Text: St. Matthew 22:41-46

Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them a question, saying, “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he?” They said to him, “The son of David.” He said to them, “How is it then that David, in the Spirit, calls him Lord, saying,

“‘The Lord said to my Lord,
“Sit at my right hand,
    until I put your enemies under your feet”’?

If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?” And no one was able to answer him a word, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.

You’re here this morning because you trust in God’s grace as offered to you in the substitutionary death of the Christ, Who rose from death victorious—with your sins paid for, and in Whom you know that you will rise to life eternal. That’s why you’re here this morning, because you believe this.

But it isn’t your nature to believe this. Jesus illustrates it in His parable of the Wedding Feast (it’s earlier in the same chapter as our text). Certain ones reject a king’s gracious invitation. They simply don’t want it; they have other priorities. Another in the parable appears to want it, but he wants it on his own terms, and ends up offending the host and getting tossed out. And, of course, that’s what happens with a lot of people when it comes to God’s kingdom; they’re either completely uninterested (again, the way of our nature), or they’re interested as long as it can be their way. Again, the nature.

Jesus’ audience in our text are the ones He’s illustrating in the parable. They’ve been opposing Him at every turn—these Pharisees and Sadducees (Jewish leaders of sorts). Right after He tells the parable they take turns trying to trick Him with questions they think He won’t be able to answer about paying taxes to Caesar, the Resurrection of the dead, which of the Law’s commands is the greatest. They hope He’ll look silly, and prove Himself to be just an ordinary man (and even a liar about who He’s been presenting Himself to be). Instead He has answered all of the questions indisputably. Even these very knowledgable Pharisees and Sadducees are no match for Him.

So, for these same men, Jesus has a question of His own in our text for this morning: “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is He?” In asking the question, Jesus isn’t talking about anything that’s foreign to them. When they say that He’s David’s son, they’re giving an answer that’s very common among Jews. They’re awaiting one God is sending to help them, and they know that He will be David’s descendant.

Many have thought Jesus is that one Who is being sent, based on what He’s been doing and authoritatively teaching. Two sets of blind men have called Him Son of David, when they are asking for His mercy and healing—the crowd present with the second pair as well (Matthew 9:27; 20:30-31). A crowd amazed at Him having healed a demon-oppressed man has called him the same (Matt. 12:23). A Canaanite woman with a demon-oppressed daughter, too (Matt. 15:22). The Palm Sunday crowds, and specifically the children who were present also call Him that (Matt. 21:9, 15).

Jesus isn’t even asking His audience in our text, whether or not they think He’s the Christ; He’s just asking whose son the Christ is (according to Scripture, He means). And again, their answer isn’t a surprising answer; it’s what Jesus had been anticipating, that He’s David’s Son. And it’s correct, though it’s only part of the answer.

Jesus wants to give them the rest of the answer.

They correctly know the Christ as David’s descendant. He wants them to recognize from Scripture, that the Christ is the eternal Son of God as well as David’s descendant in human flesh (and also to know why that’s important).

Him being also the eternal Son of God is very important. It means

His purpose is more significant than people have been thinking. It isn’t merely to help them with difficulties they might be having in this world (though He cares about those things too, as He has demonstrated repeatedly in His ministry). His even greater purpose, is to make payment for them, to secure forgiveness and eternal life.

They can’t do it themselves; they need Him to do it for them. So, again, that detail of the Christ being also the eternal Son of God amounts to a lot. The people can’t be saved from their sins if it isn’t the case.

“In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” That’s what God said to Abram in our Old Testament lesson. In Abram they’d be blessed because Abram’s descendant would be Messiah or Christ. The families of the earth would be blessed through His sacrificial death that makes payment for their sins. He’s the Lamb without blemish talked about in our Epistle lesson (it’s what all the sacrificing of animals in Old Testament worship was about), He’s the sacrifice, as well as the High Priest of the good things that have come. He’s the One Who makes atonement for sins with His own blood (the blood of goats and calves had stood in for it before; a priest had stood in for Him—now He’s here).

This issue of the Christ being God’s eternal Son comes up in our Gospel lesson too, in Jesus’ implication of Himself as being before Abraham. They ridicule the idea in the lesson, saying, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?” The same idea is expressed in John the Baptist’s statement, ‘After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me (though Jesus had been born after John, in terms of the flesh; He’s before John because He is God’s eternal Son—John 1:30).’ Of course, at the beginning of the Apostle John’s gospel he speaks of the Christ, saying, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Again, he’s saying the Christ is the eternal Son of God. The angel Gabriel referred to Him that way when he appeared to Mary, announcing that she would be the Savior’s mother. Though Jesus would be her son according to the flesh, the angel called Him Son of the Most High, and Son of God (Luke 1:26-38).

In giving His audience the rest of the answer about whose Son the Christ is, Jesus asks a follow up question: “How is it then that David, in the Spirit, calls him Lord, saying,

“‘The Lord said to my Lord,
“Sit at my right hand,
    until I put your enemies under your feet”’?

If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?”

Of course, that passage from the Psalms is another one that demonstrates Christ’s divinity—the fact of His being God’s eternal Son as well as David’s descendant in human flesh. David calls this descendant of his, LORD. There are two natures in Christ: divine and human. He’s God and He’s man. Our text is another one of the texts that demonstrates it.

And, of course, this is difficult for his audience to grasp. It says no one was able to answer him a word, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.

They’ve been left with something puzzling.

If the purpose of the one God is sending is to make them righteous before Him, it means (like we said earlier), that they can’t do that for themselves.

They can’t impress God with their lives, they can’t stand before Him in the judgment and say, remember all those good and important things I did; wasn’t that great? If they could, what would be the purpose of God sending His own Son to die (which He’s just demonstrated the Christ to be)?

So then, Jesus audience has some soul searching to do. They have the Christ in their presence. He has been doing all of the things the prophets said the Christ would do. Others have seen it, and acknowledged it. Jesus says to them on another occasion, as recorded in John’s gospel: Which one of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me?

But if they’re to believe He’s here to save them, then they can’t save themselves. But again, it’s our nature to think we can.

The one in the parable who insists on taking part in the wedding feast according to his own terms represents every self-righteous person; he represents every person who says, Oh, yeah, Lord, I want your kingdom; I just have my own way of getting there. Thanks but no thanks on Your Son. Maybe others need what You’re offering there, but not me. I’ll make do in my own way.

It’s so tempting to think that our going to heaven will be in some way based on our own goodness. You’ve caught yourself thinking that way, haven’t you? It’s your nature to do so. It’s your nature to be concerned in some moments about whether your life will have been good enough to get into heaven, and to be defiant in others, thinking something like: it better be good enough for God! Look how good it is—especially compared to other people!

Jesus wants His audience to see that the Christ isn’t just someone who is coming to help them in this world, or to help them along in getting themselves to heaven. He is God’s eternal Son sent to redeem them. They’re going to have to let Him save them entirely. Nothing about them is going to contribute in the matter. Either they will put it entirely in His hands, or they will perish in their sins.

Put it entirely in His hands, dear sinner?! God’s eternal Son has done for you what you couldn’t do for yourself. He’s the only one qualified for the job. He doesn’t have a sinful nature. There isn’t any self-righteousness in Him like there is in you and me. He God has provided Him as the solution to your sinfulness that would have condemned you to death and hell. There isn’t anything for you to worry about, if He is the one in charge of your salvation.

You’re here this morning because you trust in God’s grace as offered to you in the substitutionary death of the Christ, Who rose from death victorious—with your sins paid for (with your forgiveness secured), and in Whom you know that you will rise to life eternal. That’s why you’re here this morning, because you believe this. God has given it to you through Baptism, and through His Word. He supports it for you this morning through preaching and through the Supper. Having it from Him on His terms is the most blessed thing that could ever be. God be praised. Amen.

St. Matthew 13:54-58

Coming to His hometown [Jesus] taught them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished, and said, “Where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works? Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not His mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And are not all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things?” And they took offense at Him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household.” And He did not do many mighty works there, because of their unbelief.

The writer of the New Testament book of Hebrews devotes a chapter to recounting the faith of believers of the past. He talks about Abel, and Enoch, and Noah, and Abraham, and Sarah (without time, he says, to go into several others); he does it for the purpose of encouraging present believers with accounts of these past believers’ lives. Knowing they believed and were faithful to the LORD uplifts those who walk the same road (that is sometimes difficult).

In that same spirit, then, we consider this morning, Joseph’s life. Today, March 19, is the day when Joseph is traditionally remembered (We’re talking about Joseph who was placed by the LORD into the vocation of father to Jesus the Savior, during His childhood in this world).

The position was hardly glamorous. The way the angel talked to Mary about the father of the child to be born to her was essentially to say there wouldn’t be one in the natural sense; that what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit (Matthew 1:20).

Now, we know that this was a gracious thing on God’s part. It was the way to solve the problem of our sin; that the perfect Son of God be born into human flesh [not inheriting like we do, therefore, the sinful nature that comes through the union of sinful human parents]—He did it so that He could live perfectly in our place, and then die as the sufficient sacrifice for our sins.

But because it was to happen this way, Joseph had to learn that his betrothed was with child; and this, as St. Matthew puts it: before they [before he and Mary] came together. Matthew tells us that Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. Now, that word resolved is interesting. It indicates that there was careful thought about it, maybe over some time, right? We’re not told how long Joseph considered these things before coming to that conclusion (a very loving conclusion, by the way; one that would spare Mary the worst of what could result from such a thing). Just having these things to consider for a time must have been difficult though. Of course, an angel’s visit brought God’s purpose to light, making it clear to Joseph that marrying her as planned was the right thing.

The Bible doesn’t really comment on any whispering throughout the community over Mary’s pregnancy that evidently preceded their marriage; but it isn’t hard to imagine that Joseph endured some of that as well (Mary too, of course). Again, the position was hardly glamorous.

In addition, Joseph wasn’t by any means a wealthy man. He was a tradesman—a carpenter (as mentioned in our text). It’s noted in the Christmas season text about Jesus’ presentation in the Temple (the one in which Simeon and Anna are present), that Joseph offered the poorer person’s sacrifice of two turtle doves or a pair of pigeons for those who couldn’t afford a lamb (Luke 2:24). Wealth wasn’t part of caring for God’s Son in human flesh.

In the only other texts in which Joseph is even mentioned, he’s burdened with a great amount of concern in his role as “father” of this child. After the visit of the magi, (who’d also made their visit known to Herod), the angel returns in a dream to tell Joseph that he must take the family and flee to Egypt. They’re in danger. In fact, in an effort to kill Jesus (just after the family’s narrow escape), Herod kills all the male children in the whole region around Bethlehem who are possibly Jesus’ age.

Finally, Joseph is namelessly mentioned along with Mary under the term His parents a couple of times in the account of the twelve-year-old Jesus at the Temple. After they have inadvertently left without Him, and then found Him after three days of searching, Mary mentions Joseph, saying, “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.”

Isn’t it also evidently the case in our text, that when the locals get a glimpse of what Jesus is doing among them now, the comment that comes out seems to kind of diminish Joseph’s importance; they say, Isn’t this the carpenter's son? Jesus goes on to comment on a prophet not being honored in his hometown. Hardly glamorous.

And yet, as is the case in a lot of ways with the LORD, things aren’t quite the way they seem. This is the LORD Who regularly says, The kingdom of heaven is like… and then proceeds to describe a situation that is opposite of what people would think. With the LORD the last is first and first last. Suffering Lazarus ends up in the paradise of God’s kingdom. Most importantly, the One being crucified is really saving all sinners.

So then, it isn’t such a surprise that the LORD hides tremendously important work behind the facade of Joseph’s unglamorous life. He hides it behind a man of modest means who fears God, and who loves deeply his wife, and the child whose care he has undertaken—moving them out of harm’s way when necessary, searching anxiously when he believes the child has been lost, following the LORD’s direction all along the way. For someone whose life is so unglamorous, the LORD has made a tremendous amount of it, hasn’t he?

What a lesson in this time in which one of the biggest causes of peoples’ dissatisfaction with their lives is in comparing themselves with others’ social media postings. People of various ages look at lives apparently more glamorous than their own, and think, What am I doing wrong? Why am I this, when they’re that! It can even become a sinful dissatisfaction with what God has provided, can’t it? Behind it can really be the person saying, Why hasn’t God given me (whatever it is that looks so great  about those other people’s lives)? Why am I so ordinary? Why do I have so little? Why do such difficult things seem to keep happening to me? You’ve felt like this, haven’t you? We convince ourselves that this sort of dissatisfaction isn’t sin, that it’s sort of our right to feel this way. But it really can become sin, can’t it? No doubt, sometimes it has for you.

When we highlight the lives of these saints—these believers of the past, it’s important that we remember that it’s the things God is doing through their lives that we’re really highlighting.

The Bible doesn’t indicate to us that Joseph (or Mary, for that matter) were any less sinful than anyone else. In fact Jesus is including Joseph in His rebuke in the Temple, when He says, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?” Joseph isn’t just another sort of social-media-like person that we look at and say, why can’t I be more like him? Wouldn’t be any reason for us to observe his life today if that were the case.

Instead, we look at his life to see God’s great blessing in it and through it. Everything we’ve said about him paints kind of an ordinary picture; and yet, through this ordinary person God brings about extraordinary accomplishment. Through the unremarkable day to day life Joseph provides, the world’s Savior grows up in this man’s house, healthy and protected, all His needs met. The LORD hides tremendously important work behind the facade of Joseph’s unglamorous life.

The same can be said for the life of every believer. When the writer to the Hebrews is talking about those believers of old, he, too, isn’t talking about some kind of “super believers”. He’s emphasizing what their faith was in.

These all died in faith [he says], not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth (11:13).

Their faith was in God’s grace, and that it was coming through the One Who’d been promised—Messiah. The writer talks about a few specific believers’ lives, but then goes on to mention in general a lot more, about whom he says:

Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated—of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth (11:35-38).

Talk about unglamorous lives. And yet, they were so valuable to the LORD, that they’re mentioned in the Bible as though they were VIP’s. He was accomplishing important things through them, even though it sure didn’t look like it on the surface. Many times it sure didn’t feel like it to them either, no doubt.

You are equally important to Him. He does His work in and through your life too. You are His witness in this world who reflects Him in your vocation every day of your life, no matter how unglamorous or even unimportant you might think it is. Yours is a life that was redeemed by the Savior. As Paul says, you were bought with a price (1 Cor. 7:23). Furthermore, you were Baptized—brought into God’s family, given faith to know Him according to His grace and mercy. You know the essence of God’s grace toward you, that Jesus, who desired at all times only what the Father willed, has made payment for your desires that were beyond that, and for every other sin. Behind the facade of your unglamorous life God accomplishes great things. His love is in you, that goes out to others. He hears your prayers. Let us pray:

Heavenly Father, grant Your mercy and grace to Your people in their many and various callings. As you did for Your servant Joseph, give them patience, and strengthen them in their Christian vocation of witness to the world and of service to their neighbor in Christ’s name; through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

—Appropriated from Lutheran Service Book, p.311.

St. John 12:20-32

Now among those who went up to worship at the feast were some Greeks. So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Philip went and told Andrew; Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. And Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.

“Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The crowd that stood there and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not mine. Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”

“The hour has come for the Son of Man to be [not killed, not crucified, but…] glorified.“—Jesus says. Glorified. Now, killed, crucified; those are bad things. But, glorified—that’s a good thing! He’s about…to be killed though. And He knows it. That’s why He’s here, according to an eternal plan. He’s talking here, about what St. Paul refers to in our epistle lesson when he says that Christ, gave himself up for us. That’s what this is about. Ironically, that’s what Jesus means in our text by glorified—that the hour has come for Him to be…crucified, and thereby, glorified.

Isn’t it interesting He talks about it that way! We would tend to think, how could being killed (crowned with thorns, nailed to a cross, drenched with the spit of his enemies, stained with his own blood, parched, bruised, pierced)—how could that in any sense be called glorified? Jesus knows it isn’t going to look like something that could be called that. He knows his disciples are going to have a hard time seeing it that way. His rich words in this text certainly give us perspective on what His death means.

Also, though, they give perspective on what this life means for you. The theme for this morning (printed on the bulletin cover in the midst of this Lenten season): Triumph Over Satan.

Only, a lot times in this life it doesn’t seem like there’s much of a triumph happening, does it?

Blessed are those who mourn; blessed are the poor in spirit; the meek; those who hunger and thirst for righteousness; who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake; who are reviled and have all kinds of evil said about them for Jesus’ sake

—those things Jesus lays out in the Beatitudes as the way of those who follow Him; not apparently a lot of glory being talked about there, right? Rather, the words might inspire a lot of longing for Christ’s return and the end of this.

Case in point: the day before Jesus said what He says in our text, He’d been at the home of Mary and Martha, and their brother Lazarus, whom Jesus had raised from the dead, and who was present with Jesus on the occasion. St. John tells us that a large crowd had gathered to see Jesus, but also to see Lazarus, because they’d heard about the miracle. A miracle like that is glorious, right? But here’s what it becomes in this world: we’re told that then, the chief priests made plans to put Lazarus to death as well [as Jesus], because on account of him many of the Jews were going away and believing in Jesus (John 12:10-11). Persecuted for righteousness’ sake.

So, even Jesus’ friends are in an uncomfortable situation in this world. You know it, because you keep adhering to the written words of God, who says in that Word, I the Lord do not change (Malachi 3:6). The world does—significantly—but God and the truth of His Word remain. So does the burden of clinging to it in opposition to the world.

True believers in the time leading up to the Babylonian Captivity of Israel felt the same burden. Those preaching God’s Word were steamrolled by a society that had gone away from it. God’s true prophets were killed one by one as the people surrounded themselves with false prophets willing to say what they wanted to hear.

So, again: even Jesus’ friends are in an uncomfortable situation in this world. No doubt, you wonder when you’re going to be confronted for holding to the Bible’s teaching. You wonder when someone is going to make plans to do to you what the chief priests were planning to do to Lazarus. Maybe it’s hard to imagine it’s going to get that bad any time soon. But Jesus’ words, Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake are brought into sharper focus in what He goes on to say to His disciples:

“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name's sake (Matthew 24:9).

Another time He said to them:

Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God (John 16:2).

Doesn’t it sometimes feel to you, like God has been holding back the rushing waters; but that they’re making continual progress in chipping away at the dam, so that eventually you’ll find yourself overwhelmed. You’ll be surrounded in this world by Jesus’ enemies who also consider you to be their enemy, and who think silencing you or eliminating you would be in the interest of the greater good (that’s how the chief priests were thinking about Lazarus).

Jesus says something a little strange in our text, about hating this life. You might have caught that earlier. Whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. By hating his life He doesn’t mean sitting around wishing it were different. Fact is: there are a lot of things to love about this life, right? He’s talking about choosing or preferring this life over the eternal life that God is offering in His Word.

It’s like a rich young man coming to Jesus one time, wondering how to inherit eternal life, and him going away disheartened when he learned it meant he had to prefer that life he’s seeking, over his wealth, he had to be willing even to give up his wealth in order to have it if that were necessary (Mark 10:21-22).

Of course, wealth is only one of the things a person might choose in this life over God and His kingdom. Being willing to abandon what God says in order to be loved by the world is perhaps the greatest temptation a believer faces, isn’t it? Then, all the burden goes away…for now. The pressure comes off. No more opposition. No more poor in spirit. No more persecuted for righteousness’ sake. No more reviled. No more having all kinds of evil said about them for Jesus’ sake. Hasn’t that thought crossed your mind a time or two, how comfortable it could all get if adhering to God’s Word were no longer an issue? Maybe sometimes you’ve already gone there.

“The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” And, of course, it’s interesting because the glory doesn’t even really look like a victory. He illustrates it this way in our text: unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. It falls to the ground and dies. So, it seems like the end of it, seems like nothing will ever come of it; but with it having died, new life, then, comes of it.

Jesus is comparing that, to what’s about to happen to Him. Nothing good will happen for sinners if He goes on living without dying. They’ll be alone—apart from God, apart from His grace, held entirely accountable for their sins, condemned to face the wages of sin, eternal death (Romans 6:23). Even though He’s being killed, even though it looks like nothing more will come of it, in dying, He brings about life for every sinner. He brings it about by paying the price every sinner owes, so that, forgiven, they rise to eternal life. That’s the triumph over Satan that our bulletin cover is talking about.

That’s why Jesus, even as He says, “Now is my soul troubled,” will not ask the Father to save Him from this hour. He’ll be handling a burden so heavy, that later in the Garden He will say, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will”. He’ll be suffering a punishment so severe, that on the cross He'll say, Why have you forsaken Me?

But here, in our text, before the worst of the suffering is happening, we see in Jesus’ words, that it’s very clear to Him what He has to do.

What is He here for, if not to die like this, if not to make atonement for your sins, and for all the worlds’ sins?

So, when Jesus says, Father, glorify your name, He means, bring about what happens as the result of My dying. Bring about the bearing of much fruit, bring about the life that comes only from my death—new life for those who are, and who otherwise remain, dead in trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1).

A lot of times in this life it doesn’t seem like there is much of a triumph happening. Your spiritual enemies, the devil and the world cause you so much grief and concern. You’re overwhelmed by it sometimes, right? You wonder how it’ll all end up. Does your story have a glorious ending? By the way, your own flesh is the third of those enemies we were talking about. It doubts, it wonders, it struggles. It even falters sometimes. How could there be glory at the end of it all?

There is; Jesus says it in our text. His followers will be where He is. His followers will be honored by the Father. In being lifted up from the earth [lifted up to the cross, He means], He draws all people to Himself. The non-doubter Who is there, punished for all of your doubts, draws you to Himself. The One Who isn’t in need of any forgiveness pays there, so that you have forgiveness—from every sin.

It’s ironic. The hour of His crucifixion is the hour in which He is glorified. In His death is your life eternal; because everything needed in order for you to be with God is accomplished. The poor in spirit is blessed. The one who hungers and thirsts after righteousness is blessed. God be praised. Amen.

Matthew 12:38-42

Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him, saying, “Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.” But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and behold, something greater than Jonah is here. The queen of the South will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and behold, something greater than Solomon is here.

Last week in our Gospel lesson, Satan (who was tempting Jesus for forty days in the wilderness) wanted Him to demonstrate that He was really the Son of God. That’s what someone who isn’t acting as one of God’s people, isn’t apparently one of Jesus’ followers, does. Someone who isn’t exhibiting that he or she is being led by the Holy Spirit does that.

The opposite is the case with you. In Baptism (or through the hearing of God’s Word) the Spirit made you well aware of who your Savior is, and without any need of Him demonstrating it through some sign (It’s demonstrated in His Word!). Your faith in it, is living and active. It moves you to come here on a morning like this, and confess your sins, and hear the absolution of God’s grace extended to you in Christ your Savior. It moves you to want to gather with other believers like these, to hear the Word that strengthens, sing hymns of faith, receive the Supper that nourishes like no other meal ever could—this food and drink that are joined mysteriously with Christ’s true body and blood for the remission of your sins!

One of the things that comes up a lot in the accounts of Jesus’ ministry is the questions of who really are God’s people, and what it is that makes one that.

As far as Jesus’ disciples are concerned, the woman who comes to Him in our Gospel lesson doesn’t fit the bill. She isn’t even Jewish, like them; she’s a Canaanite woman—a Gentile. Her daughter is being possessed by a demon (Wonder what she did in order to bring that about!—they were probably whispering to each other). Good people aren’t possessed by demons (they were probably thinking to themselves). When she asks for their help, they’re begging Jesus to get rid of her.

Jonah had thought similarly about the Ninevites, to whom God had sent him to deliver His message of repentance (Jesus mentions them in our text). They too, weren’t even Jewish. They were Gentiles, and had a horrible reputation. In the LORD’s sending of Jonah, He said: “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me.” Of course, Jonah, who couldn’t even believe God was sending him there, made up his mind not to under any circumstances go there (didn’t work out that way for him).

Again, those questions: Who really are God’s people; and What it is that makes one that?

Jesus mentions the queen of the South in our text too—another who wasn’t even a Jew. What’s remarkable about her, and about the Ninevites (Jonah’s audience), is that both who weren’t God’s people according to blood, weren’t among the covenant people of Israel, heard His message and humbled themselves before Him. The queen of Sheba came and sought out the wisdom of God’s prophet Solomon. The Ninevites repented at hearing Jonah’s message.

That text from Jonah’s third chapter says, The word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, “By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish.” And at their repentance, the LORD who had sent His prophet to say, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!”—relented, and did not send the disaster of which He’d warned. The people’s humility before Him is what God was seeking. That that’s what He wants from all people is evident in His words through the prophet Isaiah:

But this is the one to whom I will look:
    he who is humble and contrite in spirit
    and trembles at my word (66:2).

Jesus is seeing something other than that in our text. The men He is speaking to, want Him to demonstrate that He is really the Son of God. Their case is a little different from Satan’s in last week’s Gospel lesson that we talked about, in that Satan knows Jesus is the Son of God, and was challenging Him to prove it so that He would choose some self-serving avenue aside from God’s will (Of course, Jesus proved that He couldn’t be made to do that). The scribes and Pharisees in our text simply don’t believe. They have known the words of the prophets, heard Jesus’ own preaching seen many signs from Him, but in the face of clear evidence, have refused to humble themselves before God, before His Messiah. Instead, they were envious of Him. They didn’t like that people were gathering with Him (instead of them), and they were proud, they imagined themselves their own saviors.

When the apostle Stephen is about to be stoned by people like these to whom Jesus is speaking in our text (recorded in the book of Acts), he says these words that would apply also to Jesus’ audience: “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered, you who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.”

So, these who are God’s covenant people according blood demonstrate that they really aren’t His people when it comes to inheriting His kingdom. They aren’t humble before Him as He requires.

On the other hand, look at the Gentile woman in our Gospel lesson. She comes to Jesus for His help. She knows He’s the one who can help her. Jesus has been demonstrating it all over the place. He cares about people, and He can do amazing things to help them. She even calls Him Son of David; so she knows (even though she isn’t a Jew) the Scriptures that have foretold Jesus’ coming. She calls Him by the Name the Savior is to be called by. And she is so sure that Jesus will help her, that she pushes past His disciples’ resistance. She keeps asking until they finally make Jesus aware of this irritation they are currently enduring from this Canaanite woman.

And at first He seems to be going along with them on it. He challenges her to keep on—even if it seems for a moment like Jesus isn’t the one she’s read about, the one she’s heard about, the one she knows. So, in response to His statement about it not [being] right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs, she says the thing that indicates true humility before God: “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” She’ll take whatever mercy God is willing to give. What other help will she have? To Whom else is there to go? She has humbled herself before God by hearing His Word and believing it. You can tell she believes it because she has come for help to the One God has provided.

There was a faculty meeting this past Friday. To open the meeting Principal Dale read the Monday evening prayer from p.168 in the front portion of the hymnbook (there are prayers there for every morning and evening of the week, by the way). One line in the prayer says, “Let me always draw near to You with a broken heart.” It refers to one of the Psalms: The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise (51:17). “Let me always draw near to You with a broken heart.” That’s what God always wants from you. He wants there never to be any other agenda than coming before Him humbly to receive His mercy for your sins.

But isn’t it true, that the last thing your nature wants is to humble itself before anyone. The world is very cooperative in this. “You don’t have to humble yourself before anyone!“ Your nature wants to be the Pharisee, that even looks at God’s own Son, and says, “Who are you again? Ah, could we see a little evidence of this? Because last time I looked there’re a lot of things about this life that I wish were different. I don’t have enough of anything I want. Isn’t that the way of your nature, to lack humility, to lack contentment with what God has given, to insist on your own way, to accuse God of shorting you in some way, to be proud and unapologetic to the One Who requires a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, to be a Pharisee who insists that God prove Himself to you? The end of all that is God’s forsaking.

But glory be to God, that He forsook in your place His own Son, Who was humble even to the point of death on a cross. Since there was never a time when He failed to humble Himself, His blood makes payment for every failure of yours. Since He was three days and three nights in the heart of the earth, your death is now an entrance to eternal life. Your sins are forgiven. You have come to the right place to receive the help that you need. What other help will you have? To Whom else is there to go? You have humbled yourself before God by hearing His Word and believing it. You have come for help to the One God has provided. Praise be to God. Amen.

John 2:13-22

The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father's house a house of trade.” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”

So the Jews said to him, “What sign do you show us for doing these things?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking about the temple of his body. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

God went to the first people, who’d sinned (according to our Old Testament lesson), and said, “What is this that you have done?” Shortly thereafter, He declared that a Savior would be coming, Who would fix what had been broken.

Isn’t that what happens in a place like this every single week? God comes to you in His Word and says, “What is this that you have done?” Convicted, you, as a sort of modern Adam and Eve, confess your sins (we presume that after they got through making excuses, they did too), and you hear the pastor say that a Savior has fixed what you have broken. He has turned the accusation you owned onto Himself, so that God was saying to Him now, “What is this that you have done?”—and He was made to face your consequences.

God’s House exists for that purpose, for the purpose of Him confronting you with your sins, you confessing them, and Him declaring to you again the grace that He has provided in the substitutionary death of the Savior, Jesus. The end of it all is that your Spirit-given faith endures unto eternal life with Him in heaven. God’s House exists for that purpose.

So, when Jesus arrives at the Jerusalem Temple for Passover and finds what He finds, He is overcome with righteous zeal to put right the wrong that He sees.

It occurs to Him immediately, that the impression one gets at the scene in God’s House is not that it is the place in which God confronts sinners, they repent, and they receive His grace, but rather that it is a house of trade. Whatever necessary selling of sacrificial animals to far-off travelers may have formerly been done has more recently given way to an atmosphere unbecoming of God’s House. It doesn’t appear to exist for its original purpose anymore. God’s House doesn’t appear anymore to exist for the purpose of God speaking necessary words to sinners.

To bring that situation about is the devil’s purpose. His purpose is to prevent people hearing God speaking necessary words to them.

Think of how he does that in our Old Testament lesson. He goes to the ones to whom God’s has already spoken, and he works to undo what God has done, he works to deceive. He implies that it would be naive to think God’s perspective is the only perspective, that the peoples’ own truth isn’t just as legitimate, just as wise, to be valued just as much.

We might imagine the situation in our text came about in the same sort of way. Travelers to Jerusalem for feasts like the Passover had been burdened with trying bring sacrificial animals with them on their long journeys. A solution had been conceived by some well-meaning congregant, that animals be made available for that purpose near the Temple (presumably at a respectable distance so as not to overshadow the true purpose of God’s House, OF COURSE!). But at some point in time, not overshadowing the true purpose of God’s House became less important than the convenience of being closer (perhaps also than the prospect of making even more money in the endeavor).

We can imagine the thought process. Do you really think being a little closer to the actual Temple is going cause such a problem? I mean, what are we even doing subjecting ourselves to this inconvenience? We’re trying to provide a service here! (Others around say, yeah, yeah, that makes sense, yeah. We gotta get closer.).

So, having set things up, now, in such a way that those entering the Temple must enter through the area of the sellers, at some point someone says, Would it be any problem, you think, if we were to put signs all around the area, directing people to each of the specific spots where things are being offered for sale (probably also with prices on them)? I mean, it’s going to be a whole lot less distracting for worshipers if they don’t have to work so hard to find what they need. Their minds are going to be so much more focused on the worship. So, now there are market-like signs all around.

Having moved the buying and selling area immediately in front of the Temple, and having put advertising everywhere, someone says, You know what would make this even more convenient for weary travelers?—connected restaurant. They gotta eat, right?! What kind of people are we, letting them worship on an empty stomach. That’s not neighborly! (Others around are saying, No, no; you’re right, you’re right. Gotta have a restaurant).

Pretty soon this perhaps initially well-meaning service of providing travelers to Jerusalem with necessary sacrificial animals in the vicinity of the Temple is now a market blocking the Temple, distracting weary travelers from the very purpose of God’s House, which is Him confronting them with their sins, them confessing them, and Him declaring to them His grace in the Savior. The devil has succeeded in turning God’s House into a house of trade. Sellers and buyers together have lost what God has intended for them have in His House.

That’s what Jesus’ righteous zeal in our text all about. It’s about the very purpose of God’s House being lost as peoples’ reasoning related to it has replaced their desire to receive from God what He wants them to have.

Their sin of elevating their reason over God’s Word feels very close to home, doesn’t it? Hasn’t it also been your sin sometimes to justify things you know are wrong, to find a way to massage it so that once you’re done making a case for the wrong, it actually comes out sounding like right! It actually comes out sounding (this thing that comes into conflict with God’s Law) like the only righteous thing to do. You have given in to the same temptation as your first parents, haven’t you?  You have let the devil talk you into putting aside what God has said in favor of what you really prefer. You are your first parents’ child. Your confession earlier was right on the money when you said you have justly deserved God’s temporal and eternal punishment.

Having clarified for the people the purpose of God’s House as the place at which He speaks to us, Jesus speaks again the critical message. He talks about His purpose for being here. To those who are determined not to believe, it is obstructed from their view in a sign, like a Temple entrance obstructed with a market. They are unable to see through it, to grasp what He is saying to them about Himself.

Later, the disciples understand though. After Jesus has suffered and died, remained in the grave three days, and risen from death, they recognize that when He says here, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up”, He is talking about His body. He is saying what God wants to say to people who come to His House: for sinners He has provided a Savior—His only begotten Son Jesus Christ. He has provided the One Who couldn’t be manipulated by the devil during forty days of temptation in the wilderness—couldn’t be made to imagine that whatever He could think up in his mind was wiser than what God has said. The only time God says to Him, “What is this that you have done?”—it’s because He has taken upon Himself what you have done. He has put Himself in your place for accusation, condemnation, termination. The temple of His body is destroyed as if He were the one out of all the people who put His own human reason over God’s Word.

So, in this place every single week, God comes to you in His Word and says, “What is this that you have done?” Convicted, you modern Adams and Eves confess your sins and hear the pastor say that a Savior has fixed what you have broken. He has turned the accusation you owned onto Himself, so that God has said to Him and not you, “What is this that you have done?”—and He has faced your consequences. He has bought your forgiveness. You are forgiven of every sin. God’s House has fulfilled its true purpose. Your faith is revived in order to endure unto eternal life. God be praised. Amen.

Psalm 51

My humble opinion about something as we begin this evening: I’ve never been a big fan of billboards on the highway that say some apparently clever message, and then attribute it to God as if He is some sort of stand up comedian.

“It’s a small world. I know; I made it.”—GOD. Or:

“Life is short. Eternity isn’t.—GOD.

Not my favorite thing—especially when it’s like that; when it’s making up something God didn’t really say, and then sticking His name on it.

Instead, what if we took the portion of our text that I want to focus on this evening and then after it write:—JESUS? So, it would go like this:

For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is ever before me.

Against you, you only, have I sinned
    and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
    and blameless in your judgment.

Cast me not away from your presence,           
    and take not your Holy Spirit from me.       

Restore to me the joy of your salvation,    
    and uphold me with a willing spirit.

                          —JESUS

Might be a little bit shocking to hear that, right? Your immediate reaction might be, “How can those words be attributable to Jesus—the perfect Son of God, the one whose active and passive obedience made Him the perfect substitute for us, this one who in every respect has been tempted as we are [says the writer to the Hebrews], yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15)?” Those words we read are the words of the sinner (and Psalm-writer), David. They’re words we could claim as our own were we to sing them in worship, as our Old Testament era brothers and sisters evidently used to do. That would fit as something we could say. But how could they be Jesus’ words? How could it be appropriate to attribute them to Him like that?

For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is ever before me.

You certainly know your transgressions. You’ve seen them in the mirror of God’s Law, of His Ten Commandments. You have looked into that mirror and recognized that you have fallen short of what He has required. The smudge on your forehead is a visual representation of the spoken confession you made this evening.

Remember the pastor’s words: “Do you repent of your sins? Yes? You should repent,” like David who prayed for a contrite heart, like St. Peter who wept bitterly, like the others who are mentioned there.

In your confession from earlier, that, again, is visually represented with the smudged cross on your forehead (that’s why we do it, after all!), you said that because of your sins you justly deserve God’s temporal and eternal punishment. Those aren’t words you say just to take up the time while you’re here in a service; they’re based in real events from your life. They’re based on your transgressions, on your sin that is ever before you.

You have sinned and done what is evil in God’s sight in the impatience you’ve demonstrated toward your neighbor, for instance, and the wicked and mean things you have thought about him as a result. Maybe it was your sibling or your spouse, or someone in line with you at the store, or in another vehicle on the road, another student in your classroom, a co-worker. Your transgressions and your sin were before you then, and they’re ever before you. There’s a lifetime of these things. As our text says, God is justified in His words, blameless in His judgment against you. You sang in the hymn just now:

I also and my sin

Wrought Thy deep affliction;

This indeed the cause hath been

Of Thy crucifixion.

[from Jesus, I Will Ponder Now]

It is right that you contritely in the Psalm beseech the LORD to cast you not away from His presence, to take not His Holy Spirit from you. Were He to do so, you would be in the place of the dammed. You would be where you deserve to be, but certainly not where you’d ever want to be. The smudged cross on your forehead is representative of it. Someone innocent before God would never appropriately wear such a thing. That’s the emblem that is placed on sinners; it’s on ones who could never stand before God and make a winning case for their own lives. That same cross was made on your head and heart at your Baptism.

For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is ever before me.

Against you, you only, have I sinned
    and done what is evil in your sight,

so that you may be justified in your words
    and blameless in your judgment.

Cast me not away from your presence,

and take not your Holy Spirit from me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation,

and uphold me with a willing spirit.

                        —JESUS

But again… how can we justify such an attribution? How can we look at those words and consider Jesus to be the one saying them? Well, we look into the Holy Scriptures, and digest what it says about our Savior; that’s how.

He’s the one Who had to come to be known for having committed your crimes.

Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted (Isaiah 53:4).

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us (Gal. 3:13).

So then, it isn’t so far-fetched for Him to be the one saying:

For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is ever before me.

Against you, you only, have I sinned
    and done what is evil in your sight,

so that you may be justified in your words
    and blameless in your judgment.

He’s the one Who, experiencing the anguish of it all, said in the Garden of Gethsemane:

“My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will (Matt. 26:39).” And:

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken Me (Matt. 27:46)?”

So then, it isn’t so far-fetched for Him to be the one saying:

Cast me not away from your presence,

and take not your Holy Spirit from me.

You’ll be especially expressing this when you sing in the closing hymn this evening:

Thyself to scorn didst offer.

All sins Thou borest for us

He’s the one about Whom it is written:

Yet 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 (Isaiah 53:10)

The prophet comments on the end of it all; the glorification of the Christ now having made full satisfaction for all sins, the LORD’s will—of sinners redeemed (Christ’s spiritual offspring).

So then, it isn’t so far-fetched for Him to be the one saying:

Restore to me the joy of your salvation,

and uphold me with a willing spirit.

On this evening on which you wear ashes on your forehead, and on which you might ask, just how serious are my sins anyway? The answer is that saving you required the perfect God’s perfect Son to say on your behalf, I know My transgressions; My sin is ever before Me. They required Him to say to the Father, I have sinned and done what is evil in your sight. He was taking upon Himself what you are. Your sins required Him to become before the Father the justifiable object of His most severe wrath and judgment. Instead of you, He was the one saying, Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me.

But the Son was cast away from the Father’s presence. He was forsaken. He was turned over to the place of the damned, because where you deserved to be became instead (on your behalf, for your benefit) where He deserved to be.

It was so that you can now stand before God on the Last Day without transgressions and sins before you. It was so that you are considered not to have sinned and done what is evil in His sight. It was so that there aren’t any words of judgment against you. It was so that you are never cast away from the LORD’s presence.

You are forgiven because of what Jesus has suffered for you. The cross on your forehead represents, now, the cross upon which your Savior died for you. You follow your risen LORD, rising from death yourself to receive the joy of His salvation. What sweet music are those words of our text when attributed to Jesus. Amen.

St. Matthew 16:21-23

From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “Far be it from you, Lord! This shall never happen to you.” But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”

Last week in our text, Jesus was saying some things to people that we would never want to hear Him say to us. They would die in their sins, where He was going they could not come, they were of this corrupted, dying world rather than His kingdom. He was saying those things to people who weren’t believing in Him. He was saying it in judgment of their unbelief.

Today, it’s the case again, that Jesus is saying something to someone, that none of us would ever want to hear Him say to us. He says it this time, to His own follower, Peter. He says, “Get behind me, Satan!” To this believer, though, He says it, not in judgment, but for His good. He says it in order to make him understand something very important for him to understand. He goes on: You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”

We’re talking about faith this morning. On the bulletin cover you see the Latin phrase, Sola Fide, which means faith alone. The last couple of weeks we had, Sola Gratia—Grace Alone, and Sola Scriptura—Scripture Alone, and now, Sola Fide—Faith Alone. These are phrases that Martin Luther used to talk about how we are justified or made righteous before God. They stand against any idea of us being righteous through things we have done or accomplished. We are righteous before God because He has been gracious to us (loving us even though we don’t deserve it—Grace alone), because we are able to draw near to Him through the Spirit’s work in the Holy Scripture (Scripture alone). That work of the Spirit, is that He puts faith in our hearts that clings to the One in Whom God has placed His grace for us—in Jesus, the Christ. Sola Fide—Faith Alone. We’re saved only because we have this faith in Jesus. Our sins are forgiven in Him.

Peter is setting his heart on the things of man, Jesus says. And again, He’s referring to Peter’s insistence that Jesus won’t die as He has said. That’s for Peter to have his heart set on the things of man. Really, he’s subscribing to the popular point of view of the time, that the Messiah would be someone who would only live. Were He to die, according to that thinking, all would be lost.

How could the Messiah (how could Jesus) die like that? How could He be overtaken by His enemies? How could He fail to win a very clear—even military-like victory in this world? Even in the late moments, on the occasion of Jesus’ arrest in the Garden, Peter was still trying to defend Him with a sword, to prevent what Jesus is predicting in our text, that He will go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed (also rise, of course).

Other things Jesus had been doing had been making sense with Peter’s Messianic expectations. He was compassionate and powerful. He was able to do things like heal the sick, even raise the dead. He’d fed giant crowds of people with just a small amount of food, and done other amazing things. That’d all checked out.

But how could it last if that person was going die? How could He be everything they’d been thinking He’d be?

In our Gospel lesson, similarly Jesus is predicting His death. And it says of the disciples that, they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said. The fact of the matter is, on the occasion of our Gospel lesson and in our text, they just simply weren’t really paying to attention to the prophets’ words in Holy Scripture. That’s what it means when it says His saying was hidden from them, that they weren’t grasping what He was saying.

Now, had they thought about Isaiah’s words in the 53rd chapter, for instance, then Jesus wouldn’t have been saying anything so mysterious to them.

Isaiah 53:4-5

Surely he has borne our griefs
    and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
    smitten by God, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions;
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
    and with his wounds we are healed.

53:12b he bore the sin of many,
    and makes intercession for the transgressors.

Isaiah’s words anticipate perfectly Jesus’ prediction in our text, that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed.

The thing is: that’s also Who the Messiah would be. He’d be preaching the good news and doing powerful miracles (like Peter had expected), but also dying for the peoples’ sins.

If the disciples had been paying attention to the Psalm writer’s words, they’d have seen it too.

1 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
    Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?

6 But I am a worm and not a man,
    scorned by mankind and despised by the people.

16 For dogs encompass me;
    a company of evildoers encircles me;
they have pierced my hands and feet—

I can count all my bones—
they stare and gloat over me; 

they divide my garments among them,
    and for my clothing they cast lots.

Again, these words from Psalm 22 certainly anticipate (hundreds of years before), Jesus’ prediction in our text, of Him suffering and being killed. They describe the scene that took place at the cross, with the peoples’ scorning and despising, the piercing of His hands and feet, the soldiers’ dividing of His garments, even the very words that express His atoning for peoples’ sins: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Again, we’re talking about faith this morning. Jesus is harsh with Peter because He wants him to grow to understand what faith really is. Faith isn’t that we figure out in our minds how we think everything best turns out, and then we say to ourselves, “it better turn out that way.” That isn’t what faith is.

St. Paul writes in our epistle lesson: now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. Paul wasn’t talking about the mirror you have in your bathroom. You wouldn’t see dimly in that mirror; you’d see a perfect reflection of yourself. He is talking about a first century mirror of polished brass, that allowed a person to see a dim reflection of himself. Were you, now, to have that sort of mirror in your bathroom, you would long for the clearer image.

His point is pretty clear: we don’t know, or fully understand everything, though we wish we did. Peter had thought that a clear image of the Messiah was that He would live in this world, providing for His people, protecting them. Instead, the truly clear image of the Messiah was what Jesus had been telling them on a number of occasions. It was what the prophets had said. He would be a suffering servant, dying in a rather horrifying way (and then rising, of course).

But it’s interesting; look in our Old Testament lesson, how the prophet describes the situation of Christ’s saving of us: “Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.” Whether we think or not, that those are the kind of words that should describe what’s happening at the cross (because that’s what they’re describing, God coming with vengeance to save us), it is how God chooses to put it through the prophet’s words. His being crushed is the winning of a victory for us in the only way it could be won.

It couldn’t have been won in the way Peter had imagined it. It couldn’t have been won with the Messiah living comfortably in this world, winning victories over Israel’s enemies, and whatever else they’d all imagined. No sins would have been paid for then. His death had to happen (as foreshadowed in the death of the Passover Lamb in Moses’ time—that lamb without blemish or defect whose blood saved the people from the judgment that had come upon those who were opposing God).

That’s what Jesus wanted Peter and the others to understand. God has everything firmly in hand. And the fact is, it isn’t how we would have imagined it. Right? Faith puts aside our own thinking about how everything seems like it should turn out, and holds instead to what God has said in His Word. Peter and his fellow disciples had a lesson to learn in that.

You have a lesson in it too. So do I. You, at times, have wanted faith to be God bending His will to whatever you thought should be the case. Sometimes, you might even have decided that whatever it says in His Word can’t really be the way things are. You have been Peter telling Jesus there’s no way things are going to be the way He’s said they’re going to be. Instead, they’re going to be your way.

That doubt of God’s Word is one of your sins (and mine) for which the Messiah had to suffer and die. It couldn’t have been any other way, even if we might wish it could have been. Rather than, “Far be it from you, Lord! This shall never happen to you”—Better for Peter and for us, to say, “Your will be done, LORD.” According that perfect will of God, the one without any doubt (or any other sin) has been put in the place of, and died for all sinners. There aren’t any more sins for you to be accused of in the judgment; because Jesus was accused of all of them, and made to pay for them at the cross.

And beyond those words so troubling to Peter, about Christ’s suffering and death are the ones that can bring true joy to your heart this morning. After the suffering and the killing that Jesus mentions, are the ones about Him rising from death. Take those words as a great comfort this morning because, having been forgiven of your sins in Christ’s sacrifice, you too will rise to be with Him. There isn’t any other way it could work out that would be better. God has it all worked out. It is worked out in the best possible way for you. God be praised. Amen.

Other Lessons This Week:

Isaiah 35:3-7

Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.”

Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer, and the tongue of the mute sing for joy. For waters break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; in the haunt of jackals, where they lie down, the grass shall become reeds and rushes.

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

St. Luke 18:31-43

Taking the twelve, [Jesus] said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written about the Son of Man by the prophets will be accomplished. For 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.” But they understood none of these things. This saying was hidden from them, and they did not grasp what was said.

As he drew near to Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. And hearing a crowd going by, he inquired what this meant. They told him, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.” And he cried out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” And those who were in front rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he cried out all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” And Jesus stopped and commanded him to be brought to him. And when he came near, he asked him, “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.” And immediately he recovered his sight and followed him, glorifying God. And all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.

John 8:21-29

So [Jesus] said to them again, “I am going away, and you will seek me, and you will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come.” So the Jews said, “Will he kill himself, since he says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?” He said to them, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins.” So they said to him, “Who are you?” Jesus said to them, “Just what I have been telling you from the beginning. I have much to say about you and much to judge, but he who sent me is true, and I declare to the world what I have heard from him.” They did not understand that he had been speaking to them about the Father. So Jesus said to them, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he, and that I do nothing on my own authority, but speak just as the Father taught me. And he who sent me is with me. He has not left me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to him.”

“Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.” Jesus says that at the end of our Gospel lesson, the one about the seed that was sown, landing in various kinds of soil. The seed represents the Gospel message—the good news of God’s saving of the world from sin and death. It goes out like seed flung from the hand of a sower, to some who reject it outright, like it was on a hard-packed path. And it goes out to some who receive it half-heartedly (finally putting it aside)—like it was in shallow, rocky soil. And it goes out to some who receive it more deeply, but finally let other things in this world replace it—like it was deeply set in weedy or thorny soil. And it goes out to some who treasure it unto eternal life—like it was in good soil.

Jesus wants everyone to be in that last group. He’s leading His listeners in the parable to (among other things) recognize what God is doing for them. He’s leading you, too.

His whole purpose for coming into this world was to say also to you, Where I am going, you can come. Even though you have fallen short of God’s glory, you won’t die in your sin; I have seen to it. I’ve performed perfectly in your place everything that was required of you; I’ve done it in full. My doing of it gets considered now as if you’d done it. God doesn’t have anything against you anymore. In Me, you have forgiveness and salvation. You are of My kingdom.

God’s Son came into this world according to an eternal plan to do all of that, and to make you aware of it. That’s what he wants to say to you. He wants you to know that God would have you in his kingdom, that the sacrifice Jesus has made is for you along with the rest of the world. All of that is what He whole-heartedly wants to say.

So, what Jesus has to say in our text is the opposite of what he really wants to say. He doesn’t want to tell anybody they’re going to die in their sin. He doesn’t want to tell people that where He’s going they can’t come. He doesn’t want it to be said of anyone that they’re of this corrupted, dying world rather than of His kingdom.

Since we know He doesn’t want to tell people they’ll die in their sins, or that where He’s going they can’t come, or that they’re of this world rather than His kingdom, one might rightfully ask, Why then? Why does He say it to people in our text? And…could there ever be a time in which He might say it to me?

We’ve already said He doesn’t want to (but that doesn’t really answer the question, does it?). That’s why it’s important that on this particular day in the Church Year, we talk about the precious nature of the Holy Scripture, of God’s Word of grace. You want to be comforted this morning. You want to know how God feels about you, what He’s done for you. There’s a way to know it.

When we’re talking about the things we get from Holy Scripture, one of the things we have to say is that we certainly get warned through the Holy Scripture. That’s one of its great purposes, and the gist of a lot of what’s said in our lessons this morning. We get warned through the Holy Scripture.

Jesus is certainly giving a warning through the parable in our Gospel lesson. Warning: You aren’t going to get the comfort you’re seeking, the assurance of God’s being graciously disposed toward you if His Word is prevented from penetrating your heart. It’s seed doesn’t penetrate the hard path, it penetrates very shallowly and briefly the rocky soil, it only temporarily penetrates the weedy/thorny soil.

If you’re to get comfort from God’s Word (which is what He wants for you to have), that Word has to find itself in a heart that receives it and rejoices in it, and treasures it. So, you’re warned through the Holy Scripture. It’s possible for the human heart to put up defenses against what God is trying to accomplish in it. To this, Jesus says, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.”

What He wants you to hear, He kind of makes clear from these words in our text: believe in Me. He wants you to hear the message of God’s grace (to be found in Him) and believe it. That doesn’t seem so hard, does it? I hope all of you believe in Jesus; I hope that’s why you’re here.

But when we talk about the hard path, the heart that says “a firm no” to anything other than what’s rational and reasonable—what can be seen, and demonstrated, and calculated, and verified: that’s your natural state. Your natural state is not to accept anything that must be believed. You inherited that from your first parents. They were that way after they sinned, so you’re that way according to your nature.

But that isn’t too big of a problem for God to solve. He declared the coming of a Savior right after the first sin. As for you, the Holy Spirit baptized you into that Savior’s death (or opened your heart through the preaching of the Word). Your hard-packed path turned to soil that can receive the sower’s seed, and bear fruit. You came to believe in God’s grace—believe that it is present for you in the atoning blood of the Christ.

Once again, we’re talking about the precious nature of the Holy Scripture, of God’s Word of grace. If you’re to get comfort from God’s Word (which is what He wants for you to have, and what you want to have), that Word has to find itself in a heart that receives it and rejoices in it, and treasures it. So Jesus warns,

don’t let your interaction with the Holy Scripture be shallow, casual, non-committal. And having made a firm commitment to it, don’t let other things replace it.

But you might ask,

Will God’s Word really be effective in changing even my hard heart that has many times been treacherous, that has many times deceived me, led me into sinful activity that offended God and added to my guilt and shame?

Will it be effective in answering my doubts (that finally aren’t all that different from those of the people Jesus is addressing in our text—the ones who will die in their sins, the ones who can’t come where He’s going, the ones who are of this corrupted, dying world rather than His kingdom)?

God answers it through the prophet’s words in our Old Testament lesson. He says, My word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. And then He goes on to talk about His people going out in joy, being led forth in peace, flourishing eternally.

Dear sinner who has come here this morning seeking God’s grace, who has come here to confess your sins, who has come here to find comfort and joy, recognize it to be flowing out to you this morning in the preaching of the Holy Scriptures. Recognize that these Scriptures are declaring the One Who says to you, Where I am going, you can come. He says it on the basis of His having been perfect under the Law in your place, and having made payment for every one of your sins with His blood on the cross. Recognize that these Scriptures are declaring the One Who says to you that you won’t die in your sin. He says it on that basis of His having risen from death—the very evidence that God has accepted His payment for your sins. Recognize that these Scriptures are declaring the One Who says to you that you are of His kingdom. After all, He is the very one who said,  In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also (John 14:2-3).

That’s what Jesus wants to say to you this morning. That’s what he’s leading you to recognize. God be praised. Amen.

Sermon— St Matthew 11:16-24

[Jesus said] “But to what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to their playmates,

“‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
    we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’

For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is justified by her deeds.”

Then he began to denounce the cities where most of his mighty works had been done, because they did not repent. “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum, will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I tell you that it will be more tolerable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you.”

We might say sometimes, that a person is impossible to impress. Even though the person is being shown important and interesting things, he or she always wants to see more, always wants something even more important or interesting. Impossible to impress.

Jesus is expressing frustration early in our text. It could be said that His listeners are impossible to impress, in the sense of hearing something important to them and accepting it. His illustration is for the purpose of making that point. They are like characters out of children’s song in the marketplace about whom a speaker laments that even having played the flute for his audience, he hasn’t been able to get them to dance. Having sung a dirge (or funeral song), he hasn’t been able to get them to mourn. What more can he do?—that’s kind of the idea. What will impress them?

Jesus points out that His audience’s inability to be impressed can be illustrated in the fact that John the Baptist’s stern adherence to the Law (illustrated in his not eating and drinking) offended them; they weren’t impressed with his not eating and drinking. Jesus’ more easygoing approach (illustrated in eating and drinking) still offended them. They cannot be impressed!

And their inability to be impressed is a real problem for them, considering what Jesus is trying to impress them with. He isn’t merely a flute player trying to make them dance, or a singer trying to make them mourn; He has something much more important for them. In fact, it’s so important that they face a real problem should the present situation continue. Jesus is talking about the day of judgment. God has been trying to impress upon them an urgency for some time. Jesus compares their city to notorious cities of the past (Tyre and Sidon, and Sodom), saying that as difficult to impress as those cities were, had they seen what these people have seen from Jesus’ ministry, they certainly would have been convinced. But these that Jesus is talking with now; they’re just not willing to hear what God is telling them.

The prophet Jeremiah was experiencing the same frustration in our Old Testament lesson. He knew what he was facing, being sent to speak to God’s people. “I don’t know how to speak,” he’d said to the LORD. The whole section is about the prophet receiving the encouragement he needs from the LORD so that he will no longer be afraid of the people to whom he’s supposed to speak. “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”—the LORD says to him. He needed that much encouragement. He needed the LORD to say a little later: I have put my words in your mouth.

He was facing the same apathy (if not outright hostility) from his would be listeners that Jesus is facing in our text. He would be speaking to a people that up to this point had seemed impossible to impress. Yet God is telling him in the lesson, “I have set you this day over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.” God will be with the prophet, giving him strength, and patience, and eloquence to bring His message to people not easily impressed, not easily accepting of the message they need.

Isn’t it the same sort of thing in our Epistle lesson? St. Paul is telling his readers, Don’t be like your forefathers in the wilderness who weren’t sufficiently impressed with the Gospel even though it was so near to them. God was present with them in the cloud—moving along with them on their journey from Egypt to the Land of Promise. He caused the sea to part before them so that they could escape pursuing Egyptian soldiers, and emerge dry and safe on the other side. They were eating and drinking the spiritual food from Christ Himself. Even with all of it they were impossible to impress. They were still bent on pursuing their own way to their destruction.

Will you be impossible to impress like they were; that’s kind of the question before you today, isn’t it? What could cause it to be so (you want to know so you can avoid it)?

A number of people are employed to work in a vineyard in our Gospel Lesson. The ones hired in the very beginning start out impressed, huh? The vineyard owner makes them an offer that gets their attention. He will sort of rescue them from idleness (sitting around in the marketplace), and pay them a certain amount that’s suitable to them (They’re excited about it in the beginning). They have been able to be impressed, or convinced that what’s been offered to them is to their good.

We could think about Baptism in that way (or about a person coming to faith through hearing the Word). Through Baptism, through the Word, the Holy Spirit, like that land owner, makes a certain offer to a sinner that gets his attention. God will forgive his sins because Jesus died for Him. Though he’s guilty of falling short of God’s glory, God will consider him innocent, fit for His eternal kingdom through this sacrifice Jesus has made for him. And that makes an impression on the person. He will cling to Christ for forgiveness and salvation. He is suitably impressed. What could ever get in the way of that?

You know that parable sees many more hired throughout the day, and equal payment made to all at the end (though these hired first have been there several hours more than others). All get the same. The ones who have been hired first, then, are angry because they think they deserve more.

We could say that they have come to a point at which they are no longer impressed. What has been given to them (that seemed great in the beginning) doesn’t seem so good anymore. They’ve become resentful of the treatment they are receiving, envious of others. They might even have begun to think of how nice it would be to have more of the world’s good things than they have had up to this point.

We asked, what could cause you to become impossible to impress like were Jesus’ audience? What could make you unwilling to hear God’s Word with a believing heart?

The long day in that parable, in which the workers were in the vineyard, can be compared to the long time of our lives in this world. St. Paul and the other apostles wrote letters to the congregations encouraging them in the Christian faith because of what happens to people during the course of long lives in this world.

You experience all sorts of things, don’t you? You might have experiences like those earliest hired workers in the parable, that make you envious of others, unsatisfied with what God has provided for you in this life. You might have been affected by tragic events that caused you to question God’s love for you. You might have become tired of feeling like an outsider in this world, as it moves further away from God’s purpose and will, and thought sometimes, why can’t I decide for myself on things? Every moment of your life God has been trying to impress upon you an urgency, that you repent of your sins, and believe in the grace He provides in Christ. But all of those things we just mentioned have gotten in the way of it.

Any time you have heard God’s powerful Word and been clinging instead to envy of others, doubting of God’s love, desiring to be able to embrace the world’s ungodliness, Jesus could rightly have said of you, that Tyre’s, and Sidon’s, and Sodom’s ability to be suitably impressed by God’s Word was greater than yours. You could have been among those of God’s people in the wilderness—the ones with whom He wasn’t pleased, and who were overthrown there. You could have been among Jeremiah’s audience of whom he was so afraid.

But praise be to God, you have a Savior from all of it. In the eyes of the Divine Judge Jesus became known as the one impossible to impress. He became your envy and dissatisfaction. He became your doubt. He became your worldliness. He became it in the sense that your charges were applied to Him instead of you. He offered Himself in your place, so that you might have what He always had—innocence, perfection before God. You needed it in order to be in heaven.

He distributes it to you this morning at the altar in Holy Communion. He earned it for you at the cross; but here, at the altar He gives it to you to place upon your lips—this payment made for your salvation.

You were suitably impressed in your Baptism or in your hearing of God’s Word. The Spirit impressed upon you that you’re a sinner in need of God’s grace. He put faith in your heart; faith that clings to Christ for forgiveness and salvation.

You tread a long path in this world day by day, though. You’re tempted to leave it all behind, grabbing instead the world’s approval, the world’s possessions, the world’s point of view. So, your Savior feeds you here each week. He invites you over and over, to come to Him and have God’s grace and His kingdom. And it will be worth the wait. It will be worth the struggle. Amen.

Jeremiah 1:4-10

The Word of the LORD came to me, saying, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

Then I said, “Ah, LORD GOD! Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth.”

But the LORD said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am only a youth’; for to all to whom I send you, you shall go, and whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you, declares the LORD.” Then the LORD put out his hand and touched my mouth. And the LORD said to me, “Behold, I have put my words in your mouth. See, I have set you this day over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.”

1 Corinthians 9:24–10:5

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. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.

For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.

St Matthew 20:1-16

[Jesus said], “The kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And going out about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the marketplace, and to them he said, ‘You go into the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you.’ So they went. Going out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour, he did the same. And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing. And he said to them, ‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You go into the vineyard too.’

And when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last, up to the first.’ And when those hired about the eleventh hour came, each of them received a denarius. Now when those hired first came, they thought they would receive more, but each of them also received a denarius. And on receiving it they grumbled at the master of the house, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’

But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? Take what belongs to you and go. I choose to give to this last worker as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?’ So the last will be first, and the first last.”

St. Luke 6:1-10

On a Sabbath, while [Jesus] was going through the grainfields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath?” And Jesus answered them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?” And he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.”

On another Sabbath, he entered the synagogue and was teaching, and a man was there whose right hand was withered. And the scribes and the Pharisees watched him, to see whether he would heal on the Sabbath, so that they might find a reason to accuse him. But he knew their thoughts, and he said to the man with the withered hand, “Come and stand here.” And he rose and stood there. And Jesus said to them, “I ask you, is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to destroy it?” And after looking around at them all he said to him, “Stretch out your hand.” And he did so, and his hand was restored.

Dear Fellow Redeemed:

One of the hymns for this Epiphany Season says:                                                                (Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary #200)

2 But they who have always resisted His grace
And on their own virtue depended,
Shall then be condemned and cast out from His face,
Eternally lost and unfriended.
Have mercy upon us, O Jesus!

And then, in the next verse:

3 O may we all hear when our Shepherd doth call,
In accents persuasive and tender,
That while there is time we make haste one and all
And find Him, our mighty Defender.
Have mercy upon us, O Jesus!

These verses set out pretty nicely the main issue in this text. The first one talks about a person depending on his own virtue in order to be acceptable to God (the consequence is that he’s condemned and cast out from God’s face). He has tried to do what doesn’t work; he has depended upon the corrupted virtue he has rather than upon the grace God has offered. The second of the verses talks about what does work—hearing the persuasive and tender call of the Shepherd, our mighty Defender. Having the defense of that Shepherd is what God accepts as the righteousness for sinners.

The Pharisees were some of the peoples’ religious leaders in Jesus’ day, of course. Jesus had recently angered them by telling someone He was healing, that his sins were forgiven. Only God can do that, they’d said. Then, more recently, the Pharisees had demanded to know why theirs and John’s disciples fast, but Jesus’ disciples eat and drink. In response, He’d given them an answer that indicated there’s a new era afoot.

They were concerned about doing things God’s people had been told to do in preparation for the Messiah’s coming. Now that He was here, those things could be compared to taking a piece from a new garment and putting it on an old garment. The new has replaced the old; the two things don’t belong together.

In our text there’s this same conflict. In a changing time—that of God’s Messiah coming among the people, the Pharisees are still clinging to what was important before, but now has passed, and refusing to embrace the One Whose coming was always intended to replace those things. In addition, they are making the obeying of those former things what makes them righteous before God rather than the Savior He has provided for that purpose.

The conflict plays out this time on an occasion in which Jesus’ disciples are doing a very practical thing; they’re picking heads of grain as they walk through a field, and eating. The Pharisees’ issue is that it’s happening on the Sabbath (of course, no work was to be done on that day). To them, it gets even more outrageous on another Sabbath (also talked about in the text), when a man with a withered hand is in the Synagogue while Jesus is teaching. The Pharisees have made a habit of looking for things like that. They see that man there, and they say to themselves, I wonder whether Jesus, on this Sabbath will once again commit an act that is unlawful, whether He will once again, work on the Sabbath.

Let’s remind ourselves again of the issue in this text; it’s, How will a person be justified before God; how will a person be saved? Will it be in resisting grace and depending on his own virtue; or in hearing the Shepherd’s persuasive and tender call and finding Him the mighty Defender?

It would be the former as far as the Pharisees are concerned; it would be their own virtue. They would be saved by not preparing food for themselves on Sabbaths. They would be saved by trying to prevent Jesus from healing someone on the Sabbath. In their minds the law is the only priority. It is so absolute, that even if someone is suffering, one doesn’t find any exception in it. They have added to its burden things God didn’t even intend in it.

Look how Jesus says otherwise in this text. When He asks them the question, Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to destroy it?—He’s making an important point about the law’s purpose. The Sabbath law’s purpose isn’t to prevent someone from getting needed help. Ignoring suffering breaks the even more important law of love. God wouldn’t want that. The Sabbath law’s good purpose was to give rest to people and direct them to the spiritual rest that God intended for them to receive in the hearing of His Word. It was to give them in that weekly observance a foretaste of the eternal rest that comes in God’s kingdom. From God’s perspective, helping someone in need certainly shouldn’t have been considered working on the Sabbath (neither should a hungry person in unusual circumstances preparing something for himself to eat). And who would know that more than the Messiah Himself, anyway?

Look how in our lessons for today, this idea of anything we would do ourselves in order to be justified before God is absent in favor of what is truly important. In the OT lesson we are exulting the one who clothes me with the garments of salvation, who has covered me with the robe of righteousness [the isn’t myself; it’s God’s Messiah Who was perfect in my place who Who died for my sins]; in the epistle lesson, the celebrated prophetic Word is about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ [not anything in us]; He is the one who is transfigured in our Gospel Lesson, demonstrating that He is God’s anointed, the Lamb of God Who takes away the sin of the world.

What a good reminder for us to today about what’s really important—because we, like the Pharisees, have a strong sense of the way things should be, don’t we? The fact is, they didn’t like to see people getting away with things. There were laws, and they wanted them followed. Don’t you talk like that sometimes? I do. Laws are important. But laws don’t save anyone. To some degree and in some way you have broken every law you would accuse someone else of breaking. The Commandments aren’t given for other peoples’ benefit; they’re for you. They’re to demonstrate to you how you’ve fallen short of God’s requirements. In so far as you, like the Pharisees, have insisted on the keeping of laws at the expense of mercy and love, you have demonstrated your own breaking of what Jesus called the greatest commandment in the law. Laws don’t save anyone.

Glory be to God, that He has provided the Mighty Defender who calls [you] in accents persuasive and tender. Jesus—the Messiah is the only one of us Who has measured up to the law’s requirements. Since this is so, when He gave up His life for you on a cross, God accepted it as payment for your sins (we know it’s the case because He rose from death victorious). Jesus became for you, the hypocrite who imposed the law on others while not keeping it Himself. It was your sin; but He took it upon Himself so that being punished for it, you could be made innocent through Him.

How will you be justified before God; how will you be saved?

God’s grace will save you. He offers it to you in this moment as you hear the Shepherd’s persuasive and tender call. You hear it in this preaching of His Spirit-filled Word. You find in it the One Who defends you from the accusations of the evil one. Those accusations are real. They really reflect your unworthiness before God. But the charges are no longer yours; they belong now to the One Who took them from you and put them on Himself. Instead, the perfection that He is has been put on you, so that you stand before God on the Last Day without any spot or stain. No charge convicts you. No law points out any sin that still belongs to you. It is removed. And you are saved. Amen.

Other Lessons this week:

Isaiah 61:10-11

I will greatly rejoice in the Lord;
    my soul shall exult in my God,
for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation;
    he has covered me with the robe of righteousness,
as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress,
    and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.

For as the earth brings forth its sprouts,
    and as a garden causes what is sown in it to sprout up,
so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise
    to sprout up before all the nations.

2 Peter 1:16-21

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain. And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

St. Matthew 17:1-9

And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light. And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. And Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good that we are here. If you wish, I will make three tents here, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah.” 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.” When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified. But 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.

And as they were coming down the mountain, Jesus commanded them, “Tell no one the vision, until the Son of Man is raised from the dead.”