“Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Alleluia, Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia, Amen. Alleluia, Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia, Amen. Alleluia, Christ is Risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia, Amen. 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 of joy is the Gospel lesson read a few moments ago from the twentieth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint John. Dear friends in Christ: confusion; misunderstanding; chaos. Women run to the tomb, and run back. Mary Magdalene comes alone, sees the gaping hole. Peter runs. John runs. John arrives, but doesn’t go in. Peter arrives, and walks right in. Angels. One angel? Two angels? No body. Where’s the body? Where are the soldiers? Gravecloths. Head coverings. Gardeners. Fear. Trembling. Weeping. Where is Jesus? The tomb is empty; Jesus is gone. The cloths are there, neatly folded; no evidence of robbery, of forceful removal. “Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed.” He believes, but he does not understand. “For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise from the dead.”
No alleluia’s yet; just confusion and misunderstanding, people running to and from the tomb, muddled reports coming to the disciples in their bunker. What has happened? What does it mean? The tomb is empty, that much is certain, but where is Jesus? “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” No one understands, no one comprehends; something has happened, but the world doesn’t understand. In Rome, in Gaul, in Asia, in Egypt, people rise and go about their work, the difficult struggle to keep alive in the ancient world. The sun comes up as it always does, warming the Mediterranean world, on its journey to warm places that haven’t heard the name of Rome, much less the name of Jesus. The world doesn’t understand; for them, Easter hasn’t changed anything. In Lincoln, Nebraska, two thousand years later, people sleep in, they enjoy a few days off from work, but Easter hasn’t changed their lives. Even in the pews of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Easter simply means a yearly trip to church, some nice clothes, and an egg hunt in the afternoon. Then back to our routine. Nothing has changed. The world continues to turn, people continue to live as they always have, whether the tomb is empty or not.
Mary Magdalene stands at the entrance of that tomb, weeping. The gaping emptiness of the tomb matches the gaping emptiness of her heart. She turns, and she sees Jesus, but she doesn’t recognize her Savior. “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” His response? One word. “Mary.” “I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me.” He calls His sheep by name, and in a moment, everything has changed. Alleluia, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia, Amen. Easter has changed everything. Or has it? With His one-word greeting, Mary could hope that Good Friday was simply an interruption, that everything would go back to the way it was before, that He would be with His friends again, doing miracles, preaching and teaching. “For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise from the dead.”
She does not yet understand: Easter has changed everything. “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Good Friday was not an interruption, and now that Easter has come, Jesus can get back to His ministry; no, Good Friday and Easter have changed everything. Nothing will remain the same. Jesus is on a journey to the right hand of the throne of God; Easter leads to the Ascension. The sheep cannot cling to their shepherd in the same way they did before; Jesus will no longer walk among them as He did for the past thirty years. But this is no reason for sorrow and despair. Easter has changed everything. When He ascends to the right hand of the throne of God, you, along with all believers of every time and place, will cling to Him in faith. In the Word, in the Supper, He has a fellowship with you that is more intimate than any He had when He walked this earth. That is what He will teach the disciples at Emmaus; in the Holy Supper, He is with you physically, with His Body and Blood, in a way that He never was before. And eternity has been set aside for you to see Him face to face.
Easter has changed everything; all things are made new. “Go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” My brothers. Jesus calls them ‘my brothers.’ Easter has changed everything. That rotten mess of failures, who abandoned their Lord at His most desperate hour, Jesus calls them ‘my brothers.’ They ran, the fled, they denied, and then they cowered behind locked doors. But Easter has changed everything. They are now His brothers. Restored, forgiven, redeemed. The blood shed upon the cross of Calvary was shed for them; He is their Savior, their brother. Satan’s lie to you, Satan’s lie to the world, is that Easter hasn’t changed anything. It’s just a holiday on the calendar, a day to dress up, or a chance to sleep in, a four-day weekend. Look around you, Satan says. You still see sin, death, and suffering, everywhere, but especially in your own life. Easter hasn’t changed anything. You are still in your sins; God is still a wrathful judge. You must cower, hide, live in fear of God’s judgment. But the empty tomb, the risen Jesus, and these words expose the lie; Easter has truly changed everything.
You were an enemy of Jesus, His denier, His betrayer, but no more. He now calls you ‘my brother.’ The One who conquered death and hell, who triumphed over Satan, who the grave could not keep, calls you ‘my brother.’ And as His brother, everything that Christ has is yours, everything that He won He gives to you. Easter has changed everything; most importantly, it has changed you. You are no longer an enemy of God, you are no longer in your sins, suffering has no hold on you, you are no longer held captive by the grave. “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” Christ rises, and the Creator of the universe is your Father, your God. Christ rises, and you are no longer estranged, no longer severed from God, no longer subject to His wrath. Easter has changed everything. Easter has changed you. You are Christ’s brother, you are part of the family, Christ’s victory is your own, and He is eagerly awaiting the moment when He will raise you up with Him. No one could tell on that first Easter morning, but when Jesus left the grave behind, the clock started, the countdown began. This world is passing away, for Christ has conquered it, and it will be remade on His return. He ascends in order to return, to return in glory to give to you all that He won, to put a final end to sin, death, and Satan, to raise you up to live before Him, body and soul, in the new heavens and the new earth, forever.
That is what the empty grave means; that is what the risen Jesus means. That is what the disciples would learn to understand and then proclaim to the world. “For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise from the dead.” He must rise, for He died bearing the sin of the world. He must rise, for His death was not for Himself, but for you. He must rise, for His death conquered death. He must rise, for the Father must vindicate His Son. He must rise, so that His victory can be proclaimed throughout the world. He must rise, for the bonds of death cannot hold the One who paid the price for all sin. He must rise, for He crushed the serpent’s head. He must rise, because He is the firstborn from the death. He must rise, for this is what the Scriptures foretold. “It was the will of the Lord to crush Him; He has put Him to grief; when His soul makes an offering for guilt, He shall see His offspring; He shall prolong his days; the will of the Lord shall prosper in His hand.”
Do not cling to a Jesus who was simply a good teacher, a miracle worker in ancient Palestine. Do not cling to a Jesus who is a good friend, but little else. Do not cling to a Jesus who didn’t really rise from the dead. Cling to the Jesus who made an offering for guilt; His perfect life and innocent death in the place of your sin. Cling to the Jesus who has risen in victory over the grave. Cling to the Jesus who comes to you in water and Word, the bread and wine which are His Body and Blood, which give you a more intimate fellowship than any who clung to His garments or His hand as He walked this earth. Cling to the Jesus who is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity. Easter has changed everything. It has changed you, it has changed this world. Death no longer rules you, Satan no longer accuses you, your sin no longer condemns you. Christ is risen, and nothing will ever be the same. Alleluia, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia, Amen. Alleluia, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia, Amen. Alleluia, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia, Amen.
Tuesday, March 29, 2016
Maundy Thursday (John 13:1-15)
This sermon is based on a sermon series entitled 'Knowing God Perfectly' by Rev. Brent Kuhlman.
What a Savior we have! Look at what He does in the upper room, washing the feet of His disciples. Look at what He does in the upper room, giving His Body and Blood to eat and to drink. He does this for sinners, for you. Jesus is God for you. The eternal Word, God Himself, who became flesh—He is nothing but a Servant. He is simply for His disciples and He is for you. This is the Divine Service, God in the flesh serving man, making Himself your Servant, fulfilling His own words, “The Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many.”
At first, Peter objects, he refuses, he cannot handle having His God as a Servant. He cannot receive this Divine Service. “You shall never wash my feet.” Really? He would reject the Lord’s Divine Service? Would you too? Do you receive Jesus as your Servant, or do you give into the demonic desire to give Him something, to make Him fit your ideas of what a Savior should be? Peter cannot abide Jesus, His Lord, His God, acting as a Servant, but this is the only way to have Him. “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.” Apart from Christ’s Divine Service, there is no share in the benefits of His suffering and dying that will come with His Good Friday cross. Jesus comes as our Servant, or not at all. That is what today is all about, and that is what tomorrow is all about. “Do you understand what I have done to you?” Do you understand what this Divine Service points to? The foot washing on Maundy Thursday is a preview of what is coming on Good Friday. His self-sacrifice of Himself tonight will climax tomorrow as He gets nailed to the tree. Bearing all your sin. Suffering your hell. Salvation won. Jesus as gift.
“Do you understand what I have done to you?” Do you? He washes your feet as an act of Divine Service, for He is God’s gift to you. But there is more. The free gift of His sacrificial service of love in washing feet on Maundy Thursday, then suffering and dying on Good Friday, hooks you into a life that looks just like your Teacher and Lord, your Servant. Jesus is gift, first and foremost, but He is also example. “I have given you an example that you should also do just I have done to you.” Later on, after our text, Jesus puts it this way: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, just as I have loved you.” Jesus as gift; Jesus as example. It is this new commandment that gives Maundy Thursday its name, the new commandment, or mandatum in Latin, is to love one another in imitation of Christ. In other words, faith in Jesus is very active. Believers are very active in loving self-sacrificial service for the sake of others. His gifts have their way with you. His gifts enliven you. For salvation. And for fruitful service in your daily callings in life. “Do you understand what I have done to you?” We know God perfectly in His love for us and our love for others.
“Love one another, just as I have loved you.” Christ’s love for you is given in the upper room; the love that led Him to get down on the floor and wash the feet of His disciples, the love that led later in the evening to an even greater Divine Service. “The Lord Jesus Christ, on the night when He was betrayed, took bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it and gave it to the disciples and said, ‘This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.’ In the same way also He took the cup, after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new testament in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.’” Maundy Thursday is the night of service, Christ’s Divine Service, all for you. Jesus gives Himself as gift; His own Body; His very Blood. The same Body and Blood sacrificed upon the cross Good Friday for the salvation of all is given into our mouths for the forgiveness of sins. Jesus is the Passover Lamb; His blood marks our doors, death passes over, and we eat the sacrificial meal, which is no mere memorial, but delivers to us all that He won. This Divine Service connects us with the Divine Service of the cross; the two are inseparable acts of love, inseparable deeds of service, together they are Christ’s gift of Himself. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” We know God perfectly in the Lord’s Supper, for in the Supper He is our servant, the host, the meal, He is gift for us.
Today we prayed, “Grant that we may so receive the sacred mystery of your Body and Blood that the fruits of your redemption may continually be manifest in us.” Christ as gift; Christ as example. Jesus extends His love to others through you and your bodily existence. Your redeemed and died for physical life in the body. As Jesus gave His Body to us—into death upon the cross and to eat in the Supper—so you give your body for others. “Do you understand what I have done to you?” Because of Christ’s Divine Service, you no longer live but Christ lives in you. Jesus uses you, His redeemed disciples, to help those around you through self-sacrificial acts of love. Having received Christ as gift, you “offer your bodies as a living sacrifice.” You live sacrificially in the body as you love one another with brotherly affection; as you outdo one another in showing honor; not being slothful in zeal, being fervent in spirit, serving the Lord, rejoicing in hope, being patient in tribulation, praying constantly for others, contributing to the needs of the saints and showing hospitality. John preaches it, in His First Epistle: “By this we know love, that He laid down His life for us… And we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers… Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” Christ as gift; Christ as example. His love comes first; our love for others flows from the love He has shown to us.
“Do you understand what I have done to you?” You do now! It’s what you expect and receive today and every Sunday: His Divine Service for you in Word and Sacrament, His giving of His Body and Blood for you to eat and to drink; the benefits of His Divine Service on the cross given into your ears and into your mouths. You know God perfectly when you receive Christ’s sacrificial Divine Service, as He serves you. And only when He has connected you with His cross through the Word and Holy Sacraments does He have good use for you in this world as His instruments of love. Jesus your gift. Jesus your example. He sends you forth to love as He has loved you. And oh the love that He has shown to you! Jesus is your servant, He offers to you His Divine Service, giving up His life into death upon the cross for you, and giving to you the same Body that hung upon the tree, the same Blood poured out there for the salvation of the world. In the Divine Service, we know God perfectly, for we know Jesus our servant; God for you, forever. In the Name of Jesus, host and meal, Amen.
Tuesday of Holy Week (2 Timothy 6:12-14)
“Keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.” 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 Holy Tuesday is the Epistle lesson read a few moments ago from the sixth chapter of Paul’s first letter to Saint Timothy. Dear friends in Christ, the saints in Christ were gathered together, many witnesses assembled, waiting, preparing, listening, anticipating the good confession. The pastor’s voice boomed out: “Do you renounce the devil?” Yes, I renounce him. “Do you renounce all his works?” Yes, I renounce them. “Do you renounce all his ways?” Yes, I renounce them. “Do you believe in God the Father Almighty?” Yes, I believe. “Do you believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord?” Yes, I believe. “Do you believe in the Holy Spirit?” Yes, I believe. The good confession, boldly spoken, spoken before the Church and the world; spoken to the Church and against the world. Witnessed by many on behalf of all; a single congregation in a moment of time standing in for the Church of all ages, of every time and place. “Do you intend to continue steadfast in this confession and Church and to suffer all, even death, rather than fall away from it?” I do, by the grace of God.
A very different crowd was gathered together, at the point of a riot, crying out for the blood of one man. He stood before the governor, who stood in for the power of Rome; one powerful man representing an empire, an empire that had its bullseye on the chest of Jesus. The governor’s voice boomed forth: “Are you the king of the Jews?” “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say this about me?” “What have you done?” “My kingdom is not of this world.” “So you are a king?” “You say that I am a king… Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” The good confession, boldly spoken before kings and rulers, spoken against kings and rulers. Witnessed by one man on behalf of all, the one who represented the powers of this world, Rome reduced to one. “Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?” “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given to you from above.”
He refused to compromise, He refused to say what would deny the truth and save His life. He confessed unto death. He confessed even though He knew exactly what it would mean; He confessed even though He had counted its cost. He confessed as God called on Him to confess. He kept that commandment pure and undefiled; He refused to profane it by denying His Father at the moment when death was to be His share. He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” Before the powers and principalities of this world, with a governor looking for an excuse to set Him free, Jesus refused to deny His Father’s will and the path that was set before Him. Why? Because Jesus knew that it was not Pilate who had life to give, but His Father. “I know that His commandment is eternal life. What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told me.” Death would be the price of His confession, and He would willingly pay it.
You are surrounded by many witnesses, some violent, some not, some looking for an excuse to set you free, some looking for an excuse to condemn you. You are on the stage, you bear the name ‘Christian;’ will you confess, or will you deny? This world will not let you be a comfortable believer; it will attack you, it will try to seize your faith from you. Your sinful flesh will not go quietly, it will not submit to God’s Word without a struggle. No, to be a Christian means to battle. “Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.” You confessed that you would suffer all, even death, rather than fall away from this faith. Easy words to say, when you are standing in a Church, surrounded by your fellow believers, confessing along with them. Now, you are called upon to fight. Fight the good fight; struggle against this world, fight its temptations, refuse to let it put you back into bondage! Fight the good fight; struggle against you flesh, put it to death! Drown it and its desires each and every day.
The world promises you death: death of relationships, death of influence, death of popularity, and one day it may, as Pilate did, promise you physical death. Will you confess, or will you deny? Will you fight, or will you surrender? Will you hold on to the faith, or will you let it go, loving the glory that comes from men more than the glory that comes from God? You know how often You have surrendered, you know how often you have failed to confess, you know how often you have loved the glory that comes from men more than the glory that comes from God. Repent. Repent and confess your sins, your failures. Repent and believe, for you have a Savior who made the good confession for you.
Jesus refused to compromise, Jesus refused to say what would deny the truth and save His life. He confessed unto death for you. He confessed for the times you failed to confess, He confessed to give His life into death for that sin and all others. He confessed even though He knew exactly what it would mean, His death in your place; He confessed even though He had counted its cost, the very punishment that your sin deserved. Death would be the price of His confession, and He would willingly pay it, because He loves you. He confessed as God called on Him to confess because He loves His Father and He loves you. He refused to leave you in your sin, He refused to deny His Father’s will and the path that was set before Him. He knew that the Father would give Him life, and that the Father would give you life through Him. And He will; you confess the God who gives life to all things; He gave life to Jesus, and He will give life to you, for as Christ was surely raised, so you will be raised with Him at His glorious appearing. For you confess the one who made the good confession on your behalf, even unto death, and he still makes the good confession for you as He is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
A very different crowd was gathered together, at the point of a riot, crying out for the blood of one man. He stood before the governor, who stood in for the power of Rome; one powerful man representing an empire, an empire that had its bullseye on the chest of Jesus. The governor’s voice boomed forth: “Are you the king of the Jews?” “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say this about me?” “What have you done?” “My kingdom is not of this world.” “So you are a king?” “You say that I am a king… Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” The good confession, boldly spoken before kings and rulers, spoken against kings and rulers. Witnessed by one man on behalf of all, the one who represented the powers of this world, Rome reduced to one. “Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?” “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given to you from above.”
He refused to compromise, He refused to say what would deny the truth and save His life. He confessed unto death. He confessed even though He knew exactly what it would mean; He confessed even though He had counted its cost. He confessed as God called on Him to confess. He kept that commandment pure and undefiled; He refused to profane it by denying His Father at the moment when death was to be His share. He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” Before the powers and principalities of this world, with a governor looking for an excuse to set Him free, Jesus refused to deny His Father’s will and the path that was set before Him. Why? Because Jesus knew that it was not Pilate who had life to give, but His Father. “I know that His commandment is eternal life. What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told me.” Death would be the price of His confession, and He would willingly pay it.
You are surrounded by many witnesses, some violent, some not, some looking for an excuse to set you free, some looking for an excuse to condemn you. You are on the stage, you bear the name ‘Christian;’ will you confess, or will you deny? This world will not let you be a comfortable believer; it will attack you, it will try to seize your faith from you. Your sinful flesh will not go quietly, it will not submit to God’s Word without a struggle. No, to be a Christian means to battle. “Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.” You confessed that you would suffer all, even death, rather than fall away from this faith. Easy words to say, when you are standing in a Church, surrounded by your fellow believers, confessing along with them. Now, you are called upon to fight. Fight the good fight; struggle against this world, fight its temptations, refuse to let it put you back into bondage! Fight the good fight; struggle against you flesh, put it to death! Drown it and its desires each and every day.
The world promises you death: death of relationships, death of influence, death of popularity, and one day it may, as Pilate did, promise you physical death. Will you confess, or will you deny? Will you fight, or will you surrender? Will you hold on to the faith, or will you let it go, loving the glory that comes from men more than the glory that comes from God? You know how often You have surrendered, you know how often you have failed to confess, you know how often you have loved the glory that comes from men more than the glory that comes from God. Repent. Repent and confess your sins, your failures. Repent and believe, for you have a Savior who made the good confession for you.
Jesus refused to compromise, Jesus refused to say what would deny the truth and save His life. He confessed unto death for you. He confessed for the times you failed to confess, He confessed to give His life into death for that sin and all others. He confessed even though He knew exactly what it would mean, His death in your place; He confessed even though He had counted its cost, the very punishment that your sin deserved. Death would be the price of His confession, and He would willingly pay it, because He loves you. He confessed as God called on Him to confess because He loves His Father and He loves you. He refused to leave you in your sin, He refused to deny His Father’s will and the path that was set before Him. He knew that the Father would give Him life, and that the Father would give you life through Him. And He will; you confess the God who gives life to all things; He gave life to Jesus, and He will give life to you, for as Christ was surely raised, so you will be raised with Him at His glorious appearing. For you confess the one who made the good confession on your behalf, even unto death, and he still makes the good confession for you as He is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
Palm Sunday (Zechariah 9:9-12)
O God, O Lord of heaven and earth, Thy living finger never wrote that life should be an aimless mote, a deathward drift from futile birth. Your will, your design, your intention, was not death, it was not futility, it was not corruption. Life was not meant to be a slow drift to death, it was not to be worthless, without value. Instead, Thy Word meant life triumphant hurled in splendor through Thy broken world. You brought order from chaos, you spoke, and it happened, you formed the man from the dust of the earth, and you formed the woman from the side of the man. Since light awoke and life began, Thou hast desired Thy life for man. You breathed into our nostrils the very breath of life, life that was to have no end, life that was to be enjoyed in this perfect world, life that was unstained by evil. Work was no burden, worship no imposition. Abundance was our portion, freely given, to sustain our bodies and our souls; you gave us everything, the fruits of the earth and the fruits of your Word. You gave us a life of joy, that we would gladly serve you and serve our neighbor. Life was your decree, life your gift, given at the moment of our creation, as your hands knit us together in the wombs of our mothers, and then sustained in every moment since. Every breath, every beat of our heart, was never meant to be one step closer to our last, but instead a gift that had no end. O God, O Lord of heaven and earth, life was your gift, life to the full.
But our fatal will to equal Thee, our rebel will wrought death and night. We heard the serpent’s lie, and we listened: “You shall be like God.” We forgot that we were made in your image and likeness, that we were already like you, and we sought to make ourselves your equal. Our will had been your will, we had desired what you desired, we had sought what you sought, but no more. Our will set itself up in opposition to your will, our desire was for what you had in wisdom not given to us, and we grasped after the fruit of death, rather than rejoicing in a world of life. We seized and used in pride and spite Thy wondrous gift of liberty. We were free, free to love you and live in joy, receiving your gift of life from your abundant hand, but we put ourselves into bondage. And like the flipping of a light, darkness and death entered in. O God, O Lord of heaven and earth, Thy living finger never wrote that life should be an aimless mote, a deathward drift from futile birth, but now it was. Birth could only deliver death; one heartbeat, one breath meant that we were one step closer to the just consequence of our sin. Our pride, our rebellion had cut us off from life.
We housed us in this house of doom, where death had royal scope and room. We put ourselves into prison, into bondage. It was our sin that did it, our fatal will to equal Thee. We put ourselves into prison, we gave the jailer the key, and we ourselves shut the locked door. We have no one else to blame, no one else to accuse. We fell in Adam’s Fall, and we have fallen every moment since. Now, this house of doom is our home, this dominion of death, this kingdom of the damned. We put ourselves here, and we cannot escape. Every cut, every scrape, every cold or fever, every drop of blood we shed is a reminder that we are slaves, in bondage to sin and death. Death is our ruler, death is our king; he rules this house of doom, and we follow his commands to the grave. None can escape, none will escape; death claims us all. We put ourselves into bondage, and now we cannot get out. The door is shut; the dead made it, and the dead keep it. We will all die. By our perverse, rebellious will we call this house of doom freedom, we call the chains and shackles of sin liberty; we rejoice to live what we foolishly call independence, but our jailer still holds the keys, and there will come a day for us all when the illusion of liberty will be replaced with the reality of death.
But then the cry comes over the walls of our prison: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is He, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of donkey.” We housed us in this hall of death, where death had royal scope and room, until Thy Servant, Prince of Peace, breached all its walls for our release. He has come, He has come. Your servant, Prince of Peace, humble and mounted on a donkey, righteous and having salvation. He comes to bring peace, He comes to put an end to our warfare, to cease the conflict between nations, between neighbors, between us and you. You declare, “I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace to the nations; His rule shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.” O God, O Lord of heaven and earth, your Son has come, and He has come bringing peace. He has come to reconcile us with you, to restore to us the life that we cast away in foolish rebellion. He has come to breach the walls of our prison and set us free.
Thou camest to our hall of death, O Christ to breathe our poisoned air, to drink for us the dark despair that strangled our reluctant breath. You breached the walls of our prison, O Jesus, you breathed the air that we poisoned, thick with the stench of death. And you drank down to the very dregs the cup of death that was our portion. Your lungs filled with our poison, your belly filled with our judgment, you gave yourself into death to set the prisoners of death free. “As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit.” A new covenant you brought, O Jesus, a covenant founded in your blood. Your blood set us free, the blood shed upon the cross of Calvary, the blood of your sacrifice pouring down Golgotha’s hill of horror. On the cross, your lungs took in the air poisoned with death, on the cross, you drank of our despair and drained the cup of your Father’s wrath. You came into our hall of death to give yourself up into death for our sake. Your blood forgives our rebellion, the transgressions of our fatal will, and so your blood sets us free; in triumph, you lead us out from our prison as you went forth from your grave.
How beautiful the feet the trod the road that leads us back to God! “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you, righteous and having salvation is He, humble and mounted on a donkey.” How beautiful are your feet, O Jesus, the feet that walked the roads of Palestine, living a perfect life in our place, the feet that dangled from the donkey’s back, entering Jerusalem in triumph, entering Jerusalem in humility, the same feet that walked the path of the cross, bearing our sin, the very feet that crushed the serpent’s head, trampling our jailer and taking his keys. The stronger man entered the strong man’s house and plundered all of his goods. The humble King did not spurn the cross, but gave Himself up into death, shedding the blood of the covenant to set the prisoners free. How beautiful the feet that trod the road that leads us back to God!
How beautiful the feet that ran to bring the great good news to man! “Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double.” You have made us prisoners of hope; no longer prisoners of death, no longer captive to the predations of our ancient foe, but now prisoners, captives of hope. We are enslaved by hope, the hope of resurrection, of final victory, the sure and certain hope that just as you O Christ were raised in victory on the third day, so we too will be raised on that Day when the cry goes up once again: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is He.” We are no longer housed in a house of doom, a hall of death, we are prisoners of hope in your stronghold, O Christ, the stronghold, the fortress that is your bride, the Church. In your Church we receive double; double forgiveness for all of our sins, double grace and mercy for our rebellion, an overflowing abundance of love flowing from your pierced side.
In your Church we are captive to hope, the hope that you will come again, a hope sustained because you do come, week after week, humble and joined to bread and wine, water and Word. You come as the Son of David and the Son of God, as God and man, as our Creator and our brother, as our servant and still our King in the Holy Sacrament. Your humble coming on Palm Sunday, the coming of your kingdom on the cross, and your coming on the clouds of heaven are all contained in bread and wine. In this world we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, captive to hope, living on these words, proclaimed every Lord’s Day and trumpeted on the Last Day: “Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you.” O Spirit, who didst once restore Thy Church that it might be again the bringer of good news to men, breathe on Thy cloven Church once more, that in these grey and latter days there may be those whose life is praise, each life a high doxology to Father, Son, and unto Thee. Amen.
But our fatal will to equal Thee, our rebel will wrought death and night. We heard the serpent’s lie, and we listened: “You shall be like God.” We forgot that we were made in your image and likeness, that we were already like you, and we sought to make ourselves your equal. Our will had been your will, we had desired what you desired, we had sought what you sought, but no more. Our will set itself up in opposition to your will, our desire was for what you had in wisdom not given to us, and we grasped after the fruit of death, rather than rejoicing in a world of life. We seized and used in pride and spite Thy wondrous gift of liberty. We were free, free to love you and live in joy, receiving your gift of life from your abundant hand, but we put ourselves into bondage. And like the flipping of a light, darkness and death entered in. O God, O Lord of heaven and earth, Thy living finger never wrote that life should be an aimless mote, a deathward drift from futile birth, but now it was. Birth could only deliver death; one heartbeat, one breath meant that we were one step closer to the just consequence of our sin. Our pride, our rebellion had cut us off from life.
We housed us in this house of doom, where death had royal scope and room. We put ourselves into prison, into bondage. It was our sin that did it, our fatal will to equal Thee. We put ourselves into prison, we gave the jailer the key, and we ourselves shut the locked door. We have no one else to blame, no one else to accuse. We fell in Adam’s Fall, and we have fallen every moment since. Now, this house of doom is our home, this dominion of death, this kingdom of the damned. We put ourselves here, and we cannot escape. Every cut, every scrape, every cold or fever, every drop of blood we shed is a reminder that we are slaves, in bondage to sin and death. Death is our ruler, death is our king; he rules this house of doom, and we follow his commands to the grave. None can escape, none will escape; death claims us all. We put ourselves into bondage, and now we cannot get out. The door is shut; the dead made it, and the dead keep it. We will all die. By our perverse, rebellious will we call this house of doom freedom, we call the chains and shackles of sin liberty; we rejoice to live what we foolishly call independence, but our jailer still holds the keys, and there will come a day for us all when the illusion of liberty will be replaced with the reality of death.
But then the cry comes over the walls of our prison: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is He, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of donkey.” We housed us in this hall of death, where death had royal scope and room, until Thy Servant, Prince of Peace, breached all its walls for our release. He has come, He has come. Your servant, Prince of Peace, humble and mounted on a donkey, righteous and having salvation. He comes to bring peace, He comes to put an end to our warfare, to cease the conflict between nations, between neighbors, between us and you. You declare, “I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace to the nations; His rule shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.” O God, O Lord of heaven and earth, your Son has come, and He has come bringing peace. He has come to reconcile us with you, to restore to us the life that we cast away in foolish rebellion. He has come to breach the walls of our prison and set us free.
Thou camest to our hall of death, O Christ to breathe our poisoned air, to drink for us the dark despair that strangled our reluctant breath. You breached the walls of our prison, O Jesus, you breathed the air that we poisoned, thick with the stench of death. And you drank down to the very dregs the cup of death that was our portion. Your lungs filled with our poison, your belly filled with our judgment, you gave yourself into death to set the prisoners of death free. “As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit.” A new covenant you brought, O Jesus, a covenant founded in your blood. Your blood set us free, the blood shed upon the cross of Calvary, the blood of your sacrifice pouring down Golgotha’s hill of horror. On the cross, your lungs took in the air poisoned with death, on the cross, you drank of our despair and drained the cup of your Father’s wrath. You came into our hall of death to give yourself up into death for our sake. Your blood forgives our rebellion, the transgressions of our fatal will, and so your blood sets us free; in triumph, you lead us out from our prison as you went forth from your grave.
How beautiful the feet the trod the road that leads us back to God! “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you, righteous and having salvation is He, humble and mounted on a donkey.” How beautiful are your feet, O Jesus, the feet that walked the roads of Palestine, living a perfect life in our place, the feet that dangled from the donkey’s back, entering Jerusalem in triumph, entering Jerusalem in humility, the same feet that walked the path of the cross, bearing our sin, the very feet that crushed the serpent’s head, trampling our jailer and taking his keys. The stronger man entered the strong man’s house and plundered all of his goods. The humble King did not spurn the cross, but gave Himself up into death, shedding the blood of the covenant to set the prisoners free. How beautiful the feet that trod the road that leads us back to God!
How beautiful the feet that ran to bring the great good news to man! “Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double.” You have made us prisoners of hope; no longer prisoners of death, no longer captive to the predations of our ancient foe, but now prisoners, captives of hope. We are enslaved by hope, the hope of resurrection, of final victory, the sure and certain hope that just as you O Christ were raised in victory on the third day, so we too will be raised on that Day when the cry goes up once again: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is He.” We are no longer housed in a house of doom, a hall of death, we are prisoners of hope in your stronghold, O Christ, the stronghold, the fortress that is your bride, the Church. In your Church we receive double; double forgiveness for all of our sins, double grace and mercy for our rebellion, an overflowing abundance of love flowing from your pierced side.
In your Church we are captive to hope, the hope that you will come again, a hope sustained because you do come, week after week, humble and joined to bread and wine, water and Word. You come as the Son of David and the Son of God, as God and man, as our Creator and our brother, as our servant and still our King in the Holy Sacrament. Your humble coming on Palm Sunday, the coming of your kingdom on the cross, and your coming on the clouds of heaven are all contained in bread and wine. In this world we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, captive to hope, living on these words, proclaimed every Lord’s Day and trumpeted on the Last Day: “Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you.” O Spirit, who didst once restore Thy Church that it might be again the bringer of good news to men, breathe on Thy cloven Church once more, that in these grey and latter days there may be those whose life is praise, each life a high doxology to Father, Son, and unto Thee. Amen.
Saturday, March 12, 2016
Lent Midweek 4
This sermon is based on a Lenten sermon series entitled "The Apostles' Creed: Knowing God Perfectly!" authored by Rev. Brent Kuhlman.
“When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but rather that a riot was under way, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, ‘I am innocent of the blood of this man; see to it yourselves.’ Then all the people responded, ‘His blood be on us and on our children.’” 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 day is the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, part four: the Praetorium. Dear friends in Christ, you know God perfectly when you recognize the Light. The world was shrouded in darkness, engulfed in the thick veil that had come on the day of man’s fall. This is the darkness of sin, this is the darkness of unbelief, this is the darkness of rebellion against God. All of creation was the valley of the shadow of death. But into that darkness a light shone. “The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.” To know God perfectly is to recognize that Light when it enters this shadowed world, to see it and rejoice in its warm, life-giving rays. But when that long-awaited, long-prophesied moment came, when the Light shone, a creation shrouded in darkness refused to receive it. “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, yet the world did not know Him.” Not just the nations, not just the pagans, but His brothers, His countrymen, the bearers of the promise, rejected Him. “He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him.”
They did not receive the Light with the joy befitting his coming, they refused to know Him. They scorned the light, for they loved the darkness more. “And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.” In the beginning of their history, God had given them a gift, the Law. This Law was to be light for their path, showing them how God wished them to live, separated from the uncleanness of the nations around them. This Law, this Word from God, also spoke of a Savior, the Messiah who would come into the world. But when this Messiah appeared, here in flesh and blood to save them, they wielded the Law as their weapon against Him. “We have a law and by that law Jesus ought to die because He made Himself the Son of God.” The One who gave the Law is condemned by that Law. The Law is their weapon, not for truth, not for justice, but to rid themselves of someone they hate. They do not know God perfectly, for they refuse to see Jesus as the Light of the world.
They do not recognize their brother, they do not recognize their kinsman, the One whom Moses promised would come from among them as their final prophet. The entire point of the history of Israel, of the existence of God’s chosen people, was to bring forth the Messiah, but when He comes, He is rejected. God promised them a Savior from their flesh and blood, but when He comes, they choose Barabbas instead. “Pilate asked them again, ‘Which of these two do you want me to release for you?’ And they cried out all together, saying, ‘Away with this man, and release for us Barabbas.’” Barabbas is their Savior, Barabbas is their choice. The terrorist, the murderer, the scoundrel Barabbas. The innocent One, their own brother, is condemned to death. The guilty one, whom they hardly know, is set free. He deserving of death goes forth to live. He deserving of life goes forth to die. They didn’t recognize their brother, they didn’t recognize their Savior; they didn’t know God perfectly, and so they put Him to death.
Pilate had the Light of the world standing before him, shining despite His humility. The very One who gave Pilate all of his authority, his power over life and death—not Caesar, but Jesus, was presented before him. As governor, Pilate had the God-given vocation to punish all criminals and evildoers, pardoning the innocent. And he knows that Jesus is innocent. Three times he declares the innocence of Jesus; three times he tells Jesus’ accusers that their charges have no merit. He knows what justice calls for, but he will not do it. The divinely appointed guardian of truth and justice blows off his duty with a cute phrase—“What is truth?”—and then asks for a bowl of water. “‘I am innocent of the blood of this man; see to it yourselves.’ Then all the people responded, ‘His blood be on us and on our children.’” The blindness is complete; Jesus, the Light of the world, is rejected by those in the bondage of darkness.
They do not know God perfectly; Israel condemns Him, Israel rejects Him, Rome abandons Him. It all happens in one moment of time. “Pilate went out again and said to them, ‘See, I bring Him out to you that you may know that I find Him not guilty.’ So Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, ‘Behold the man!’ When the chief priests and officers saw Him, they cried, ‘Crucify Him! Crucify Him!’” He is presented before the world as the innocent One, the innocent One condemned to death. Here Pilate is an evangelist, against his own will; he preaches a sermon, pointing the entire world, pointing you and me, to ‘the man;’ where his finger points is the one place where God is known perfectly. Purple-robed, flogged, thorn-crowned Jesus is the man who gives His life into death. He is the man on whom the sin of all mankind is laid. He is the innocent man that gets counted as sin and the greatest sinner as He bears the sin of the world in His own body.
Pilate, the one-time evangelist, does fulfill his office as governor; he delivers a verdict: “Not guilty,” but he will allow the enemies of Jesus to dictate the sentence for an innocent man. And the enemies of Jesus have chosen Barabbas. But in this choice, the chief priests and elders have also become evangelists. When they call for the innocent One to go free and the guilty one to be condemned, they are telling you where to know God perfectly: in the great exchange. Jesus doesn’t just swap with Barabbas, He swaps with you. He takes all your sin and all its punishment, and He gives you in its place all His perfection, innocence, and holiness. Jesus is condemned, and you are set free.
What Israel could not see, what they did not realize, you know by faith. You know God perfectly in the condemnation of Jesus by the very Law that He gave. You know God perfectly in the perfect life of Jesus lived in your place, His condemnation that was to be yours, His death that you deserved. You know God perfectly because in Jesus you know what to expect from Him: forgiveness, life, and salvation. When Pilate washes his hands, trying desperately to exonerate himself from any blame in condemning the innocent to death, the crowd cries out, “His blood be on us and on our children!” They are evangelists, pointing us where to know God perfectly—in the blood of Jesus, shed on Calvary’s cross and poured out upon you in the Word and holy Sacraments. Yes, may the blood of Jesus be on us and on our children, for it is only by being covered with the blood of Jesus that we are delivered from the darkness of this world.
That darkness schemed and plotted, manipulating the law, subverting authority, in order to overcome the Light. And as Jesus is led away to be crucified, the Light is condemned, rejected, and abandoned, but it is not overcome, it will not be conquered. “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” The darkness it itself overcome, for the innocent One could not be contained by the grave; the tomb was forced to release its captive. Now, not Pilate but the Church says, “Behold the man!” the man who conquered death for you. Now, not the chief priests and elders but pastors proclaim, “Release for us Barabbas!” yes, release all Barabbas’s, those in the bondage of sin and death, for Christ died and rose again in our place. Now, not an angry crowd but the apostles say, “His blood be on us and on our children!” the blood shed for the sin of the world. At the empty tomb you know God perfectly, for the crucified One is the risen One, never to die again. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
Oculi (Ephesians 5:1-9)
“Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” 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 is the Epistle lesson read a few moments ago from the fifth chapter of Paul’s letter to the Church of God in Ephesus. Dear friends in Christ: What is love? We read books about love, hear songs about love, watch movies about love, but do we have any idea what it is? Where do we look to learn about love? Do we look to God, imitating Him, or do we look to the world, and imitate those around us? Every three years, at the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod’s national youth gathering, a survey is taken, asking the opinion of the youth on a variety of topics. In 2013, only fifty-five percent of the youth surveyed agreed with the statement that homosexuality is ‘always wrong according to God’s Word.’ Do we imitate God, or have we imitated the world? In that same survey only forty-four percent of nineteen-year olds reported that they were virgins. Do we imitate God, or have we imitated the world? I have no statistics here, but most pastors today will tell you that it’s extremely rare to work with a couple in preparation for marriage that has not been sexually active, even living together as if they are married. The question remains—as Christians, do we imitate God, and His love, or have we imitated the world, and its love?
Without compromise, without equivocation, without apology, Paul calls on us to imitate God and His love. And there is only one place to look in order to see God’s love: the cross. “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” Christ’s love is for us; it is for you. His love is not self-serving or self-seeking; it is oriented toward the other, toward you. He loves you, and He gives you everything: His life, His righteousness, His glory, and the very riches of heaven. He gives you everything, and takes what is yours: your sin, your death, your poverty. He takes you place, He exchanges all that you have for all that is His, for His love is always directed outward, from Himself to you, to a world in desperate need of His love.
Christ’s love is self-giving, it is sacrificial. He gives up His own life into death for you; He does not hold onto His own life, He does not seek His own good, but He seeks yours. He gives up everything, submitting to death, even death upon the cross. The aroma of His sacrifice rises pleasing to God, for in the death of Christ, God is revealed as love. Love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be. He loves you by not leaving you in your sins; He does not pour out His wrath upon you, He pours it out on Christ, the willing sacrifice, who had everything but gave all things up for you. Jesus does not take, but He gives: His life, His blood, His flesh. He gives them to you by sacrificing them for you upon the altar of the cross, and He gives them to you by pouring out His gifts upon you in the Word and holy sacraments. Jesus did not grasp after glory, as Satan tempted Him to do, but He gave up His life into death because He loves you.
This love has very little in common with how the world teaches and practices love. The love of Christ is always directed toward the other; the love of the world is directed toward the self. This is no more evident, or potentially destructive, than in the area of human existence that Paul focuses on today: sexuality. There the world tells you that your wants, your passions, your desires rule the roost. No self-control is called for, no renunciation of the desires of your flesh. You are encouraged to indulge yourself, no matter what the consequences may be. You are told only to think of yourself; there is no thought as to what such activities are doing to your neighbor, or to the one who may someday marry your neighbor. The love of Christ is self-giving; you are told to take, to seize what is not yours, to join yourself with one who has not been given to you in marriage, the only place where God gives another person to you to become one flesh.
Saint Paul is more than explicit: such things have no place among Christians! “But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.” Such things must not even be named among the saints! The saints of Christ, you and me, are to show the same self-giving, self-sacrificial love that Christ has showed to you. You are called to chastity, restricting sexuality to the one God has given to you in marriage. That means laying aside your desires and passions, and that means protecting the chastity of those around you, from your sons and daughters to your boyfriends and girlfriends, to every other man or woman made in the image of God. If what you are doing or saying or thinking isn’t showing to your neighbor the love of Christ, then Paul calls on you to instead give your body to a spouse when He gives one to you, to instead use your thoughts to contemplate God’s Word, to instead use your lips for thanksgiving.
The love that the world teaches, this self-gratifying, self-focused love, contradicts your identity in Christ; that is not the kind of love Christ shows to you! It is incompatible with who you claim to be. You cannot go around bearing the name ‘Christian’ and yet love as the world loves. Paul minces no words in his condemnation of such hypocrisy. “For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.” Paul isn’t talking to the heathen, he isn’t standing on the corner of Bourbon Street, he’s talking to Christians, he’s talking to you and me.
“Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.” Do not be deceived by the empty words of others, inside the Church and without, who tell you that sexual sins are no big deal, that chastity is old-fashioned and repressive, that freedom is to be found in serving your natural passions. Do not be deceived by those who would tell you that to be a Christian is to no longer have a use for the Law, those who use the Reformation teaching of grace as an excuse for lawlessness and laziness. Do not be deceived by those who promise freedom, but give only bondage, bondage to sin, a bondage that controls you and leads you away from God. Sexual sin is slavery, slavery that delivers only death. Freedom is only found in Christ, in the release from the shackles of sin won by His shed blood, the freedom He bestows day after day by His forgiveness. Do not return to the slave drivers, but live in the freedom of Jesus Christ.
“Therefore do not associate with them, for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk in the light.” You used to be associated with the darkness, but no more. You are light. Christ has shown forth His love to you in taking you out of the darkness, seizing you from the prison house of death. Christ is the Light, the Light no darkness can overcome, the Light that appeared to be snuffed out in the darkness of Good Friday, but instead shone out all the more on Easter morn. Christ loves you by giving you freedom, by releasing you from your sin. He has driven away the suffocating darkness, He has broken the bonds of slavery. He has made you light, shedding His blood and dying for every sin, against every commandment, but especially those against the Sixth Commandment. He died for every sexual sin of thought, word, and deed. He died for those sins that only you know, He died for those sins that only you and one other person knows, He died for those sins that too many people know. He died for them all. He fulfilled the Sixth Commandment perfectly so that He could pay the price for all those times you have not. He died to make you light, and Paul has one encouragement: “Walk in the light.”
What does it mean to walk in the light? It doesn’t mean a life of perfection; it doesn’t mean that you never sin. It doesn’t mean that if you have messed up you are ‘damaged goods’ and have lost something that Christ cannot restore. What does it mean to walk in the light? It means to live the life of repentance. It means to despair of your sins, to cry out for Christ’s forgiveness, receiving that forgiveness by grace, and then, having been forgiven, to bear the fruits of repentance. As Saint Paul says, “The fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true.” The life of chastity is not easy; you will battle your own sinful flesh, and you will feel the overwhelming pressure of a world that doesn’t understand you at all. You cannot live as Christ calls you to live on your own power. Only by daily repentance and faith, confession and absolution, only by continually receiving Christ’s forgiveness can you walk this road.
Without compromise, without equivocation, without apology, Paul calls on us to imitate God and His love. And there is only one place to look in order to see God’s love: the cross. “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” Christ’s love is for us; it is for you. His love is not self-serving or self-seeking; it is oriented toward the other, toward you. He loves you, and He gives you everything: His life, His righteousness, His glory, and the very riches of heaven. He gives you everything, and takes what is yours: your sin, your death, your poverty. He takes you place, He exchanges all that you have for all that is His, for His love is always directed outward, from Himself to you, to a world in desperate need of His love.
Christ’s love is self-giving, it is sacrificial. He gives up His own life into death for you; He does not hold onto His own life, He does not seek His own good, but He seeks yours. He gives up everything, submitting to death, even death upon the cross. The aroma of His sacrifice rises pleasing to God, for in the death of Christ, God is revealed as love. Love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be. He loves you by not leaving you in your sins; He does not pour out His wrath upon you, He pours it out on Christ, the willing sacrifice, who had everything but gave all things up for you. Jesus does not take, but He gives: His life, His blood, His flesh. He gives them to you by sacrificing them for you upon the altar of the cross, and He gives them to you by pouring out His gifts upon you in the Word and holy sacraments. Jesus did not grasp after glory, as Satan tempted Him to do, but He gave up His life into death because He loves you.
This love has very little in common with how the world teaches and practices love. The love of Christ is always directed toward the other; the love of the world is directed toward the self. This is no more evident, or potentially destructive, than in the area of human existence that Paul focuses on today: sexuality. There the world tells you that your wants, your passions, your desires rule the roost. No self-control is called for, no renunciation of the desires of your flesh. You are encouraged to indulge yourself, no matter what the consequences may be. You are told only to think of yourself; there is no thought as to what such activities are doing to your neighbor, or to the one who may someday marry your neighbor. The love of Christ is self-giving; you are told to take, to seize what is not yours, to join yourself with one who has not been given to you in marriage, the only place where God gives another person to you to become one flesh.
Saint Paul is more than explicit: such things have no place among Christians! “But sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints. Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.” Such things must not even be named among the saints! The saints of Christ, you and me, are to show the same self-giving, self-sacrificial love that Christ has showed to you. You are called to chastity, restricting sexuality to the one God has given to you in marriage. That means laying aside your desires and passions, and that means protecting the chastity of those around you, from your sons and daughters to your boyfriends and girlfriends, to every other man or woman made in the image of God. If what you are doing or saying or thinking isn’t showing to your neighbor the love of Christ, then Paul calls on you to instead give your body to a spouse when He gives one to you, to instead use your thoughts to contemplate God’s Word, to instead use your lips for thanksgiving.
The love that the world teaches, this self-gratifying, self-focused love, contradicts your identity in Christ; that is not the kind of love Christ shows to you! It is incompatible with who you claim to be. You cannot go around bearing the name ‘Christian’ and yet love as the world loves. Paul minces no words in his condemnation of such hypocrisy. “For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.” Paul isn’t talking to the heathen, he isn’t standing on the corner of Bourbon Street, he’s talking to Christians, he’s talking to you and me.
“Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.” Do not be deceived by the empty words of others, inside the Church and without, who tell you that sexual sins are no big deal, that chastity is old-fashioned and repressive, that freedom is to be found in serving your natural passions. Do not be deceived by those who would tell you that to be a Christian is to no longer have a use for the Law, those who use the Reformation teaching of grace as an excuse for lawlessness and laziness. Do not be deceived by those who promise freedom, but give only bondage, bondage to sin, a bondage that controls you and leads you away from God. Sexual sin is slavery, slavery that delivers only death. Freedom is only found in Christ, in the release from the shackles of sin won by His shed blood, the freedom He bestows day after day by His forgiveness. Do not return to the slave drivers, but live in the freedom of Jesus Christ.
“Therefore do not associate with them, for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk in the light.” You used to be associated with the darkness, but no more. You are light. Christ has shown forth His love to you in taking you out of the darkness, seizing you from the prison house of death. Christ is the Light, the Light no darkness can overcome, the Light that appeared to be snuffed out in the darkness of Good Friday, but instead shone out all the more on Easter morn. Christ loves you by giving you freedom, by releasing you from your sin. He has driven away the suffocating darkness, He has broken the bonds of slavery. He has made you light, shedding His blood and dying for every sin, against every commandment, but especially those against the Sixth Commandment. He died for every sexual sin of thought, word, and deed. He died for those sins that only you know, He died for those sins that only you and one other person knows, He died for those sins that too many people know. He died for them all. He fulfilled the Sixth Commandment perfectly so that He could pay the price for all those times you have not. He died to make you light, and Paul has one encouragement: “Walk in the light.”
What does it mean to walk in the light? It doesn’t mean a life of perfection; it doesn’t mean that you never sin. It doesn’t mean that if you have messed up you are ‘damaged goods’ and have lost something that Christ cannot restore. What does it mean to walk in the light? It means to live the life of repentance. It means to despair of your sins, to cry out for Christ’s forgiveness, receiving that forgiveness by grace, and then, having been forgiven, to bear the fruits of repentance. As Saint Paul says, “The fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true.” The life of chastity is not easy; you will battle your own sinful flesh, and you will feel the overwhelming pressure of a world that doesn’t understand you at all. You cannot live as Christ calls you to live on your own power. Only by daily repentance and faith, confession and absolution, only by continually receiving Christ’s forgiveness can you walk this road.
If you have the guilt and shame of sexual sins in your present or your past, repent and hear these words: You are forgiven! God showed His love to you in that while you were still a sinner, Christ died for you. You’re not ‘damaged goods,’ you are clean, you are pure in Christ, for you are forgiven. Bear the fruits of repentance. Repent and abstain, repent and move out, repent and purchase accountability software. And know that you do not walk this road on your own. As a Church we need to do more than give out purity rings and sign pledges. We need to support and help all who are walking the road of chastity, before marriage, during marriage, after marriage. We cannot simply tell our young people ‘just say no’ and then give them no help in leading a chaste life. The Church is not the place to excuse or ignore sin, but the place where sin is pointed out, repented of, and forgiven. That’s what Christ does with our sin. He loves us by giving up His life into death and He loves us by shining His light in our hearts, making us light in the Lord; He gives us the supreme example of love, but it is much more than an example, it is your forgiveness, your life, your salvation. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)