Don't Be Surprised

Texts: Psalm 116; John 15:18 - 16:11; 16:33

THREE OR FOUR WEEKS ago I decided to preach today on the theme, "In this world you will have trouble. But be of good courage, I [Jesus] have overcome the world." I use the New International Version for my personal devotions, and "trouble" is how it translated the Greek here in verse 16:33. And after the events in Japan this past week, I thought that it'd be more appropriate than ever to preach on the whys and wherefores of the trouble and disasters that comes to us in this world, especially when it seems to contradict our belief in an all-powerful and all-good God.


But the Scripture has a way of speaking for itself, and when I looked closer at this passage in John, I had to admit that the "trouble" Jesus is speaking of isn't things like earthquakes and tsunamis and bankruptcy and cancer, terrible as those things are. It's the tribulation and persecution that will certainly come to those who belong to and identify with Jesus Christ.

I mentioned last Sunday the sort of comments that were coming up online, in response to videos of the destruction in Japan. Comments where people were using this tragedy as a soapbox from which to deny and blaspheme God and insult His believing people. Examples? "Your god is a fairy tale." "I don't believe in a sky monster that causes disasters." "You're a schizophrenic primitive-minded retard who's still living in the dark ages." "Your Jesus story doesn't make any sense." "Stop praying, start helping." And so on. I've been online since 1998 or so, and it seems to me that this sort of thing is getting worse and worse. Used to be, if someone disagreed with another person's religious position, they'd keep their mouths shut about it. Or at least have an honest go at proving why the religious person was wrong. But more and more, the vitriol, nastiness, and just plain hatred leveled at Christian believers is unveiled, aggressive, and totally unapologetic.

But should we be surprised? Not at all. John records in chapter 15, verse 8 of his gospel that Jesus said this to His disciples, the night He was betrayed: "If the world hates you, be aware that it hated me before it hated you." In fact, we should feel more surprised and worried if we never get any trouble for being a Christian, for then we might need to question our identity in Christ.

Jesus says that the world hated Him before it hated us. First, maybe we should define this word, "world." After all, doesn't John 3:16 say, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life"? Yes, Jesus said that there. But let's keep in mind that that "world" is all the lost, rebellious, God-hating sinners that love darkness rather than light, the world that needed the blood of the Son of God to be shed before even one of us could be called out of darkness into God's marvellous light. "The world" is the whole manmade system of thinking and believing that denies God and sets up thousands of idols rather than bow the knee to Him. It's the evil urge in all of us that says "Me first!" and be damned-- yes, damned-- to anyone who gets in our way.

Last Sunday evening, I was participating in an online conversation on Facebook. One friend, who's the mother of four, posted this statement: " . . . the most destructive force on the planet is not a tornado, tsunami or earthquake, it's a 16 month old human child."

Well, some people sympathized--we know how one-year-olds can be--and one aunt Expressed Astonishment that anyone could imply such a thing about her adorable nephew. But one friend wrote a comment that simply said, "Too soon."

Too soon to be minimizing the tragedy unfolding in Japan by saying that it takes a back seat to the depredations of one's destructive toddler. Too soon, while post-tsunami victims were perhaps taking their last despairing breaths under the wreckage; too soon, while survivors were numbly searching for lost loved ones, while the crises at the nuclear plants grew worse and worse. Surely, to liken all that pain and horror to the rampages of a self-willed infant was bad taste at best and cold-hearten unkindness to the people of Japan at worst.

But that very spirit of rebellion that's frustrating but cute in a toddler is the same heart of sin that erupts in hatred of God and persecution of His Church. Jesus says, "If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world-- therefore the world hates you."

Remember, now we are in Christ. We are identified with Him, as He has identified Himself with us. He is our Elder Brother, our greatest of Friends, and our Master. If you have trouble in this world because you belong to Jesus, don't be surprised. As He reminds us, "Remember the word that I said to you, ‘Servants are not greater than their master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you."

But it hasn't seemed to be that way, not here in America, at least. For a long time in the 19th and 20th centuries, if you were a nice, respectable, middle or upper class person and you weren't Jewish, you were considered to be a Christian. And that was a good thing. In fact, you weren't considered a good candidate for certain jobs or offices if you couldn't claim membership in some church or other. And we all believed in God and Jesus Christ (or we thought everyone did) and when it comes down to it, maybe a lot of us believed in God and Jesus Christ because we thought everyone did.

But now it's getting harder. Now we're encountering more people we know and even like who think Christianity is silly or even dangerous. Now our faith has to be in Jesus, and not in the idea that society in general believes.

There in the Upper Room, Jesus was preparing the Eleven for the fact that life was not going to be easy when He's gone. And if it wasn't easy for them, in a way, it's even harder for us. For unlike them, we have never physically seen, heard, and touched Him. What we know, however, is that we have been marked with His name; He has put His new life into us and we are His. So now, let's not be surprised when the world treats us badly, for it only proves they neither know Christ nor the One who sent Him.

And there's no excuse for it. Just because everything Jesus said and did is in the past does not mean He didn't do them or that they're no longer true. The Son of God was born into this world to manifest the power and glory of the Father in this world. He did this in everything He did and in every word He spoke. Those who complain, "Your Jesus story doesn't make sense" really mean "it doesn't fit in with my desire to be the god of my own life." For such people, the existence of God is the most inconvenient thing there could be. And we, as symbols of the risen Christ, get in their way just by existing.

But, you might say, not everyone denies there's a God. Most people do hold to the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of humanity, right? And even if they don't believe in Jesus, they're still on our side, yes?

Well, actually, no. Jesus Himself is the touchstone, the definition of what it means to have faith in the one true God. If you're going to talk about God the Father, it's crucial we make sure we're talking about the One, True, and Living God, not some idol we've made up in our heads. God is triune, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You can't have God as your Father if Jesus is not the Brother who saved you, first. Our Lord says in verse 23, "Whoever hates me hates my Father as well." He proved He was the Son of God by the miracles He did, and after this teaching, in four short days, He would prove it conclusively by rising from the dead. If He hadn't done all this, people might have some excuse, "But now," Jesus says, "they have seen and hated both me and my Father."

But doesn't that raise the question, what about people who have never heard about Christ? The hidden assumption goes something like, "God isn't being fair to those other people, therefore I don't have to believe in Him." The real question is, What about you now that you have heard? And if you have heard and believed and you're concerned about the heathen (or so you say), what might God want you to do for them so they can hear?

Don't be surprised when the people of this world come up with every excuse they can to reject Christ and ridicule you for your faith in Him. And do not fear when it comes time to testify to what Jesus has done on your behalf. For that is the job of the Holy Spirit, the Advocate. He's your crack attorney when the world tries to put you in the dock for the offense of the cross. He gives witness to the truth of Jesus and in His power, you and I can testify to Jesus, too.

The Holy Spirit speaking through the Scriptures reminds us what "testifying on Jesus' behalf" means. It's all about the cross, how the Lord of life was slain to give eternal life to sinners like me and you. If we go telling people they should come to Jesus because believing in Him will make their earthly existence all comfortable and easy, we deserve every bit of ridicule we get from the pagan world. It amounts to taking the Lord's name in vain, for He never promised that being His servant would be comfortable or easy. When disaster comes and people mock that false sugar-daddy god, we shouldn't be surprised. As we shouldn't be surprised when people reject the message that they need a Saviour from their sin. That's going to happen, so Jesus warns us ahead of time, so we will not stumble when rejection comes.

And we need to be warned that the most painful rejection will come from people who seemed to be fellow-Christians. For the disciples, the fiercest and most tragic persecution came from their fellow-Jews, the ones who were the most religious, the ones who would have claimed they had the best interests of God's people at heart. It's the same for us today. In the March/April issue of Modern Reformation, Reformed pastor Fletcher Matandika, from Malawi, writes an open letter to the North American churches, lamenting our shallow refusal to contend for the faith once delivered to the saints. He writes, "A few years ago, an older minister from a mainline denomination who had reached retirement age lamented as we talked. ‘Fletcher,' [the pastor said], ‘I cannot preach about sin in my congregation. People get mad at me and they would walk out of the church if I did that.'" If it's difficult for us pastors, how much harder it will be for you. People who claim the name of Christ will call you narrowminded and bigoted for upholding the standards of Scripture. They'll tell you we know more today about Jesus' identity and mission than Jesus knew Himself-- and they'll say it in the name of God. As Jesus said to the Eleven, "They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, an hour is coming when those who kill you will think that by doing so they are offering worship to God."

This happened literally to most of the disciples. I pray the Lord will spare us and it will not come to the shedding of our blood. In many parts of the world, you know, it does. And if you truly are in Christ, your heart will bleed over what the world says about Him and about you for the sake of His name. "But I have said these things to you so that when their hour comes you may remember that I told you about them." Don't be surprised!

And do not fear. The Holy Spirit is with you, helping you to withstand whatever the world may throw your way. The world may mock and ridicule and deny, but the Spirit exposes the guilt of the world. The fact that they rejected the Son of God when He came proves their sin. The fact that Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven proves His righteousness. And the fact of His triumph proves that Satan has already been judged.

The world will do whatever it can to deny the witness of the Spirit about Jesus Christ. Indeed, they cannot receive His message, for their minds are darkened by their own rebellion and wilfulness. So do not be surprised if the world hates you, for it hated Jesus first.

Rather, be of good courage. Jesus Christ took your sin and bore its penalty in His own body. Testify to that fact, whenever the Spirit leads you. Pray for those who persecute you-- the Lord saved us, and He is able to save whomever He chooses to call. In this world, we will face persecution. But be of good heart and stand strong, for Jesus our Lord has overcome the world.

This Little Word 'In'

Texts: Ephesians 1:1-14; John 14:8-21

I, N-- IN. SUCH A LITTLE WORD, YOU MIGHT overlook it. Insignificant, really.

But ask a junior high girl if it matters what crowd she belongs to, she'll tell you this word ‘in' is a matter of life or social death.

Ask the product designer who has to gauge what people are likely to buy. His game or car or cell phone had better line up with what's in-- or his working life could be in its way out.

Or think of a person who's starving. Is ‘in' a meaningless word to one who more than anything needs food in him? For him, that word ‘in' is a question of life or death.

Our New Testament was written in Greek, and in that language ‘in' in a very little word, too. It's epsilon, nu: en, and even Greek readers might not be blamed if they happened to overlook it in the midst of all the bigger, more important-looking words on the page. But this little Greek word ‘en,' and its English translation ‘in,' means eternal life to sinners like me and you.

Still, we can find this little word ‘in' to be confusing. In our reading from the 14th chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, our Lord Jesus is speaking to His closest disciples the night before He will be crucified. We can expect that every word of this farewell address will be especially important. But then we get to verse 13, where it says, "Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me." And we have verse 20, where Jesus says, "On that day you will realize that I am in the Father, and you are in me, and I am in you." And the temptation is to say, "Wait, what? Jesus, you're saying that you're in the Father and the Father's in you and we're in you and the Spirit's in us and how can anyone keep this straight?" So we gloss over those parts and jump down to verse 23 where Jesus says, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching." Active obedience, that we can understand. All this about who's in whom and one being in the other, that's too hard.

But if we'll take the time to unravel what our Lord is saying, we'll find that this little word ‘in' invites us to enjoy everything our God is and everything He has for us, in this world and the world to come.

From the very beginning of this fourteenth chapter of John's gospel, Jesus has been teaching His disciples that they should identify Him with God the Father. They should trust Him as they trust God. He is leaving them, He says, but that's so he can prepare them a place in His Father's house. He's told them that He is the only way to the Father. He says that if they really knew Him, they'd know the Father as well. And He has good news for them: "From now on," says Jesus, "you do know him and have seen him."

But the disciples can't imagine how they possibly could have seen the Father. So, Philip speaks up and says, "Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us."

Philip thinks Jesus is saying they can see the Father in Him the same way we speak of seeing God in the beauty of a sunset or in the power of a thunderstorm. But if Jesus is going away, Philip and the others want a more direct vision of the Person of God. Like Moses in the book of Exodus, they want actually to lay their eyes on Him, if only for a little while. Moses got a one-time view of God's glory, and that gave him the strength to go on as the leader of Israel. So if only Jesus would bring the disciples that same sort of divine vision, it'd be enough to help them endure after He's gone.

They failed to see who Jesus really was. And how blind we can be today! Even people who claim to be ministers of the Gospel believe and preach that Jesus came to point us to God, but that He wasn't actually God Himself. But Jesus has patience with Philip as I pray He will have mercy on us. He says, "Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father." They'd lost the truth in plain sight! The whole point of Jesus' ministry, the whole object of all His preaching and teaching and miracles, was to demonstrate that He, Jesus, was God in human flesh. Not merely a messenger or a herald, but God Himself. To see Jesus was and is to behold God!

Therefore Jesus asks all His disciples, including us, "Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?" To say that they are in one another is to say that this Man Jesus and the eternal God are totally identified with one another. What one is, the other is. What one has, the other has. What one does, the other does. So when Jesus promises you eternal life, He can give it, because He is the God of Life. When He promises that His Holy Spirit will lead you into all truth, He can keep that promise, because He is the divine Word of Truth. When He says that anyone who has faith in Him will do even greater things than the miracles He did, He can make that happen, because He is in the Father and the Father is in Him, continually working the power of God in this world.

For this purpose He sent us the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is our Counselor, our Paraclete-- literally, the One who comes alongside us. But it gets better than that. For as Jesus promises in verse 17, "You know Him, for he lives with you and is in you." There it is again, that little word ‘in'! The Spirit, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, is God in us, leading us into the life of divine truth and growing us in the truth of divine life.

Jesus a few days later will prove that He has the power of divine life when He rises from the dead. He says, "Before long, the world will not see me any more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. On that day"-- after He has been raised, after the Spirit has been given-- "you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you."

"I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you."

But how can that be? Hasn't Jesus asserted that He and the eternal God are totally identified with one another? What one is, the other is. What one has, the other has. What one does, the other does. How can this be true for us and God? God is eternal and infinite; we are finite and mortal. God is perfectly holy, righteous, and true; we are impure, sinful, and false. God is self-sufficient life, uncreated, in need of nothing; we are dependent on Him for the least operation of the molecules of our cells. How can we be identified with God the Son, so that it can be said that we are in Him and He is in us?

Maybe it's just a subjective thing. Like the way we might identify with a hero in a movie or a novel. That hero inspires us, we try to be like him, and that makes us more heroic and better people. Same with Jesus, right?

Actually, no. It takes more than our emotions and imaginations for us to be in Christ and for Christ to be in us. It took Him a lot more, the breaking of His body and the shedding of His blood. St. Paul writes in the seventh verse of the first chapter of his letter to the Ephesians, "In him"-- that is, in Jesus-- "we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins." We are in Christ because He has redeemed us on the cross. As Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5, God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself. He identified with us in our sin and took the punishment for it in His own body. And having paid the price totally and forever, He identifies us with Him before the Father, and identifies Himself with us in the world. He credits us with His righteousness and holiness and imparts to us His life, wisdom, and joy. So that in Him and through Him, we can participate in the eternal blessed life of God. Verse 3 of our Ephesians passage says the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has blessed us with every spiritual blessing. How? Where? In Christ! There's that little word ‘in' again, that word that means so much. "For," Paul says, "he"-- that is, God-- "chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight." In Christ we were predestined to share the holy and blameless life of God! In love He planned for us to be adopted as His sons through Jesus Christ! Again, in verse 6, God has freely given us His glorious grace, in the One he loves-- that is, in Jesus the Son of God, who is in the Father as the Father is in Him. In, in, in!

And He has made known to us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure, which He purposed in Christ. We fret and mourn over the evil and disasters that happen in this world, and it can be a total mystery how God will work it all out, or whether He's working it out at all. But in Christ, we can trust that the day will come when all will reach its fulfillment, and all things in heaven and on earth will be brought together under the one headship of Jesus Christ our Lord. In Him we have also been made heirs of God, so that we ourselves might be to the praise of His glory. The glorious riches that belong to God's eternal Son now are coming to us, too, because when the Father sees Christ, He sees us in Him as well.

So how did this happen? Was it because we were more virtuous or deserving than other people? Not at all. Rather, we were included in Christ when we heard the word of truth, the gospel of salvation. The proof and seal of our salvation is the presence of the Holy Spirit in us, commending to us the truth of Jesus Christ and what He did that we might be saved. For as Paul writes, "You were marked in him"-- in Christ-- "with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession, to the praise of his glory."

You are God's possession! The Son of God who is in the Father lives in you and you live in Him! Even in this time of Lent, when we consider soberly what it cost Jesus to redeem us, let us also praise God and give Him glory for the love and grace He lavished on us in His Son, that we might be saved.

It would be wrong of me to conclude without saying something about the disastrous earthquake and tsunami in Japan day before yesterday. You may have seen video footage of the seaside towns being overwhelmed by that raging black wave, that took boats, buildings, vehicles, and people before it. I watched these videos on the Internet, and it was agonizing to see doom flooding in to overtake these poor victims.

But equally chilling and horrifying was reading the comments many people were leaving on these clips. People were making racist jokes. Others were self-righteously opining that the Japanese "deserved" this because they still have a whaling industry. Still others, worst of all, were using this disaster as an excuse to blaspheme God and insult His faithful people.

Are the Japanese worse sinners than any others, that this tsunami overtook them? Were the people of Christchurch, New Zealand, worse than any, or the inhabitants of Chile, or Haiti, or Chicago in this winter's snowstorms, or anyone to whom natural disaster occurs? No, not at all. We are all equally guilty before our holy God. And by some cause or another, physical death will come to all of us someday, and for some of us, as for the people on the coast of Japan, death may come suddenly and soon.

When it does, may we be found in Christ, that we may eternally share every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms. May we already be at home with God, as Jesus promises in John's gospel, because by His grace Jesus has made His home in us. But if we refuse to be in Christ, if in our pride and wickedness we insist on remaining outside of Him, there remains no hope for us, only everlasting destruction.

‘In' is such a little word, but it holds a world of meaning when the One we are in is Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen King of heaven and earth. To be outside Him is death and disaster; to be in Him means communion with God and life and blessing forever more. Amen.

The Lord of the Covenant

Texts: Deuteronomy 27:9-13, 28:1-14; Matthew 5:1-12

A FEW YEARS AGO, WHEN I WAS a full time pastor, I got a strange call one day from a man who wanted to know about our church. I got the definite feeling that he wasn't really interested in attending, rather, he was checking to see if our doctrine and practices were orthodox; at least, from his point of view. He seemed more or less satisfied with the answers I gave, until he asked, "What Bible do you have in your pews?"

"The New International Version," I told him.

"What?" he cried, "You don't use the King James Version!?"

"No," I replied. "The King James Version was good for its time, but now we have so many other better translations that are more faithful to the original Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic."

"What do Hebrew and Greek have to do with the Scriptures!?" my caller challenged me.

I said, "Sir, the Bible was originally written in those languages. Jesus Himself preached and taught in Aramaic and maybe in Greek. The Apostles and Evangelists all wrote in Greek."

The man had his back up now. He said, "Well, my Bible has nothing to do with Greek and Hebrew. Those are the languages of unbelievers. The only true Bible is the King James Bible. Jesus had nothing to do with any Greek or Hebrew or any pagan languages like that! And if you and your church believe otherwise, you're a false church and a false minister!"

Well, if he had no concept of history, we were at a stalemate. I told him I had to go and rung off. And no, I never heard from this King-James-only crusader again. But I tell you this story to illustrate how easy it is for us 21st century Americans to imagine that the customs and practices of our Biblical era spiritual ancestors were just like ours and what we're used to. When we open our Bibles, if something in there sounds like something we do today, we often take it for granted that it's the same thing we do, and we interpret the word according to what is familiar to us.

Our passage from the Gospel According to St. Matthew is an example of this. The scripture begins, "Now when he [that is, Jesus] saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him, and he began to teach them."

So, looking through our modern eyes, we think, "Here's Jesus giving a open-air sermon, and his disciples are listening." Right? We all know what preaching is. You hear it every Sunday. You're hearing it right now, today. Maybe the sermon will have something to apply to your life, maybe not, but in the end it's just a sermon. You don't expect it to radically change your whole relationship with God.

But listen with the ears of the disciples who heard Jesus' words that day, and you'll realize there was a lot more going on on that mountainside that just words from a rabbi preacher's mouth. What Jesus proclaimed that day was nothing less than the inauguration of New Covenant with His people, promised for centuries by the prophets of old. And those who are bound under that covenant, both then and now, will never be the same.

To understand this, we need to know something about the Old Covenant that the Lord God made with Israel through Moses back in the days when He brought them out of Egypt with an outstretched hand and mighty arm and made them His own, the covenant that Israel ratified when God led them into the Promised Land under Joshua.

Everything about our God is wonderful, but one of the most wonderful, to my mind, is the way He chose to manifest Himself through the everyday customs and practices of His chosen people and of the world around them. Around the time Jehovah God was freeing the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, some nations in the ancient Near East were using a covenant form called a suzerainty treaty. If you were a minor king or nation was threatened with destruction by some more powerful enemy, a greater king and lord might send his forces to rescue you and your people. The fact that you needed to be saved proved that you couldn't survive and thrive on your own, and now that the great king had delivered you, he made a treaty with you to be your suzerain, your overlord, and you agreed to be his vassal. In the treaty he'd agree to keep on protecting and helping your nation, in return for good behavior and just tribute from you..

So our God chose to use this suzerainty treaty form when He made His old covenant through Moses with His newborn people Israel. There are elements of this treaty form displayed in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, but the most complete setting out of the treaty between God and Israel is the entire book of Deuteronomy. In Deuteronomy we have all the articles and stipulations that were typical in the treaties between human suzerains and their vassals. God first identifies Himself as the Maker, Initiator, and Lord of the covenant, promising to be Israel's God and to have them as His people. Then He reminds Israel of everything He has done for them to save them. Next He sets out His laws and requirements for their conduct as His people, which they are expected to ratify. God the covenant Lord then lays down blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience, and concludes with rules for the administration, preservation, and perpetuation of the covenant. This all was for Israel's good and for God's glory.

We see God as the Lord of the covenant in Deuteronomy chapter 27, verse 9, where it says:

"Then Moses and the priests, who are Levites, said to all Israel, ‘Be silent, O Israel, and listen! You have now become the people of the LORD your God. Obey the LORD your God and follow his commands and decrees that I give you today.'"

Moses then commands the people to reaffirm and re-ratify the covenant when they have crossed the Jordan. The tribes are to remind themselves and each other of the blessings for obedience and of the curses for disobedience. We did not read verses 14 through 26, where the ratification curses are laid out, because today I wanted us to focus on the Old Covenant blessings and compare them with the blessings of the New Covenant that Jesus pronounces in the Sermon on the Mount.

Deuteronomy 28 begins, "If you fully obey the LORD your God and carefully follow all his commands I give you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations on earth. All these blessings will come upon you and accompany you if you obey the LORD your God." If you obey, you will get these blessings. As it says in Leviticus 18:5, "Keep my decrees and laws, for the man who obeys them will live by them." Which is not to say, "he will conduct his life according to them." Rather, by keeping God's decrees and laws the obedient person will inherit life and health and material prosperity. The blessings of the Old Covenant are conditional on the people's obedience. If you do this, God will do that.

Moreover, the blessings of the Old Covenant usually were material. Successful childbearing for mothers and fertility for the domestic beasts. Plentiful food. Safety at home and on the road. Protection from and conquest of Israel's enemies. Success in farming and business. Respect and fear from the other nations of the earth. This was God's will for Israel in their day. These material blessings were how they could learn what a gracious, loving Lord Jehovah was. They would demonstrate to other nations the greatness of Israel's God, and show that He was supreme over all the earth.

Now that we know what we're dealing with, the New Covenant that Jesus inaugurates in His sermon on the Mount at first seems like the same sort of thing. Matthew records that Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." And, "Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted." Those aren't material blessings, exactly, but they're blessings in our everyday lives! Isn't Jesus promising that when we're feeling down or when we've lost a loved one, everything will be all right? And when He says, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled" and "Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy," doesn't that depend on our obedience? Isn't He telling us to try harder to be good, so we'll get the promised blessings?

But look again. There is a definite and radical difference in the blessings of the Old Covenant and the blessings of the New. The Old Covenant says, "If you fully obey . . . you will be blessed." But the New Covenant says, "Blessed are those who are" poor in spirit, who mourn, who are meek, who hunger and thirst for righteousness, who are merciful, and so on. The New Covenant assumes that those included within it already are keeping it and so they are already blessed.

But look again at the picture of blessedness! See who it is whom Jesus describes as blessed. The humble, the lowly. Those who don't insist on justice to themselves, but instead show mercy. Those who are persecuted for standing up for the righteousness of God. Look at the rewards the New Covenant promises! Hardly a material advantage on the list. Who can say they truly desire these blessings? Who of us can truly aspire to this state of godly humility, or say we've come anywhere close to achieving it? "Blessed are those who are poor in spirit, mourning, meek, peacemakers, persecuted," preaches our Lord. But we are proud, boastful, mindless of what is right, often merciless, quick to argue, and we prefer to avoid danger and persecution. We say we want comfort, righteousness, the sight of God, the kingdom of heaven, and all the other covenant advantages, but we want them on our own terms and according to our own definition.

There is only one Man who ever lived who can join with God in this New Covenant, and that Man is Jesus Christ Himself. He made Himself a servant, a vassal for our sakes. He identified Himself with our helpless state when we were besieged by sin, death, and the devil. He enters into covenant fellowship with God for us, and through Him and in Him, we enter into the blessings of the New Covenant as well.

But at the same time, our Lord Jesus is our sovereign covenant Lord. He says in verse 11, "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me." As He preaches the rest of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus goes on to lay out the covenant requirements, even to lay out covenant curses, and again and again we hear, "But I tell you . . . " At the conclusion, the people are amazed, because He spoke out of His own authority, not citing others as the rabbis did. Jesus had and has every right to do this, because He is our covenant Lord.

The Sermon on the Mount is not just another religious talk and Jesus of Nazareth was not just another rabbi. The Beatitudes are not words to live by; rather, they point us to Jesus, who is both the perfect humble covenant vassal and the mighty covenant Lord. He ratified this everlasting treaty in the blood of His cross, where He rescued us from destruction and raised us up with Him to reign with Him in His kingdom. By the waters of baptism we are brought into His covenant, and by the bread and wine of Holy Communion He reaffirms it to us every time we partake of the sacred meal.

So, blessed is Jesus, the poor in spirit, for His is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed is Jesus, who mourned over our sin, for He has been comforted.

Blessed is Jesus the meek, for He has inherited the earth.

Blessed is Jesus, who hungers and thirsts for righteousness, for He will be satisfied.

Blessed is Jesus the merciful, for God showed Him mercy by raising Him from the dead.

Blessed is Jesus the pure in heart, for He beholds the face of God.

Blessed is Jesus the peacemaker, for by His obedience He has shown Himself to be the son of God.

Blessed is Jesus, who was persecuted and killed because of righteousness, for His is the kingdom of heaven.

And blessed are you in Him, for He gives all these blessings to you. Blessed are you who rely not on your own goodness and good works, but who trust in the perfect obedience of your crucified and risen Lord. Blessed are you who seek His righteousness, His mercy, His peace, even in the midst of trouble and persecution. Rejoice and be glad, for great is the reward He has won for you in heaven. For one greater than all the prophets speaks here; Jesus Christ, our covenant Lord. He has made you His people, He wraps you in His blessedness, and His promises are faithful and sure.

His Father's House and Business

Texts: Isaiah 11:1-9; Luke 2:40-52

IMAGINE FOR AWHILE THAT you're Mary of Nazareth. One day the angel Gabriel encounters you with the news that you, yes, you are going to bear the Messiah, the Son of David, the Son of God. You spend six months with your cousin Elizabeth, who is miraculously pregnant in her old age. Your husband-to-be Joseph is told in a dream that the Baby you're carrying was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Then the Baby is born, and before you have a chance to shake your head over the less-than-ideal circumstances, a band of shepherds appears and tells you a whole host of angels had told them to come and find your little Jesus, because He is the Saviour of the world. Forty days later, you go to the Temple to dedicate Jesus in obedience to the law, and not one, but two prophets come up and announce that your Infant is Israel's promised Redeemer. Then you return to Bethlehem for awhile, and one day, magnificent Magi appear from miles to the east, bow down and worship your Child, and give Him lavish gifts.

I think you'd be convinced that your Child Jesus was unique among children, and not just the way all mothers think their children are unique. You'd understand pretty thoroughly that He had a special relationship with God and that God had given Him a particular mission and purpose in this world. Even when you have to flee to Egypt because King Herod is after Jesus to kill Him, that'd just go to prove that your Son has a prodigious role to play in the history of nations and men.

But eventually you and Joseph return from Egypt and resettle in Nazareth. You get back to your everyday lives. And the other babies start coming: James, then Joses, then Judas and Simon. And two or three sisters for Jesus, too. You don't have time these days to ponder how divinely special your Firstborn is or marvel over His relationship to the Lord Most High. In fact, you get to taking for granted what an obedient, trustworthy, helpful kid He is. "Never a bit of trouble out of Jesus," you say to the neighbors, when you think about it at all. "I wish all the children were like Him." But it's been a long time since you've considered why there's no way they could be. Jesus is just the good kid every mother thinks she has.

Meanwhile, every spring you leave all the kids with their grandparents and you and Joseph go up to Jerusalem for the Passover festival. As a woman, you aren't legally obligated to go, but Joseph as a Jewish adult male is. And this year, Jesus has reached His twelfth year and become a bar mitzvah-- a son of the covenant. He's now a man under the Jewish Law, and He comes with you to celebrate the Feast, too. You travel in a great cavalcade of friends and relatives from Nazareth and the surrounding villages, singing the Psalms of Ascents and praising God. At last, you and your husband and your Firstborn stand in the crowd in the Temple courts as the Passover lamb is sacrificed, and you're filled with awe at how God saved His people from slavery in Egypt so long ago.

Do you stay for all for the Passover and for all seven days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread? Probably not. Jerusalem is expensive, and work is waiting back home.

So you, Mary, leave the house where you've lodged and start out ahead with the other women and the little children. It's a chance to catch up on all the news, and you're sure Jesus is safe with His father Joseph. They'll be with the men, who bring up the rear.

But that night you make camp, and rendezvous with your husband. You say, "Joseph, where's Jesus? I thought He was with you."

Joseph says, "I thought He was with you!"

You ask friend after friend, relatives after relative, if they've seen Him. No one has. You begin to get worried, and having to spend the night not knowing makes it worse. Jesus has never caused a problem like this! Where can He be?

At first light, you and Joseph head back south to Jerusalem, seeking and inquiring among all the pilgrims who're heading back north. "Have you seen Jesus? Have you seen our Son?"

Your anxiety grows. You reach the capital. Could Jesus be seeing the sights? Maybe He wanted to see the Roman soldiers drill at the Fortress Antonia. Could He have been drawn away by the excitement of the marketplace? In yourself you cry, "Oh, Jesus, Jesus, how could You of all my children do such a thing to me! Where are you? My heart is about to break!"

Finally, the two of you exhaust all the places where you think a smart, curious twelve-year-old boy is likely to be. Then one of you says, "Where haven't we looked yet?"

"We've looked everywhere!"

"What about the Temple?"

Together you hurry up the hill to Mount Zion. But this time you aren't singing psalms, your words are a jumble of panic and hope. You enter the Temple courts, and there on the terrace you see the gathering where members of the Sanhedrin are teaching during these last days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. The listeners seem very excited. There is a rumble of sage old voices, and then, right out of the midst of those venerable scholars, you hear an adolescent voice raising a question. A familiar voice. The voice of your Son Jesus.

Jesus! You and Joseph simply do not care who those teachers of the law are, Gamaliel or Hillel or Joseph of Arimathea or the high priest Annas himself. You rush right in and there, sitting respectfully among them, is your Son Jesus. All around, you hear the learned men murmuring, "Amazing child! Remarkable young man! Such wisdom, such understanding! Such insightful answers to all the questions put to him! Would scarcely believe it if I weren't hearing it myself. Amazing!"

But that doesn't make you feel any better. You are overcome with astonishment at where your Boy is and what He's done. You look at Him and exclaim, "Son, why have you treated us like this? Look, so anxiously your father and I have been searching for you!"

And that firstborn Son of yours, that Child who never caused you a bit of trouble in His life, replies simply and very respectfully, "Why were you searching for Me? Didn't you know that I must be in my Father's house?" But it's been a long, long time since the angels and the wise men, and neither you nor Joseph can make head or tail of what Jesus could possibly mean. But He comes along with you obediently, and after this He is again the obedient, dependable, willing Son He always was-- if He had ever been anything else. And you, Mary, store up this incident in your heart, trying to work out what it means. It's only years later, after your Son has died and risen again, that you fully understand why you should have sought Him first in the Temple, His Father's house, and why He was so careful-- and so right-- to remind you and Joseph who His true Father really was.

"Why were you searching for Me? Didn't you know that I must be in my Father's house?" These are the first words of our Savior that we find recorded in Scripture, and we must consider them spoken in wonder and even disappointment. You do not search, either anxiously or not, for something that is in exactly the right place. You go directly to that place and get it. After twelve years Mary and Joseph should have known that Jesus' place and business was in the house of God. And as much as He was their son in human reckoning, even more He was and is the Son of His Father in heaven. It wasn't Jesus' purpose on this earth that He should live out His life as Jesus bar Joseph, the good and godly carpenter of Nazareth, building houses and mending broken tables and chairs. No, He came to earth to be the Jesus the Christ, to shed His blood to build up the house of His Church and to make sin-destroyed lives whole and new.

If Mary and Joseph could forget Who Jesus was and what He came for, how much more the rest of humanity down through history! You've heard what is made of Him, by unbelievers and by those who claim to be Christians alike. They say, "Jesus is primarily a great moral Teacher." Or, "He died to show us how much God loves us and how we should love one another." Or, "He came to be our Good Example for how we should live."

Friends, these ideas about Jesus seem really attractive and possible. But all of them make Him out to be the same thing Moses and the prophets were. They're about what we have to do to make ourselves acceptable to God, about Jesus somehow helping us keep the Old Testament Law, which is summed up in love to God and our neighbor. We didn't need the death of the incarnate Son of God to teach us that! We've known about morality and the love of God and right living for millennia! A purely human prophet would have done to remind us of all that.

But the Man Jesus was and is no less than the divine Son of God, come in human flesh to save us sinners and reconcile us to God. From His earliest youth He knew who His true Father was, and from His earliest youth He had a hunger and thirst for the word and counsel of God. Heeding God's word and counsel would eventually take Him to the Cross to die for your sins and mine, for that was the predestined goal of the Christ who was to come. Let us never get so used to Jesus that we make Him mundane and comfortable and merely human. To take Him for granted like that is to miss the new life He won for us in His blood, and all the blessings He came to give.

The scholars and teachers those three days at the Temple could well be amazed at Jesus' answers and understanding. If they'd only known it, He was giving the first proofs that He was the Messiah promised by the prophets of old. As Isaiah says,

The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him—

the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,

the Spirit of counsel and of power,

the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD—

and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.

Among the teachers we see the Boy Jesus overflowing with wisdom and understanding; and in His answer to His earthly parents we see how above all He delighted in the fear of the Lord. Later on, the writer to the Hebrews would say that Jesus, "for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." From His earliest awareness He knew who His true Father was, and when the time was right, Jesus grew to understand that He had come to seek and save the lost, and to give up His life as a ransom for many. Jesus' focus on God's will for Him was total, even from His boyhood.

It is God's will for us that we be found in Christ, washed in His blood, clothed in His righteousness, enjoying His peace, focussing on His will, and delighting in the fear of the Lord. As His redeemed people, we now are able to follow Jesus' example as we choose our priorities in life and decide whom we will serve. When we know-- "know," mind you, not merely "feel"-- that any earthly authority is exalting itself above the revealed will of God as recorded in the Scriptures, we must obey God rather than man. And if our love for any human being-- parent, child, sibling, or spouse-- becomes an idol that takes the place of our love for God, that human idol must be dethroned, as much for that person's sake as for our own. God and His will for our lives must come first, as for Jesus they came first.

Jesus' place and business were in His Father's house. In Him, ultimately, our place and business are there, too. Wherever you go, whatever you do, study to be found in Him, living joyfully as a child of His heavenly kingdom. You belong in the salvation, love, and peace of the God and Father of your Lord Jesus Christ. May anyone who seeks your heart always find you with Him there, filled with His Spirit, expressing His wisdom, walking in His counsel, and delighting in the fear of the Lord. Not through your own works or virtue or strength, but through the finished work, the divine virtue, and the inexpressible power of our crucified and risen Lord Jesus, to whom be all honor and glory, now and forever. Amen.

Brought from Afar

Texts: Ephesians 2:11-18; Matthew 2:1-12

THE CHRISTMAS SEASON ISN'T COMPLETE, is it, without the Three Kings finding their way to worship the Baby of Bethlehem. We read in Matthew chapter 2 how the Gentile wise men arrived to worship the newborn King of the Jews. How they came from the east-- probably Persia, 800 to 900 miles away, how they followed the star, how they caused a great hubhub in King Herod's court with their request for directions, and how they hurried on to Bethlehem. We read of their great joy in seeing the star rest over the house where Jesus was now living with Mary His mother and Joseph His foster father. In our mind's eye we watched as they bowed down and paid Him homage as Lord and King and presented Him their gifts. We sighed with approval and gratitude when they heeded the warning of the dream and did not go back to report to Herod, but returned to their own country another way.

It's impressive what the Wise Men did. It took a lot of work and they overcame a lot of obstacles. In sermons in pulpits all over the world we're exhorted to be like them. "Wise men [and women] still seek Him," we're told, and we should go to any lengths to seek out Jesus, too.

Humanly-speaking, that's true . . . but it leaves out whose really doing the impressive work in our Matthew 2 passage. That is, it leaves out the role of God. Without the work and will of the Lord Most High, the Wise Men would have remained in Persia and never offered their allegiance and honor to Jesus, the King of the Jews. It is God who revealed to them that a great King of the Jews would be born. It was God who impressed on them that that birth would have worldwide consequences. It was God who hung the miraculous star in the heavens to guide them, and God who directed them to follow it. It was God who gave the prophecies in His word so the Wise Men could be directed to Bethlehem, and it was God who caused these great men to bow the knee to a peasant Child in a humble dwelling. Without the work of God, none of this would have happened. It was the work and will of God that brought the Magi from afar. It was the work and will of God that included the alien and alienated Gentiles in the kingdom of the Messiah of Israel. And it is the work and will of God that brings us from afar and includes us in the kingdom of Christ as well.

For what does Paul the Apostle say in Ephesians, chapter 2? By the Holy Spirit he writes:

So then, remember that at one time you Gentiles by birth . . . remember that you were at that time without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

Brothers and sisters, this is talking about us! True, most of us were born into families who have been Christians for years. But most of us, I reckon, were not born of families with Jewish blood. Remember, there was a time when God's covenant promises were only for Israel. Only the Jews received the blessings of being His people. That excluded us who were of Gentile heritage. God Himself set the boundary of the ceremonial law between Jew and Gentile, to preserve His chosen people until Jesus the Messiah would appear. There couldn't help but be a dividing wall of hostility between us. The Jews hated the Gentiles because they were unclean and did not know the Lord. The Gentiles hated the Jews because they considered Jews to be strange and narrowminded and just plain weird for rejecting idols and worshipping an invisible God.

But now Jesus Christ has appeared in the world, and it is not our doing, it is the work of God. We Gentiles have been granted the epiphany that Israel's God is our God, as He is God over all the earth. The Jews have been granted the epiphany that the covenants of promise are now open to the uncircumcised. God accomplished this by the shed blood of His Son Jesus Christ. In Christ the dividing wall is broken down and we are one in Him, and one with His church in all times and places. In Jesus we Christians are one new humanity. He has brought us from afar and become our peace.

But it wasn't just Jews and Gentiles that were far from one another in the sight of God. We were also far from God. See what Paul says in verse 16. Both groups needed to be reconciled to God. Israel belonged to God but too often were far from Him in their hearts. Our Gentile ancestors did not know God and were far from Him in both heart and physical distance.

Note this: God did not need to be reconciled to us! God has never offended against us, but we by our sin repeatedly have offended against Him. And then we blame God for the consequences of our own sin and the consequences of the sins of others, starting with Adam and Eve and their disobedience in the garden. Our rebellion alienated us from God and put us far away from Him. As Ephesians 1:5 says, we were dead in our trespasses. Even those of us who were raised in families with godly parents were born into this deadly condition. All of us-- all of us-- deserve nothing but God's wrath until God has mercy on us and sends Jesus Christ to find us and reconcile us to Himself. Israel was helpless and enslaved until God called them out of Egypt and brought them nearer. This was part of God's great plan of salvation, so at the right time the Christ might be revealed. And now Jesus has come and shed His blood for our sins, so we aren't at war with God any more. As it says in verse 17, Jesus has come and proclaimed peace with God to us Gentile-born who were far off, and peace to His Jewish children who were near.

Think of it-- together in Christ we all have access to the Father in heaven-- the great Creator God who made us and loves us--though the one Spirit He has put in our hearts! No longer are we strangers and aliens, but together with the Wise Men, God has brought us from afar. He Himself has made us fellow-citizens with the saints, and members of His own household. If you make and keep one resolution for this new year, promise that you will study to know and appreciate how amazing that is! And what a wonderful gift God has given you! You are a citizen of His divine kingdom! You are a temple for His worship, His very dwelling place! You have been brought from afar and made a child of the only, true, and living God!

And please, make another promise to God and yourself: That you will remember how far away you used to be and in His power be His instrument to bring others near as well.

Because it's a sad thing: Even though Jesus two thousand years ago died on the cross to break down barriers and wipe out distances, we in His churches too often erect new barriers and imagine new distances to keep ourselves separate from people who are different from us. I've noticed there isn't a problem, usually, with sending missionaries to evangelize people "over there" in Africa or the Far East or other places far away. The problem is the barriers we erect between our congregations and those who are physically close to us, who are our neighbors and even our friends, but who are distant culturally or economically or religiously. What I mean is this: Suppose you're talking to someone, either a chance stranger or someone you know, and this church and its ministry come up. And you learn that they don't attend church anywhere. And it crosses your mind to ask him or her to come here the following Sunday. But you look at the person's clothes and think, "No, they're too shabby or too well-dressed to fit in here." Or you think, "They're Jewish-- or Muslim-- or Mormon-- or totally secular-- or whatever-- They're got their own thing going, they wouldn't be comfortable with us and we wouldn't be comfortable with them." So you don't give the invitation. Believe me, I know. I've been guilty of the same. The only thing that should stop us from inviting someone who needs Christ to worship with us is the certainty that he will not hear the Gospel preached from this pulpit. We should never keep silent out of discomfort and fear. Jesus Christ has broken down the barriers between one human being and another. No, not so we can run around celebrating our "diversity" as if being different were a virtue in itself. But so He could make us one in Him. And it is the privilege and glory of us who are already in His Church that He uses us-- our words, our service, our loving extended hand-- to bring the alienated and the lost from afar to enjoy His peace. Even if that alienated and lost one dwells in your very household.

The habits and ways of this fallen world put obstacle after obstacle in the way of the Wise Men as they came from the East to worship the Christ Child. The habits and ways of this fallen world put obstacles in our way before we came to Him. But God had mercy on us, as He had mercy on the Wise Men. He sent His only-begotten Son Jesus Christ into the world to die and rise again for our sakes. He sent His Holy Spirit into our hearts to convince us that this is true. Jesus came to us when we could never come to Him and He has brought us near by the shedding of His blood; He has made people of every race, tribe, language, and culture one body in His flesh.

This morning, the Lord's Table is spread before us. Here is Christ's epiphany to us, our God appearing to us through the elements of bread and wine. As you partake of this holy sacrament, receive the peace and reconciliation of Jesus in your hearts, as surely as you receive the elements in your mouth. Be reconciled to one another, as surely as God has reconciled you to Himself. Draw near to Him in gratitude and joy. Jesus your Lord has brought you from afar: this is His glorious work and His gracious will. Amen.

God's Answer to the Blue Christmas

Texts: Jeremiah 31:7-14; Luke 2:21-40

HAVE YOU EVER HAD A BLUE Christmas? I'm not sure why this year in particular, maybe it's the economy, but in the weeks leading up to this Christmastide I seemed to hear even more talk than usual about how stressful, depressing, and sad Christmas can be. You probably heard talk like that, too. It reflects a real problem. For many people, Christmas hurts. Maybe somebody you love admitted that their Christmas wasn't feeling merry. Or maybe the person having a blue Christmas was you.

Going by our passage in Luke 2, a blue Christmas isn't anything new. I wonder if that's what Mary, Jesus' mother, started to have when she heard all the words of Simeon in the Temple. There she was with her husband Joseph, bringing her infant firstborn Son Jesus to be dedicated forty days after his birth, according to the dictates of the Law. This venerable old man hobbles up to her, takes her Baby in his arms, and begins to prophesy. At first his words are full of comfort and hope. Simeon says:

"Sovereign Lord, as you have promised,
you now dismiss your servant in peace.
For my eyes have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared in the sight of all people,
a light for revelation to the Gentiles
and for glory to your people Israel."

What an act of God this was! A total stranger, seeing the salvation of God in this six week old infant! Mary's Child, bringing light and knowledge of the Lord to the Gentiles! This tiny Baby, recognized as the glory of Israel! How amazing! How marvellous!

But Simeon wasn't finished. He fixes his gaze on the young mother and prophesies:

"This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too."

Wow. And a merry celebration of the Messiah's birth to you, too, sir.

But Simeon spoke truly. Yes, the birth of Christ our Lord was and is an occasion for celebration and joy. Just ask the shepherds and the Wise Men. But there is a sad side of the birth of our Lord Jesus as well.

Let me say right now it's not the sadness we experience when we say we're having a blue Christmas. If we sat down and examined our feelings, we'd probably see we were depressed because we didn't have the time, money, or strength to make this Christmas all we wanted it to be. Or we were feeling upset because people around us expected us to make their Christmas the way they wanted it to be. Sadness might've gripped us because certain loved ones couldn't be with us on Christmas, maybe never again-- or because we were having to spend Christmas Day with people whose presence-- and presents-- we could do without. A blue Christmas can come because we're in a depressed state anyway and all the general cheer clashes rudely with the way we're feeling.

I'm not here to judge those wishes and moods. But know this: the tragedy and sorrow that God our heavenly Father mixes in with the happiness of His Son's birth is both deeper and darker than the blues we might feel at Christmas time. And God has determined that both His Son and we must go through that deeper darkness and woe if we are to emerge into the light and exaltation of Resurrection joy.

For why did the eternal Son of God choose to take on flesh and be born as a baby in this world? Is the nativity of our Lord merely about an adorable child in a manger, and we can forget about Him now that the new year has arrived? No, Jesus Christ came to this earth with a mission and a purpose. He came to bring God's judgment upon sin and Satan. He came to redeem His people from slavery to death and raise them up to live with Him forever. And He did all these things through the suffering of His cross.

Christian friends, without the Cross there is no point to the manger! Without the suffering of Calvary there is no joy in Bethlehem. Without the tearing of His flesh for the sins of the world, the Word made flesh brings no joy for us. Jesus was born to die, for without His death, there could be no payment for sins, no Resurrection, no life. But Jesus Christ the Son of Mary did die and rise again, that we His people might live and dance and sing for joy forever in His heavenly kingdom.

But before that would happen, our Lord walked the road of human suffering with us. And again, as Simeon said:

"This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too."

For others, too, from His infancy the coming of the Messiah Jesus meant trouble as well as peace, condemnation as well as rejoicing, and a sword in the soul as well as comfort and joy.

What? The Messiah's advent didn't bring universal cheer? We know that wasn't true by the reaction of King Herod. But even today, we don't have to be a paranoid ruler to have a hard time accepting the newborn King for who He is. Each of us is born bound up in our human sin nature. And unless and until God reaches out His hand in mercy to us, we think that's all right and normal. We think we're good enough the way we are, and God will let us and all our friends into heaven because we're nice people. But from the very beginning of His life Christ our Lord disturbs our peace and tells us we're living a lie.

Take His name. In Luke 2:21, we're told that "On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise him, he was given the name Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he had been conceived." Jesus means "Jehovah saves." It's the same as the name "Joshua," but our Lord wasn't called that name because Mary and Joseph liked the sound of it. No, Jesus was given that name because He was to be the Savior of the world.

But that's uncomfortable, isn't it? To say Jesus has come as our Savior says that we need to be saved. His very presence on this earth condemns us for our sins. They aren't simply mistakes, or missteps, or inappropriate actions, or any of the other words we use to cover up what we do, they are sins, deepest offenses against our holy and righteous God. To say Jesus as a Good Example, most people are fine with that. But to proclaim Him as the Savior, Jehovah God come in human flesh to do for us with we could never do for ourselves, we sinful humans don't like that idea, do we? Not really.

But when the Holy Spirit convicts us of our sins, the news of the coming of Jesus who is Jehovah our Savior is the best news of all. When we accept that no amount of trying hard will make our Christmasses or our lives the way we-- or God-- want them to be, our eyes see Jesus as the glorious salvation that allows us to lay down our burdens in peace. Where stubborn sinners fall, repentant sinners rise on the grace of our Lord.

And then, there is offense in this world in the fact that Jesus was circumcised at all. As a Jewish boy, of course He would be. But nothing that is recorded of our Lord in the Gospels is done by accident. Circumcision was the sign of God's gracious covenant with Abraham. It was the outward, visible sign of God's one-way agreement with Abraham, where God promised to do great things for Abraham and his seed, including the blessing of all nations through him. All Abraham had to do-- if you call it "doing something"-- was receive the promise of God by faith. Ever since that time maybe 2,000 years before Christ, the sons of Abraham regularly received circumcision as the sign of God's covenant with them. And just as regularly, they broke God's covenant by failing to walk before the Lord in faith.

Jesus was born to be that ultimate Seed of Abraham who would walk before God the Father in perfect trust and righteousness. His faithfulness condemned Israel's violation of the covenant with Abraham. His inheritance of the promises of God shows up the failure of the false sons of Abraham who forfeited their inheritance by their faithlessness.

But for us who are the spiritual seed of Abraham through faith in Christ, all the promises of God belong to us through Him. Doesn't matter if we're born Jews or Gentiles, through trust in Jesus we become children of Abraham, too, and we inherit the perfect righteousness that Jesus showed on earth, especially in His death and resurrection. Through Him we rise, while unbelievers fall.

And then, Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to the Temple to be dedicated to God, as it is written in the Law of the Lord at Exodus 13, verses 2 & 12. The Law said that every firstborn male offspring belonged to the Lord. If it were a clean animal, it was to be sacrificed. If it were a human boy child, he was to be redeemed-- a price had to be paid to God to buy back His life. This is what Jesus' parents are doing for Him in the Temple. Through them by this action God identifies His Son with us.

What I mean is this: Because of creation, all our lives belong to God. He has the right to give us life or to take it away, simply because we are His. But because of Adam's fall, all our lives are forfeit to God because of sin. The wages of sin is death, and that's what we deserve. The traditional redemption of the firstborn symbolized this double debt to God. But when Jesus was redeemed by His parents, He became identified with all of us enslaved sinners who owed a debt to God we could never pay. He perfectly obeyed the Law of Moses that condemned us every time we broke one of its statutes. And so by His sinless life and sacrificial death Jesus became our Redeemer. He has paid the price we owed. And now because of Jesus' righteousness our Father God regards us as His own obedient children, made Christ's own brothers and sisters by His blood..

This is a cause for rejoicing, is it not? This hope is why we are filled with gladness at Christmastide, and all through the year! But there are those who reject the idea that they need a Redeemer. We rejected that idea until the Holy Spirit came upon our lives and showed us the depth of our sin. Jesus indeed grew up to be a sign that was spoken against, as the scribes and the Pharisees, the very religious people who should have recognized Him as Messiah and rejoiced in His coming-- those scribes and Pharisees rejected Him and spoke insultingly against Him. And why? Because they felt they did not need a Redeemer. Or if they did, they wanted to be redeemed from the power of Rome, not from the power of sin, death, and the devil in their own lives.

And so our Lord Jesus was arrested, condemned, and crucified as a blasphemer and liar, and thus the final part of Simeon's prophecy came true-- a sword pierced the soul of Mary, Jesus' mother.

But that wasn't the end of the story, was it? Oh, no. For the torn flesh and shed blood of Christ purchased the redemption of Jerusalem, as the prophetess Anna looked forward to, and not just of Jerusalem, but of all the world. The Resurrection of our Lord on the third day proved that He was, indeed, the Son of God, the Redeemer of Mankind, the faithful Seed of Abraham, the Savior of the world. The tragedy and woe that Jesus went through for our sake bought for us eternal gladness and peace that passes all human understanding, no matter what our circumstances might be at this Christmas or any other. Through Him the word of the prophet Jeremiah has come true, that the Lord will turn our mourning into gladness; that instead of sorrow He will give us comfort and joy.

The birth of our Lord did involve sorrow and woe, and that trouble was deeper than what we experience when we are having a blue Christmas. But it doesn't exclude that trouble. For when we bring to light the thoughts of our own hearts, we see that much if not most of our earthly Christmas sadness has to do with what we cannot do and what this world cannot provide. But rejoice, child of God! The birth of Jesus Christ, Immanuel, is all about what we cannot do and what this fallen world cannot provide! Offer up your inadequacy, your anger, your sorrow, and your need to Him, and accept Him in simple faith. In Christ, God has done for us all we could not do for ourselves; He has provided us with everything we need to be joyful and comforted in Him.

So let us dance and be glad; let us shout for joy on the heights of Zion! For the Lord has redeemed His people and will shepherd us forever. Christ, the Light to the Gentiles is with us; Jesus, the Glory of Israel has come!

Being Ready

Texts: Isaiah 2:6-22; Matthew 24:36-51

IT WAS OCTOBER 22ND, 1844. ALL THAT day, all over the Northeastern United States, men, women, and children were gathered in fields and on hilltops, ready, waiting. They sang hymns. They prayed. But mostly they strained their eyes to the heavens, expecting at any moment to see the Lord Jesus Christ descending from the skies. They were there on that day because their leader, an amateur theologian named William Miller, had added up dates and times he got out of Scripture and decided that's when the Day of the Lord was to be. But the sun moved on in the sky, the daylight hours faded, the evening darkness marched on to midnight. But nothing happened. The Lord did not return on October 22nd, 1844, or on any day thereafter. This event went down in American history as "The Great Disappointment." Those who'd expected Christ's coming that day were brokenhearted. Some renounced the Christian faith altogether.

Those Christians were ready for Jesus' return. Most of them had sold their land and businesses. They'd given away all their worldly goods and renounced all involvement with this present evil age. Their thoughts and hopes were focussed on Christ alone. They were ready. Why did it go wrong? Was it only because Mr. Miller dared to set a date? Or was it something else as well?

Certainly, we must be prepared for the day of our Lord's coming. Jesus says so in Matthew 24:44. This word He originally gave to the disciples who walked He also intends for us. In the year A.D. 2010 as in A.D. 33, our Lord's warning is the same: "Keep watch! Be ready!" But how?

Isaiah shows us how to be radically unready. We didn't read this part, but the first five verses of chapter 2 show us the perfection of the heavenly Jerusalem in the last days. They tell of the time when all God's people, Jew and Gentile, will be united as one under the word of the Lord, walking in one holy way and worshipping in one holy temple. Hear this good news: That word, that way, that temple is Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God who died for the sins of the world. By His Spirit He calls His Church from every nation and His return will bring about the perfection of God's plan for all mankind.

But in verses 6 though 9 we see how things really were in the earthly Jerusalem. And, sadly, it also points to how things frequently are among those who claim to be Christians today. Isaiah writes:

They are full of superstitions from the East;
they practice divination like the Philistines
and clasp hands with pagans.

Is it not enough for us that Jesus Christ died and rose again for us? Do we have to import Buddhist or Hindu spiritualities and practices into our lives as well? Do we have to talk about "karma" as if that were God's means for judging the world? Dare we reject the Holy Spirit Who has been sent to us to lead us into all truth? Do we need also to consult our horoscopes or quote so-called prophets like Nostradamus? Has not our Lord given us His holy Word the Bible to show us the way of faith and life? Why then do we consult our feelings or experiences or our "inner voice," instead of believing and doing what God says? And why do we "clasp hands with pagans" and pretend that Allah the god of the Muslims is the same as the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? Why do we even think it's possible to have "interfaith worship" with those who deny His godhead and call His atoning sacrifice a lie? Perhaps you don't do those things, but we all know Christians who do. People who engage in these practices will not be ready for our Lord's coming!

And hear what else the Spirit says through the prophet Isaiah:

Their land is full of silver and gold,
there is no end to their treasures.

I admit: In America today, we can definitely see coming to the end of our treasures. But fear of poverty and ruin can distract us from God just as much as excessive enjoyment of prosperity and wealth. Either way, we stop being interested in who God is and what He has done for us. We stop trusting in Him; rather, we live our lives "bow[ing] down to the work of [our] hands," as it says in verse 8. Isaiah was referring first of all to the actual idol statues that the faithless Jews were making and calling their gods, but this can also include everything we do for ourselves and put our faith in without giving praise and glory to God the Maker of heaven and earth. With such an attitude, how can we be ready and watching for the day of the Lord? With such an attitude, how could we escape the judgment it will bring?

Make no mistake about it: The day of the Lord will be a day of judgment. God has visited His people and the nations with His wrath many times throughout history, but the day of the Son of Man will be the culmination of them all, the day when all that stands opposed to the holiness, righteousness, and love of God in Christ will be shown for the filthy thing it is and will be swept from the sight of God forever. It will be the day when those whose sins have been covered by His grace will receive the glorious inheritance promised to them as children of God and co-heirs with His Son Jesus Christ. To be ready for the second coming of Christ is not a thing to take lightly!.

So we must take warning from what our Lord Jesus says in Matthew 24. He says,

"As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man."

There is nothing wrong with eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage. What was wrong in Noah's day is that these ordinary things were going on right alongside of overwhelming, God-defying wickedness. And people figured that as long as they could carry on their everyday lives, everything was all right and they didn't have to worry about what God might do about it all. St. Peter writes in his second letter that Noah was a preacher of righteousness. Noah told the people of his time that God would judge their rebellion, but they wouldn't listen. They were getting along well enough, why should they worry?

Jesus says it will be the same at the coming of the Son of Man. Most people won't be ready. There will be widespread wrongdoing and evil that dare and defy God's judgment to come, but most people will still be managing to live life as normal. They'll think it's not a time when Jesus might return. Does that sound familiar? Kind of like how things are today?

So our Lord says, "Keep watch! Be ready!" For He will come like a thief in the night; literally, like a housebreaker digging through the mud walls anywhere, front, back, or sides. We are to be like a householder who expects that to happen at any time. We are to be that vigilant.

Don't take this little parable too far, friends. The coming of our Lord is not something for God's children to be defensive about. Nor does Jesus want us to make a fulltime job out of predicting the end of the world, like poor William Miller did. The writer George MacDonald, who was a major influence on C. S. Lewis, once said,

Do those who say, "Lo, here or lo, there are the signs of His coming," think to be too keen for Him, and spy His approach? When He tells them to watch lest He find them neglecting their work, they stare this way and that, and watch lest He should succeed in coming like a thief!*

Truly, we who believe in Him should be glad to have Him break in once and for all and take away all the worldly concerns and worry and stuff that keep us from loving Him above all! For we know that when He comes He will replace what we call our treasure on earth with the infinite and eternal treasure that is fellowship with Himself.

Clearly, wallowing in the sins and worries of this world is not readiness. But how shall we avoid that? Is it by retreating from the world into our own Christian ghetto? Shall we read only "Christian" books and watch only "Christian" movies and patronize only "Christian" businesses? Shall we be so heavenly-minded we're no earthly good? That's not much different from what the Millerites did in 1844. They thought being ready meant withdrawing from the world so thoroughly they set a date and withdrew from all of life. And by doing so, they set themselves up for disappointment.

No, Jesus tells us what being ready means. He says,

"Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household to give them their food at the proper time? It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns."

Jesus is our Master who has been away and He'll return when we least expect. Meanwhile, He's given each of us work to do in this world, in His name. Most of the time, this work is not at all what we would think of as "fulltime Christian service." Each of us has a vocation in this life; some of us have several. In those vocations we serve Him by serving our neighbor: Our neighbor in our families. Our neighbor in the church. Our neighbor at work. Our neighbor literally next door. Our neighbor who believes in Jesus and our neighbor who doesn't believe, but who might someday because of what we did for him in Jesus' name. Our Lord calls us His servants and charges us to give our fellow-servants the food of love, encouragement, good workmanship, patience, whatever they need in the relationship we have with them.

Especially, we are to serve all people with the eternal food of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Whether it's your own children or some stranger you meet by chance, you have good news to tell them of Christ who came to this earth to save mankind from their sins. You have the testimony of your own life to show how Jesus saves and changes sinners, even a sinner like you. Be faithful to the calling God has given you; serve one another in them, and always be ready with joy to render an account of your stewardship, for He promises to reward you when He comes.

I admit, I don't find it easy to be ready like this. Often I want to run away and play. Not that I'd ever be like the abusive steward that Jesus condemns in this parable, but the sin nature in me would be perfectly happy to get its fun out of life and disregard the fact that my Master will certainly return. Maybe I feel this way most when I try my hardest to keep watch by being faithful.

It's times like that when you and I can be encouraged by what Jesus says at the beginning of our Matthew reading. He says,

"No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."

Yes, be encouraged. For look, Christ the Son is content to trust His heavenly Father to set the right day and hour for Him to return. And since Jesus can rest in His Father, we can, too. Jesus will help us day by day to be ready. He will see that we are taken up to be with Him forever. He will preserve us in His love and keep us from the fate of the hypocrites, who actually dread His coming.

So in this Advent season and until Jesus returns, be ready. Serve your neighbor in His strength: you can do that, for in His cross and passion He has first served you. Rest in His grace; strive only to feed on Him in His Sacraments, to fellowship with Him in prayer; to hear and follow the voice of His Spirit as He speaks to you and guides you in His written Word. Be ready, but do not fret over your Lord's coming. You are His beloved; in Him you have been made ready for the kingdom prepared for you before the foundation of the world.

I'll conclude with two verses from an Advent hymn by Charles Wesley, called "Lo, He Comes with Clouds Descending." They go like this:

Now redemption, long expected,
See in solemn pomp appear;
All His saints, by man rejected,
Now shall meet Him in the air:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
See the day of God appear!


Yea, Amen! let all adore Thee,
High on Thine eternal throne;
Savior, take the power and glory,
Claim the kingdom for Thine own;
O come quickly! O come quickly!
Everlasting God, come down!

Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus! Amen and amen!
_______________________________
*From Unspoken Sermons, Second Series: "The Word of Jesus on Prayer"