly here, instead using an emissary, the one whom Jesus called ‘Satan’ just six days earlier. “And Peter said to Jesus, ‘Lord, it is good that we are here.’” Peter is simply echoing the words of our Introit: “How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts! My soul longs, yes, faints for the courts of the Lord.” His desire to dwell in the glory of the Lord is good and godly, but his words are filled with poison for Jesus. As usual, Satan has twisted the Scriptures and human desires for his own use, to set a stumbling block before Jesus. Even the good and godly desire to dwell in God’s glorious courts can be used to Satan’s ends, if it keeps the Messiah from the cross.

And Peter’s next words reveal that this is exactly the evil one’s strategy. “If you wish, I will make three tents here, one for you and one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” He wants to stay on the mountain; He wants to dwell there forever. He is experiencing heaven, and he never wants the experience to end. Peter is overwhelmed by the glory of Jesus, but he is also impressed to be among such select company. Not one tent, but three tents. He exalts Moses and Elijah to the level of Jesus as three great saints of God; He is as awed by their reflected glory as he is by the glory Christ has in Himself. His focus is not solely on Jesus, but also on those who are with Him. Let us stay here, Lord, worshipping, adoring, conversing with this glorious company!

It is not Jesus who answers Satan’s temptations on this mountain; here God the Father speaks. Peter wanted to build some tents; God makes His own tent, a tent of His glory. “He was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased. Listen to Him!’” Listen to Jesus; He is my beloved Son. Moses and Elijah are faithful servants, but they are here to point to Jesus, they stand upon this mountain to witness to my Son. They have no desire to exalt themselves; they are not my beloved Son, even though they pointed forward to Him in word and in deed. Listen to no voice that tells you to exalt another human being; my Son is the object of your adoration, because He is your salvation. Listen to Him! It is His voice that you should hear, His voice you should heed.

There are plenty of voices in this world, each claiming to speak with authority. They tell you how to transfigure yourself, how to gain the whole world, as Satan promised on the mountain of temptation. These voices scratch your itching ears, they tell you to seek after glory, to glorify yourself and your own desires, no matter what the cost, no matter what Scripture says about it. They tell you that you deserve to get what you want, that it doesn’t matter whose reputation you destroy on your way to the top. They tell you, as Satan told Peter, to exalt mere humans as God has exalted His Son, whether political leaders, celebrities, football players, or even pastors, but especially yourself, to give sinful humans the honor and worship reserved for God in the flesh. These voices tell you to glory in man. They tell you, as Satan told Peter, to seek glory without suffering, to grasp after victory and majesty without the cross. These voices promise glory, they promise healing, they promise increase, all without the inconvenience of suffering. If your faith is strong enough, if you are a truly a Christian, your life will get better; you can have glory without the suffering. Do not listen to them! Refuse to indulge in their lies!

Listen to Jesus! He alone has the words of eternal life. Listen to Him! He tells you that He cannot stay on that mountain, and neither can you. The mountain-top is not your home, as much as you may want it to be, at least not yet. The voices want you to live on the mountain; aloof from this world, seeking to dwell in that spiritual high that you captured at a youth gathering or concert, or at the Christmases of your youth. The voices want you to chase that feeling, to seek it again and again to keep your faith running strong. The voices want you to make three tents: one for Jesus, one for your pastor, and one for the band (or the organ!). Do not listen to them! Listen to Jesus! He calls you to come down from the mountain and into the valley, for that is the path He must tread. The mountain of Transfiguration has given a glimpse of the glory yet to be, but that glory will only come after suffering. If Jesus stays on that mountain, there will be no glory, for you, for me, for anyone. There will only be darkness for us, even if Jesus continues to shine like a beacon. Listen to Jesus; He must go to the cross. There He will find another kind of glory, but like the glory of Transfiguration, it will drive men to their knees. On that day, Good Friday, as this same Jesus hung dead upon the cross, with the earth shaking and the sun refusing to shine, the centurion in terror cried out, “Truly this was the Son of God!”

The centurion wasn’t on the mountain of Transfiguration, but at the mountain of Christ’s death, Mount Calvary, he understands, at least in part, what is going on. This man, beaten, bloodied, dead, is the Son of God. There is glory hidden there, the glory of God Himself. The Transfiguration was a gift of Jesus to His disciples, a vision of glory to hold on to in the midst of the horrors that were to come, the promise that on the other side of suffering lies exaltation, for Jesus and for us. The Transfiguration is the promise of Easter, of resurrection; His and yours. The Transfiguration shows us what Jesus went down that mountain to win; it is a foretaste of the glory yet to be when He comes again on the Last Day. The Transfiguration shows us the price that needed to be paid for our sin; the cross shows us that Christ was willing to pay it. He goes into the valley of the shadow of death to destroy death; and thus He is with you in the valley, in your suffering, with the promise of deliverance, the promise of glory. The glory will come; that is His promise, His guarantee, sealed by His shed blood. That is your comfort, no matter what your eyes see; He has not left you alone.

The disciples were overwhelmed by the voice of the Father, rebuking Peter, pointing to His Son. They fell on their faces in fear. Then the vision ended, and there was no one left but Jesus only. “Jesus came and touched them, saying, ‘Rise, and have no fear.’ And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only.” Jesus only. Only Jesus is the beloved Son of the Father, the Messiah promised long ago. Only Jesus went to the cross to win glory for us, giving up His life into death to destroy death. Only Jesus can give comfort to you in the midst of affliction, in the midst of suffering; He doesn’t stay up on the mountain-top, but He goes with you into the muck of this sinful world to speak words of comfort. Listen to Jesus. He says, “I forgive you all your sins;” He says, “You are baptized into my name;” He says, “This is my Body, this is my Blood;” He says, “Behold, I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” He says these things to you, and He doesn’t lie. His resurrection proves it. The next time someone would say, ‘Have no fear,’ it was an angel, standing outside of an empty tomb. Have no fear, the promise of the Transfiguration has been fulfilled in the glories of Easter. Have no fear, the sufferings of this present age are not worth comparing to the glories that are yet to come. Suffering comes before glory, but O the glory Chris has for us! There, on Mount Zion, we will say for eternity, “Lord, it is good that we are here.” In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

The Baptism of our Lord (Matthew 3:13-17)

“And when Jesus was baptized, immediately He went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on Him; and behold, a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon on this day, the Baptism of our Lord, comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the third chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Matthew. Dear friends in Christ, a man stands in a river, a baby is held over a font. Both are gifts; the first is the gift of the Christ child, given to the entire world, the child that was born to us, the son that was given to us now grown and mature, standing there in prayer. The second is the gift of new life, bestowed upon loving parents, one of the greatest gifts that our Creator gives, squirming in his or her mother’s arms, maybe even crying out. Both witness that our God is a God of life, a God who delights in giving life, who in His great kindness and grace gives parents children when and where He pleases, just as He gave the Christ child to the world in the fullness of time. But there is a difference between the man in the river and the baby at the font. The ages don’t matter; we all become children when we are brought to the font, no matter our age, and to God all life is precious, no matter how young or old. Only one difference matters: one is sinless, one is sinful.

It is this difference that is a stumbling block, that kept Christ from the water and keeps children from the font. One is sinless; one is sinful. John understood this all too well, and so he tried to keep Jesus out of the river. “Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented Him, saying, ‘I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?’” The Christ child is held back from baptism, John keeps Him from the water, for He has no sin. John knows that he baptizes sinners, those who are in need of forgiveness, who repent. The perfect, sinless Son of God has no need for repentance or forgiveness, He has no need for baptism.

Baptism is for sinners, and so baptism is for all, even children, even infants. Every gift of life that God sees fit to give is to be brought to the font. This is the most important task of a parent, given to each and every parent on this planet: the gift of life is to be brought to the font. There is no more vital task than bringing your child to Baptism. The death of a child before he or she can be brought to the font is a tragedy, and we trust in the mercies of our God who is love, knowing that His grace is greater than we can even comprehend. But actively keeping them from the font, even to the point of deliberately taking unborn life, is a denial of the vocation God has given, an abandonment of the task that comes with every pregnancy. Baptism is a command to parents because it gives great promises to their children. “Baptism is not just plain water, but it is the water included in God’s command and combined with God’s Word.” The taking of unborn life is an act of disobedience against that command, an act which despises those promises.

But baptism is despised in many other ways as well. Even if parents do bring their children to the font, they can keep them from learning about their baptism by not taking them to church or refusing to teach them at home. We adults, moreover, despise baptism by treating it as something that has no bearing on our lives, as simply a ‘get out of hell free’ card that we’ve moved beyond. We see baptism as something that happened long ago, that has little significance today; because I don’t remember it, because I cannot recall that experience or my emotions on that day, it has little power for me now, and my life resembles the life of the unbaptized around me. This should not be. If we truly understood the power of Baptism, we would run with our children to the font, and we would return to the font every day, yes, even every hour in repentance.

For Christ Himself shows us the power of Baptism; every gift given to Christ at the river is given to us at the font. He will not let John deter Him from the waters, He will step into the baptism of sinners. “Jesus answered him, ‘Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.’ Then he consented.” Jesus’ baptism fulfills all righteousness—God’s righteousness and our righteousness—because He is baptized into His own death. Baptism always means death; the water always drowns. What does such baptizing with water indicate? “It indicates that the Old Adam in us should by daily contrition and repentance be drowned and die with all sins and evil desires, and that a new man should daily emerge and arise to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.” Baptism is always into Christ’s death. Even Christ was baptized into His own death; He was baptized as the Lamb of God, the sacrifice offered up on the altar of the cross to fulfill all righteousness, He was baptized in order to die.

A righteous and holy God cannot simply overlook sin, nor can a loving God leave His creatures to die eternally under His wrath. His righteousness could only be fulfilled in punishing sin yet sparing the sinners, and so Christ submits to the baptism of sinners in the place of sinners, and the voice of the Father declares that this One is the sin-bearer. God’s righteousness is fulfilled in fulfilling our righteousness, because God declares us righteous, justified in His sight for the sake of Christ, who went from the river to the cross to die in our place, bearing our sin and its punishment. As Christ was baptized into His own death, so we are baptized into that same death; we are put to death in the font and raised up righteous in God’s sight, able to stand before our heavenly Father redeemed and forgiven. Saint Paul declares that God offered up Christ, “To show His righteousness at the present time, so that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”

There is nowhere else to look for our salvation, for our righteousness, than Christ. Do not look to your sins, your failings, but to Christ, in the river and at the font. In between the two stands the cross, which gives your baptism its power; the waters are joined with the promises which are all ‘yes’ in Jesus. How can water do such great things? “Certainly not just water, but the Word of God in and with the water does these things, along with the faith which trust the Word of God in the water. For without God’s Word the water is plain water and no baptism. But with the Word of God it is a Baptism, that is, a life-giving water, rich in grace, and a washing of the new birth in the Holy Spirit.” The Word, the Gospel, gives Baptism its power, at the river and at the font. The Word was joined to the water in Christ’s own baptism, as the Trinity was revealed, manifested before the world: “And when Jesus was baptized, immediately He went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on Him; and behold, a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased.’”

Christ is anointed as the sin-bearer, as the One who stands in the place of sinners, who submits to the Law, not because He is a sinner, but because He carries all sin. God declares Him a sinner, the sinner, when He stands in the baptism of sinners, and He is anointed for the task of taking that sin to the cross. He bore your sin, inherited from Adam and committed since, even the sins against life, and He paid the price in your place, as your sin-bearer. In your baptism, all that was given to Christ is given to you, for He stands in your place. Heaven is opened to you; you are no longer barred from God’s holy presence; you have access to God through Christ, heaven remains opened to you because you are baptized. Your baptism isn’t a past event, it is a present reality, your identity forever. The Holy Spirit continues to descend upon you, creating faith which clings to the promises given in Baptism, and the Father speaks to you every day as you return to the font what He said on the day of your baptism: “You are my beloved child, with you I am well-pleased.”

The Father is well-pleased; He is well-pleased with His Son and with you. On Christmas the angels sang, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased!” His pleasure rests upon you, because you are His dear child through your baptism into Christ’s death. He is pleased with you because He is pleased with Jesus, and He is pleased with Jesus because He went to the cross. He showed that pleasure by raising Christ from the dead, and He shows that pleasure to you by promising your resurrection. What benefits does Baptism give? “It works forgiveness of sins, rescues from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this, as the words and promises of God declare.” The water of Baptism cannot be mere water, for The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are present there, giving the gifts of the cross and empty tomb in abundance; there is no holier water on this earth than the water that pours over our heads at the font. Our God is a God of life; He not only gives life through natural birth, but He gives eternal life through the new birth of water and the Word.

A man stands in a river, a baby is held over a font. Both are gifts; the first is the gift of the Christ child, given to the entire world, the child that was born to us, the son that was given to us now grown and mature, standing there in prayer. The second is the gift of new life, bestowed upon loving parents, one of the greatest gifts that our Creator gives, squirming in his or her mother’s arms, maybe even crying out. One gift is given for the sake of the other; one life is laid down so that the other will live forever. Our God delights in life, all life; if we are to be a people of life, we cannot be defined simply by what we are against, we cannot be those who only speak the Law. We rejoice to speak the Gospel, the Gospel that declares to us that every pregnancy, every birth, and every life, whatever the age, is a gift from the God of life, and the Gospel which declares to us that God gives eternal life in abundance to all who believe, who are baptized into the name of Christ, His beloved Son. We know this because Christ Himself was raised from the dead; He lives, never to die again. Every baptism is a celebration of life—temporal life and eternal life, all gifts from God, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. In His Name, Amen.

Holy Innocents (Matthew 2:13-18)

“A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted, because they are no more.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this observance of Holy Innocents comes from the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the second chapter of the Gospel according to Saint Matthew. Dear friends in Christ: Rachel is weeping. She weeps this day, so soon after the rejoicing of Christmas. The angels have departed, the shepherds have come and gone back to their flocks, the Magi have returned by another route. Even the holy family has fled. The nativity scene is empty, and all that remains is Rachel, weeping. She weeps for her children, young and tender, the toddlers and infants of Bethlehem. She weeps for her children, who have yet to take a breath, the unborn of a nation. She weeps for those innocent of any crime, yet struck down in cruel violence. In the evening, they rest safe in their cradles, safe in the womb, the safest places any child should be; in the morning, the cradle is empty and so is the womb, but the graves are full. She weeps, for her children have become martyrs, witnesses, not like the great martyrs in the centuries of the Church, who bore witness by confessing the faith, but martyrs, witnesses still. They witness not by their words but by their death, and Rachel weeps. She refuses to be comforted, for her children are no more.
They have paid the ultimate price as a witness, a witness to the reality of evil in this world. She weeps, for Rachel’s children have given a witness to the world of man’s hatred of God. She weeps, for her children witness to the rejection of the Messiah. Her children die because this world hates Jesus, because Herod hates Jesus. The cute baby in a manger, adored by the shepherds, worshiped by the Magi, and acclaimed by the angels, is to him a threat, a threat that must be destroyed, whatever the collateral cost. “Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men.” Rachel weeps, for her children have proved that man will do anything to destroy the threat of Jesus. For Jesus is a threat; a threat to our schemes to earn our own salvation, a threat to our pretentions to not need a Savior, a threat to our desire to live apart from God, to seek heaven by some other path.

All who are associated with this child, even the ones who are the same age and live in the same zip code, come under the murderous hatred of the world. Rachel weeps, for her children bear witness that this world does not condemn death as an enemy, but embraces it as a friend, as a tool to be wielded to clean up a mess, or to get adults what they want. Her children witness to man’s hatred of the Fifth Commandment. Certainly, every society in the world condemns murder, but in our nation at least, these are just words, and Rachel’s children pay the price when they stand in the way of adult desires. She refuses to be comforted, for the cradles and the wombs are empty, her children are no more.

They have borne witness not by their words, but by their death, to man’s love of self, an all-consuming love that drives sinful humans to do anything to get what they want. Rachel weeps, for her children witness to Herod’s love of his throne. When he hears of the Christ child, the one born king of the Jews, he is troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. And when the Magi return home by another route, Herod smells conspiracy, and the man who had no regard for the Fifth Commandment, who killed most of his sons and his wife, did not hesitate to show that he would do anything to protect his throne. Now Rachel weeps, her children are no more; they bear witness to the supremacy of adult interests.

Man’s love of self drives him to do anything; it leads him to break each and every one of the commandments, but especially the first. Satan’s enticing words haven’t changed: “You will be like God.” You can decide between life and death, you can make up your own ethics. The desire for cures leads to the creation of life just to be destroyed in research, the desire for children leads to life left frozen and often forgotten. The desire to finish school, to find a better time, better finances, or a more appropriate parent, leads to life destroyed in one of the safest places on earth. You may never have brought tears to Rachel’s cheeks, but the same desire for self-preservation, for protecting your own interests, the desire that dwelt in Herod’s heart, dwells within your heart as well. You and I are not above breaking the commandments to get what we want, and Rachel’s children, the children of Bethlehem, and the children of our nation, bear witness against us. She refuses to be comforted; forty-one years and millions of her children later, she still has tears to cry, for her children are no more.

But one child was spared. Rachel weeps for all her children, but God acted to deliver one of them from the slaughter. “Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, ‘Rise, take the child and His mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy Him.’ And he rose and took the child and His mother by night and departed to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod.” Rachel’s children witness to the reality of evil; this child, the Christ child, witnesses that evil is impotent. The Christ child bears witness that while evil can—and does—rage in a world fallen into sin and corruption, it cannot defeat God. Evil will not triumph, though it certainly does its damage, though it brings great tears to Rachel’s eyes. Herod’s bloody plans failed; he died, and no one wept, but as Rachel shed her tears, the Christ child lived, He was delivered from death. 

In humiliation, He did become an exile, He was driven from His home, and the God of the universe, laid in a manger, was cast out even from that humble beginning, living as a foreigner and alien in Egypt. But He did not remain there. “This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, ‘Out of Egypt I called my Son.’” This child bears witness that the new Exodus has come; He is the new Israel, come to triumph where Israel failed, come to triumph where you and I failed. He, like Israel, is exiled in Egypt, He, like Israel, is brought forth from exile. Like Israel, the Christ child does battle with Satan in the wilderness, engaging in combat with our ancient foe. Like Israel, like you and me, He is tempted to seek His own interests, to seek only His own good.

But He triumphs where we so often fail, He is without sin. Rachel’s children are called the ‘Holy Innocents,’ but while they were certainly innocent of any crime—other than standing in the way of adult interests—they were not innocent of sin. Her children were infected with the same disease that afflicts us all. But this Christ child, is the true Holy Innocent. He is holy, true God begotten from eternity and born into the world in our time and space as God in the flesh. He is innocent of any crime, yet, as Rachel’s children bore witness, He inspired the murderous hatred of the world, who sought to destroy Him. And destroy Him they eventually did, in God’s own time and according to His own purposes. For the Christ child walked this earth in the place of Israel, in your place and mine, and while He committed no sin, He bore all sin unto death, even the sins that bring tears to Rachel’s eyes. He lived our life—perfectly—and then He died our death. The Holy Innocent died in the place of the guilty, in your place and mine. God delivered Him from Herod’s wrath only to deliver Him up at the proper time to destroy evil forever. 

The Christ child, spared from the slaughter of Bethlehem, returned from exile as God’s answer to the weeping of Rachel; He came because such tragedies occur in this world of sin. The resurrection of the Christ, as God brought Him out of the exile of death, bears witness that even death is overcome, that on the Last Day no child will ever die again. God comforts the weeping Rachel with these words: “Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares the Lord, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy. There is hope for your future, declares the Lord, and your children shall come back to their own country.” 

Rachel’s children died for Jesus so that He could return and die for them and all children, born and unborn, as the true Holy Innocent; He even died for those who put them to death. The Christ child dies for Herod and his soldiers, He dies for every person who brought tears to Rachel’s eyes, from the doctor who caused the death, to the mother who asked for it, to the father, friends, or parents who pressured her into it. He dies for them all, and His forgiveness is given to them all, to bring an end to their mourning, to give them a hope for their future, to bring them back from the land of the enemy. His forgiveness is greater than your sin, even your sins against Rachel’s children; God forgives your every sin for the sake of Jesus, the Christ child who came out of exile to give up His life for you.

Rachel’s children bear witness by their death; witness to the reality of evil in this world. The Christ child bears witness by His death; witness to the impotence and final defeat of evil. His cross, His empty tomb, bear witness that your every sin is forgiven, that death itself is conquered, that the children of Rachel have not borne witness in vain. You and I may one day be called upon to bear witness by our death, but even now, we are called upon to witness with our lips. We are called upon to bear witness for those who cannot speak for themselves, standing up for all of Rachel’s children who are threatened by death. We bear witness that our God is a God of life in word and in action, providing for those who carry children in difficult situations, giving of ourselves for their physical needs. And, finally, we are called to comfort those who mourn, to speak not the Law to the broken, but the sweet word of the Gospel, which forgives every sin, which drives away guilt and brings eternal peace. That peace is yours through the Christ child, the Holy Innocent, who stood in your place, even unto death. In His Name, Amen.

Christmas Day (Isaiah 9:6)

“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon His shoulder, and His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon this Christmas Day is the Antiphon for this festival of joy, Isaiah nine verse six. Dear friends in Christ: a child is always a gift, and certainly every child is a gift in some sense to us all. But every child isn’t born to us or given to us; as much as we may rejoice with them, that gift was given to his or her parents, and we do not call that child our own. The only children I can call ‘mine’ in any real sense of the term are those who have been given to me, biologically through procreation or legally through adoption.

The one exception is the Christ child. He is Mary’s son, carried in her womb, but yet He is not given only to her. Isaiah declares “to us a child is born, to us a son is given.” This child is born to us, He is given to us! This child is your child, and mine, He is God’s gift to us; just as surely as God gives children to specific people when and where He pleases, so He has given this child to all people. He was born not just to Mary, not even just to the people of Israel, He is born to all people, of every tribe and nation and language. Isn’t this what we heard the angels say? “Unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” He is born to us, He is given to us, even though we are poor, miserable sinners, even though we deserve no such gift, even though our hearts are turned inward, even though we rebel against God at every turn. God has given this child to us, to this whole rotten mess of humanity; in fact He has given this child to us because we are a rotten mess.

This child is given as a gift to sinners; He comes to be the gracious King of those who deserve nothing but anger and wrath. He comes to release us from the burden of our sin and rule over us in grace. We are told through Isaiah, “the government shall be upon His shoulder.” He is a King, the King promised to David, the King that will establish his throne forever and ever, the King that we needed, or else we were doomed to eternal death. And he rules, not as the kings of the nations do, by terror and coercion, but by bearing His people upon His shoulders. He takes sinners upon Himself and He bears them, lifting them and all the burdens they carry. We dare not try to carry Him, no matter how small He appears on this Christmas Day; He comes to carry us, to take our burdens away from us and place them upon Himself. The people do not bear this King; He bears them.

The Christian Church is found nowhere else than the beaten and bloodied shoulder of Jesus. He carries His people, for He carried their burdens, the burdens of sin and death, and He bore them to the cross. That heavy load was borne even unto death. This child was born to poor, miserable sinners to bear our sin; He was given to us to take that burden to the cross and do away with it there. Any who refuse to be carried by Christ, who insist on carrying their own burdens, are not Christians at all. A Christian is one who is carried upon Christ’s shoulders, like a lamb by its shepherd. Those whom He carries are His people, His government, His children; those who are not carried by Him, who want to walk by themselves or desire to help Jesus bear the load are not His kingdom, His church, or His people. There is no greater comfort this day and every day than to know that your sins are not upon your shoulders but upon His, that you yourself are borne upon His shoulders, safe and secure upon this child, your King.

For He is our gracious King; He rules in mercy according to His names, the first of which is “Wonderful Counselor.” He is the unexpected Counselor, the mysterious Counselor, the extraordinary Counselor, who works in ways that we do not expect. To destroy sin, death, and the devil, He allowed Himself to be taken captive by them, even letting them put Him to death. To win victory He submitted to the worst defeat. With the same seeming weakness, against what our eyes tell us is true, He counsels us with His Word, with the sweet message of the Gospel, declaring to us in the midst of our sufferings and trials that the victory has already been won, that He has triumphed over all that assails us. We don’t know which way to turn in this world of sin and suffering; we are aimless and wandering, harassed at every turn. But He speaks words of comfort; He relieves our hearts when sin and guilt surround us with the precious words of absolution, He reassures us at the time of death by declaring to us His victory over the grave. And when Satan tempts us, He points us to the crushed skull of the serpent, lying at the foot of the cross.

Isaiah calls Him “Mighty God;” this child born to us, this son given to us is no mere human, but is God in the flesh, mighty to save. We are so weak and helpless; sins that we think we have conquered keep coming back, the devil continues to tempt, sufferings come at us like the waves of the ocean. We are beaten down and helpless against all that this world throws at us, and looming behind it all is the certain threat of death. But where we are weak, there this child is strong. He is born to conquer in the fight, to take our enemies head on and triumph over them. At His coming the demons tremble, at His coming diseases flee, at His coming death tries to take Him, and finds itself conquered. Nothing that attacks you in this world has the victory; all your enemies will be destroyed, for they have been triumphed over through the cross and empty tomb. The Christ child has won the victory, He will stand on the Last Day as our “Mighty God.”

He stands tall on the Last Day because His kingdom, carried upon His shoulder, will last for eternity. Isaiah calls Him “Everlasting Father” because He makes us God’s children forever. We were estranged from God, divided from our Creator. Our sin had built a wall that we couldn’t scale. We has the status of slaves, even worse than slaves; we were slaves condemned to die, slaves who had no hope of freedom, nothing to look forward to but death and an eternity of wrath. But then a child was born to us, a son was given to us, and He took our sin upon His shoulder and bore it to the cross. A child was born so that we would be children, a son was given so that we would be sons. He came to bring us into God’s family once again, to give us adoption as sons, and as His beloved children we have an inheritance that lasts forever. Our status has been changed, now we are God’s children, no longer estranged, no longer slaves; we can in boldness call God ‘Our Father.’

And if we are children, then we are at peace with our God, then this child can also be called “Prince of Peace.” The angels sang of peace on that first Christmas Eve, and the task of the Christ child was to bring peace by removing all that brought hostility. He was Himself forsaken by God in place of fallen humanity, so that the barrier between God and man would be torn down, and when He emerged from the grave in triumph, He said, “Peace be with you,” echoing the angels on the night of His birth: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!” His government, His kingdom, is then dedicated to one task: bringing that peace to the world, bringing that peace to you and me. He is the Prince of Peace because He makes peace between God and man whenever He baptizes a child into His Name, whenever He speaks through a pastor the words of absolution, whenever the Gospel is proclaimed from a pulpit, whenever He gives the gift of His Body and Blood. He is constantly bringing peace, and when He returns, peace will fill all the new heavens and the new earth, for He is the Prince of Peace.

That is the child that is born to you, the son that is given to you. This child bears you upon His shoulders, who carries you to His Father’s house. This child counsels you with His Word, comforting you in the midst of affliction with the Gospel. This child conquered in the fight, who triumphed over your enemies. This child has made you a child of God by winning peace between you and your God. That is the child that is born to you, the son that is given to you. Take these words, and write them as big as heaven and earth: this child, the Christ child, is given TO ME! He is given to me, He is mine just as much as He is Mary’s, just as much as He is given to each and every person on this planet. Set these words, set this child against all your enemies. Confess freely: I am a poor, miserable sinner, deserving of nothing but God’s wrath; I am unholy, unrighteous, and wicked. But against that truth I set another one: this child, born into the world as God promised through Isaiah, is born to me, He is given to me, and He bears me on His shoulders, He has given me all that is His and He has taken all that was mine: my sin, my death, my judgment. This child is given TO ME and is mine forever, and because of Him, because He walked the way of the cross and emerged victorious on the other side of the grave, I have His righteousness, His holiness, His life, His inheritance. For eternity I will praise Him, calling Him by each one of His beautiful names: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. In the Name of Jesus, the child born to us, the son given to us, Amen.