Sermon for Palm Sunday: "The Grand Parade"

 + Palm Sunday – March 28, 2021 +

John 12:12-19; Zechariah 9:9-12; Philippians 2:5-11; John 12:20-43

Beautiful Savior Lutheran

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

You can learn a lot about people simply by watching their parades. 

 

A 4^th of July parade weaves its way through town; the band plays and flags wave in a patriotic display. Fans line the streets for a victory parade with ticker tape for the home team hoisting the trophy. This past year we’ve even seen graduation or birthday parades to celebrate life’s milestones. 

 

Parades reveal what’s important to people, what they value, what they believe in. 

 

Holy Scripture is full of different parades, processions, and pilgrimages too. Some are sorrowful – more like a death march – Adam and Eve banished from Eden. Israel wandering the wilderness for 40 years. Still, many of Scripture’s parades are joyful: Israel’s march of life through the Red Sea. Israel’s crossing the Jordan into the promised land. 

 

The Christian church is no stranger to parades either. We began with a parade of sorts this morning. A Palm Sunday Procession. Did you notice what was at the head? Not a flag, a trophy, or a fire engine – but Palms, the holy Scripture, and leading us all at the head of the procession – the cross of Jesus crucified. 

 

A parade, or procession, as we call it in the church, reveals what’s most important to us as God’s people, what we value, what we believe in. That’s true all year round, of course, but especially today on Palm Sunday. 

 

As Holy Week begins, the holy Palm Sunday parade – with the donkeys and palms and Hosannas – points us to the reason for the occasion. The reason this is called Holy Week. And it’s not our successes, achievements, or victories, but Jesus. 

The next day the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem.  So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!”

Here is another procession in Scripture – the annual pilgrimage to the Passover. The yearly remembrance of God’s salvation in Exodus. The blood of the Passover Lamb. The holy Passover meal. The sacrificial death of the firstborn Lamb to redeem and rescue God’s people. The people enter Jerusalem as they had for the feast for hundreds of years, only this year’s parade features something new, or better yet, someone new. 

 

The King, the Lord himself. The Lamb of God riding atop a donkey. The true Passover Lamb going up to Jerusalem for the sacrifice on the cross. The ultimate and final redemption of God’s people. 

 

“Hosanna,” the people cried out. Hosanna, Lord, save us. That’s what Hosanna means. That’s what the parade goers cried out. Hosanna. And well they should. For they were in need of saving. Did they understand what that meant or how Jesus would save them? Of course not. Not yet at least. But Jesus rode into Jerusalem all the same. Jesus set out on his Palm Sunday parade route for them and for you.

 

Lord, save us, we cry out as well. Lord, save us from our pride and folly. Lord, save us from our guilt and shame. Lord, save us from fear and despair. Lord, save us from sin and suffering. Lord, save us from disease and death. Hosanna, Lord save us. 

 

And he does. That’s what this week. This day. This Palm Sunday procession is all about. Jesus’ steady, determined march to the cross for you. 

 

And yet, there’s something odd about this parade. Something unexpected, yet glorious. Gracious even. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!  The crowds cry out. They’re right of course. Jesus is the King. He comes in the Name of the Lord. For he is the Lord. And yet, notice how he enters Jerusalem. No fanfare. No Rolls Royce Limousine. No ticker tape parade. Instead he rides in on the first century version of a Pinto. Not a conquering warhorse. But a donkey. A beast of burden for the one who journeys to the cross carrying all of our burdens. A humble savior who goes to a humble death on the cross to rescue and redeem you. A victory parade of palms branches that culminates in the King crowned with thorns and enthroned in crucified glory for you. 

 

Jesus’ whole life has been a preparation for this grand parade, his final procession to the cross. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Born of the Virgin Mary. Was made man. Crucified. Suffered. Died. And was buried.

 

But the grave was not the terminus of Jesus’ parade route. No, only a three day layover. On Easter Sunday Jesus walks out of his tomb ensuring that when he returns on the last day He will raise us from our graves as well.  

 

This is why we celebrate Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. Yes, it is a procession that leads to his passion, suffering, and death, but it is also a victory parade announcing his coming triumph over death on the cross on Good Friday and Easter Sunday. 

 

Today, all of the pilgrimages in Scripture find their fulfillment in Jesus’ Palm Sunday procession. 

 

Today, our exile out of Eden has ended. Our wilderness wandering is over. We return home from Babylon. 

 

Today, Jesus leads us on a greater exodus to the cross, through the grave, into the Red Sea of the font and out again into new life and a new creation in his name. 

 

Today, we cross into the promised Land with Jesus, our greater Joshua leading the charge with his cross and empty tomb as our royal banners.

 

Today, we join the procession of angels and archangels and all the company of heaven, as we gather at our Lord’s table for the true Passover feast of his body and his blood. 

 

Today, we join Jesus’ Palm Sunday procession as we enter this Holy Week – the great week of God’s great salvation for you in Jesus. And as we process we join the ancient song, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!”

 

A blessed Palm Sunday to each of you…

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.  

 

Sermon for Lenten Midweek 5: "A Second Exodus"

 + Lenten Midweek 5 – March 24, 2021 +

Isaiah 11:11-16

Beautiful Savior Lutheran 

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

Sometimes God’s promises sound too good to be true. I mean, what military general would not have to stifle laughter upon being told that the walls of Jericho would be toppled by a Levitical marching band? Or what doctor wouldn’t chuckle at God’s plan for Moses to put a bronze serpent on a pole to cure the dying Israelites? It sounds far too far-fetched. But as we know, the Lord was not speaking tongue in cheek to Joshua or Moses. He meant what he said and would do what he promised.

 

So too, as impossible as it seemed to Abraham and Sarah, the Lord was not kidding when he told childless Abraham that through him would arise descendants that numbered more than the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. God meant what he said and would do what he promised. Through Abraham, Christ would bless all nations of the earth.

 

It all might sound a bit crazy, laughable, too good to be true. Abraham was approaching the century mark. Sarah, too, was old enough to be cashing in her social security checks. She even giggled a little when she overheard that she, at her age, was going to be mother. And sure enough, a year later, when was 90, Sarah held a baby boy in her arms. Abraham gave him the name Isaac, which means laughter.

 

While God’s people might think his promises too good to be true, even laughable, God always delivers. God always comes through, without fail.

 

So, what about the promise God preached by Isaiah, that Abraham’s descendants, scattered here and there and everywhere, would be gathered again to Jerusalem? The Exodus of Israel out of Egypt was one thing, but a worldwide exodus? Imagine the logistics! 

 

But that’s exactly what the prophet Isaiah says. In that day the Lord will extend his hand yet a second time to recover the remnant that remains of his people… He will raise a signal for the nations and will assemble the banished of Israel, and gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.

It all sounds too good to be true. How could the Heavenly Father rescue his captive children from all over the globe, remove every barrier that stands in their way, build a highway for them to travel on, and lead them safe and sound to the holy city?

 

As wild as his promises sound, God always delivers. God always comes through, without fail. For once in the days when a decree went out from Caesar Augustus and Quirinius was governor in Syria, there in a feed trough in David’s hometown lies an infant like all other babies, yet also unlike any other. Here is David’s son and David’s Lord, whose rule and reign is over the four corners of the world.

 

And if his birth wasn’t remarkable enough, listen to the message Abraham’s Seed preaches. That he will draw all people to himself in his crucifixion. That he will be a shepherd not only over the flock of the Jews, but over the Gentiles as well, so there will be one flock and he the one shepherd. That he will send out his apostles into all the world to teach and baptize in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

 

But of course our Lord wasn’t done there. Jesus goes to Jerusalem to accomplish a bloody exodus from the city of Jerusalem, up to the mountain called Golgotha, onto a tree to die for you, and laid into the tomb. We might think the devil has the last laugh here. But he doesn’t. Just wait one day. Wait two. Wait three.

 

And then, if you want to laugh, then by all means, when our resurrected Lord Jesus climbs out of the grave on day three, then laugh with all the joy you can muster as soldiers faint like dead men, as demons shriek in horror, as the women come to the tomb in utter astonishment and amazement. There is only a bit of burial cloth left. Nicely folded in its place. The Lord and Creator and Savior of all is alive once more, never to die again.

 

So we laugh with Sarah and Abraham. We laugh joyfully and triumphantly, for God has accomplished the impossible. God always delivers. God always comes through, without fail. What seemed too good to be true has come to pass. Christ has risen. And all of it, every last bit of it, done for you.

 

This is how God fulfills what Isaiah foretold. Lift up your eyes and see the nations streaming to Jesus. From Assyria to America, from Egypt to Japan, from the four corners of the earth, people once fettered in sin are freed in Jesus. In his own bloody exodus from the city of Jerusalem, the Son of God has paved the way for all – for you – for the whole wide world – to enter the heavenly Jerusalem, the Church of the living God. 

 

And no matter who you are or what you’ve done, you’re part of this pilgrim throng – sons and daughters of Abraham by faith. Sin, death, shame, guilt, regret, failure – these are gone. Death and the devil are utterly destroyed. They have no power over you, for you are children of God. Beloved. Redeemed. 

 

It is finished. The exodus of all exoduses has been accomplished in Jesus’ death for you. 

 

God always delivers. God always comes through, without fail. Jesus has done it all for you. And he who sits in the heavens, at the Father’s right hand, he laughs. And we laugh with him. Yes, even in Lent! For he has kept his promise. The last laugh is his, and yours as well, for God has kept his word, now as always. 

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Sermon for Lent 5: "Opposite Day"

 + Lent 5 – March 21, 2021 +

Series B: Jeremiah 31:31-34; Hebrews 5:1-10; Mark 10:32-45

Beautiful Savior Lutheran

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

Occasionally children play a little game that, no doubt, many of us, our own kids or grand kids have played as well – opposite day. You know how it goes. Up is down. Jump is sit. Go to bed means stay up late. And so on. 

 

If you think about it, there’s a grain of truth in the opposite game that children play. When we turn to Scripture, we find that God’s kingdom, work, and ways are often hidden in their opposites. Quite often God hides himself in the opposite of what we would do or expect. Think about it. The almighty God is born to an unwed teenage mother in a feeding trough in a country town called Bethlehem. The Lord of heaven and earth, who by his word spoke creation into existence out of nothing, becomes man and hides himself in the frailty of human flesh. The Lord of all becomes the servant of all.

 

“See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles.  And they will mock him and spit on him, and flog him and kill him. And after three days he will rise.”

 

If we were to imagine or create a god for ourselves, this is not at all what we’d expect. This is not what the disciples expected either. 

 

This is the third time in Mark’s Gospel that Jesus predicts his death. Each time he’s given more detail. And each of Jesus’ predictions are met with confusion or denial from his disciples. Whenever Jesus talks about his suffering, crucifixion, and death, the disciples want to talk about the opposite - glory, self-exaltation, honor. Given the choice, they choose their selfish ambitions every time. Jesus, on the other hand, does the opposite. He chooses the cross. 

 

In Mark 8 Jesus predicts his crucifixion and Peter takes him aside to rebuke him. Jesus responds by saying that to be a disciple is to take up the cross and follow him. Jesus is hidden in the opposite – not in saving himself, but in his cross to save you. 

 

In Mark 9 Jesus predicts his passion again and the disciples squabble over who is the greatest. Jesus respond by placing a child in their midst. Jesus is hidden in the opposite – not in greatness, but in smallness. Not in being first, but in being last in our place. 

 

Here in Mark 10 this pattern plays out yet again. Jesus predicts his suffering and death while James and John ask for a divinely appointed promotion to the right and left hand seat of power. Jesus responds by teaching them that greatness and glory isn’t found in being a ruler, but a servant. Once again, Jesus is hidden in the opposite of what we, and the disciples expect – a suffering, dying, humble, servant.

 

“Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”  And he said to them, “What do you want me to do for you?” And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.”

 

James and John want the power positions in the kingdom, to the right and to the left of the King. That’s where his most trusted advisors sat. James and John are thinking kingdom of God is an earthly kingdom, and see themselves with key positions in the new administration when Jesus takes up residence in Jerusalem and sets up the throne of David again. Chief of staff and Vice-president. And why not? They were among the first of the disciples, after all. They’d left their father’s fishing business and faithfully followed Jesus for three years. They deserved this. They earned it. Who could argue, except perhaps Peter and Andrew, but hey, they got to Jesus first.

 

What infected James and John was what Luther called a “theology of glory.” Wanting it all now. By-passing the cross and going straight for the glory of the kingdom. But the glory of the kingdom of God always looks weak and defeated to this world – hidden in opposites. It looks like Jesus dying on a cross. 

 

Truth be told, we’re not all that different from James and John. We suffer from the same sinful, selfish infection. Given the choice, between suffering and glory, between the crucifixion and exaltation, between the cross and honor, crucifixion, like the disciples, we’d choose the glory, exaltation, and honor every time. 

 

Good thing for James and John, for the other disciples, and for you and me, that Jesus does the opposite of what we do. Where we would avoid suffering, he goes to Jerusalem knowing exactly what suffering awaits him. Where we would seek a glory apart from the cross, Jesus reveals his greatest glory on the cross by dying for you. Where we would seek self-exaltation and honor for ourselves, Jesus humbles himself to the point of death on the cross in order to exalt you. 

 

When Jesus responds to James and John he points them once again to the cross, “To sit at my right and my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.” It is for the Father to grant, and for the Son to do His Father’s will. We have no idea who is to sit at Jesus’ right and left in the heavenly kingdom. But we do know who was on His right and left when He came into His glory on earth. Not James and John. Not Peter and Andrew. But two nameless thieves. One who turned to Him in faith. And one who mocked Him to His death. That’s who was at His right and left when Jesus came into His glory. 

 

That makes Good Friday the ultimate opposite day. The day where God hides himself in the opposite of what we expect as a reminder that all of life is given and lived by his grace.

 

In Jesus’ suffering is your glory. In Jesus’ weakness is your strength. In Jesus’ defeat is your victory. In Jesus becoming the last you are made first. In Jesus’ lowliness you are exalted. In Jesus the cup of God’s wrath over sin is drained to the last drop and this is his glory. In Jesus’ cross is your redemption.

 

For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.

 

For you.

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

Sermon for Lenten Midweek 4: "Exodus out of Babylon"

 + Lenten Midweek 4 – March 17, 2021 +

Ezra 1:1-4

Beautiful Savior Lutheran

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

There was a 2^nd century heretic named Marcion. What does Marcion have to do with a Lenten sermon series on the Old Testament? Even more odd than his name – which isn’t Martian, but Marcion – was his even more odd, and false teaching that the God of the Old Testament was different than that of the new. For Marcion – and sadly many others – God is nothing more than a cantankerous hothead with a short fuse. 

 

And yet, a closer look at the Scriptures reveals just the opposite. God is long-suffering, long-tempered. Quick to forgive. Slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, as the Psalms declare.

 

Now, it certainly is true that the Lord’s patience has a limit. There comes a point when the heavenly Father will, in fatherly love, discipline his children. A time when the Father will warn his children of the danger they are putting themselves in when they play with spiritual fire. 

 

In a way, this is the story of much of the Old Testament. The Lord sending his children Israel prophet after prophet, all preaching variations on of the same sermon: Repent and turn away from your false idols and come back to the true God.

 

From Amos to Isaiah, Hosea to Jeremiah, they all foretold Israel’s coming death, but their hearers for the most part brush off and close their ears to the Lord’s messengers and his message. Worse yet, sometimes they would even kill the messenger. “Yea, yea, we’ve heard that message before Pastor Chicken Little, but the sky hasn’t fallen yet.”

 

But eventually it did. The might of the Babylonian empire came crashing down on Israel. Under King Nebuchadnezzar, Babylon bulldozed Jerusalem, smashed her temple to smithereens, and reduced even the most wealthy of her citizens to prisoners and slaves. Like Lot’s wife, no doubt, Israel’s sons and daughters looked back upon the ruined, rubbled holy city with salty tears drenching their once happy faces. Off to Babylon they marched, and as they marched I imagine many of them remembered the words of the Lord that had gone unheeded for so long. Off they went to Babylon exiled, homeless, and yet, not hopeless.

 

Just as the Lord told Abraham how many years Israel would be stuck in Egypt, so too, he told his prophet Jeremiah how Israel would be in Babylon, living far from home and feeling home-sick. 70 years. No doubt it felt like an eternity to those enduring those 70 years. And yet it was not forever. For though the wages of sin were exile, the free gift of God is a homecoming. In God’s time and in God’s grace, he brought Israel home.

 

Eventually Persia became the world superpower. And through Cyrus, king of Persia, the Lord was working to bring his people home. 

In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also put it in writing:

 “Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and rebuild the house of the Lord, the God of Israel—he is the God who is in Jerusalem.  And let each survivor, in whatever place he sojourns, be assisted by the men of his place with silver and gold, with goods and with beasts, besides freewill offerings for the house of God that is in Jerusalem.”

One of those Israelites was Ezra, following in the footsteps of Moses, leading Israel back to the land flowing with milk and honey.

 

The book of Ezra is one of many examples of God’s long-suffering; that he is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. That is the kind of God Israel had. And so do you.

 

Unlike our moods that often change from day to day, he is same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. God gave Noah an ark for the salvation of his household. He brought Abraham out of exile. He took Jacob by the hand and brought him back to his fatherland. He led Israel out of Egypt and through the Red Sea. He pulled his people out of the quicksand of Babylon and onto the solid ground of Canaan. And he has done the same for us, no matter what Babylon we might find ourselves in.

 

Do you find yourself in the Babylon of addiction or selfishness or simply going through the motions, or guilt or shame or despair?

 

Whatever it is that has you feeling exiled, Jesus has delivered you. However big our sins are, the love of Jesus is always bigger. Not only has Jesus taken away your sins, he also fills you with life, his life. 

 

Whatever your Babylon, whatever that place of captivity and exile, it cannot and will not keep you from Jesus who died for you. His cross is a sledgehammer that pounds away and smashes the walls that hold you captive. Just as Samson tore the gates of a city to earth and carried them high on a hill, so has Jesus the greater Samson wrecked the gates of each and every one of our Babylons. Jesus has brought forth his own resurrected body from the tomb and raises you to new life in his name.

 

You see, God is not the grumpy old man telling us to “get off my lawn”. He is not short-fused and hotheaded. God is slow to anger for you. Abounding in steadfast love for you. He is quick to forgive you. And that will never change. And because of that you need fear no Babylon. The Lord Jesus has conquered them all and brought you home in his death and resurrection. 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sermon for Lenten Midweek 3: "Out of Egypt I Called My Son"

 + Lenten Midweek 3 – March 10, 2021 +

Exodus 14

Beautiful Savior Lutheran

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord. ¹¹ They said to Moses, “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt? ¹² Is not this what we said to you in Egypt: ‘Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”

 

It’s easy for us sitting here, separated by thousands of years and thousands of miles, to wag our fingers and shake our heads at Israel? If we were out there in the wilderness, surely we would’ve done better, right? Surely we’ve never grumbled as they did.

 

Who are we kidding, of course we have. The truth is, we have the same same prideful, ungrateful, sinful blood flowing through our veins. 

 

If Israel wasn’t complaining about the water, they were bickering about the manna. And if they weren’t bickering about the manna, they were whining about the terrain. And if they weren’t whining about the terrain they were grumbling and criticizing Moses himself. Sound familiar? It should. We are Israel. And like Israel, our only hope in this wilderness, the only way out of our exile in this fallen world, is God our Savior. 

 

What he has accomplished for Israel, he has accomplished for you. Down into Egypt the Lord sent Moses, staff in hand, as his chosen man. But the Lord did not send down Moses to save you. No, if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. So the Lord himself came down into this world, not just to do things right, but flawlessly. Perfectly. Not as an eighty year old man like Moses, but as a baby, born of our own flesh and blood, born of Mary for you. 

 

The Lord brought 10 plagues against Egypt before Pharaoh let the Israelites go. Yet Jesus did not come to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. The only one plagued when Christ came was the pharaoh of hell, whom Jesus attacked again and again. Not with hail or locusts, but with his living word. In the 9^th plague against Egypt, three days of darkness engulfed Egypt, followed by the 10^th plague, when the firstborn of Egypt died. But when our Lord Jesus came to rescue and free you, he endured three hours of darkness on the cross, followed by his own death = he who is the firstborn of the Father.

 

The Lamb of God takes away the sin of the world. He let Israel’s sin. Egypt’s sin. Our sin. All of it rained down on him as he became the Passover Lamb to set us free. His blood now marks not our the doorposts and lintels, but our very own lives – soul and body. For we are baptized into his bloody death and resurrection. Jesus feeds us a new Passover meal of his holy body and blood. Jesus is the Lamb of God who sheds his blood that death would Passover us and onto him. 

 

In this way, Jesus leads us, not out of slavery in Egypt like Israel of old, but out of captivity to the grave, a bondage of sin. He has shoveled back the 6 feet of dirt that covered our graves. He has smashed open the coffin in which we lay. And filled our lungs with the life giving Spirit of God. In Jesus we are dead to sin, and alive in Him. Jesus has loosed our bonds. Defeated sin, death, and the devil. Set you free.

 

Our fathers, the Israelites, were all under the cloud, and all passed through the Red Sea; all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea – as St. Paul says; all ate the same spiritual food and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were all drinking from the same spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ.

 

But you, the new Israel of God, have received far greater gifts in Christ. In Jesus, the Father has lavished his goodness upon you. For you are all under the Spirit as well. You have passed through the Red Sea of the font, where you were baptized into Jesus by water, word, and the Holy Spirit. We eat the food of the Spirit, the food Jesus gives that is his own body hidden in the bread, his blood hidden in the wine. All of this, not from the rock in the wilderness, but from the rock who is Christ.

 

Out of Egypt God called Israel. Out of Egypt God has called you as well. Out of Egypt. Out of slavery. Out of darkness and into his kingdom. Where you are his treasured people. His holy people. Where you are a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. The dark days of exile have come to an end. The day of salvation has dawned in Jesus crucified and risen for you, a day that shall never end.

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

Sermon for Lent 4: "Action-Packed Love"

 + Lent 4 – March 14, 2021 +

Series B: Numbers 21:4-9; Ephesians 2:1-10; John 3:14-21

Beautiful Savior Lutheran

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

We tend to think of love as an emotion, a heart-racing, warm fuzzy feeling – what Thumper refers to as being twitterpated in Disney’s Bambi. And while those things are certainly a part of God’s gift of love to us, love is also much greater than that. To paraphrase the classic rock band Boston, when it comes to Scripture, love is more than a feeling.

 

God reveals his love for us most often by his actions. By what he does for his people. Our scripture readings today unveil God’s loving actions for his people, for you.

 

In Numbers 21, despite the Israelites grumbling against God, despite their rebellion, despite their lack of faith in YHWH’s promises – still YHWH loves his people. when they deserved only punishment and death he sent rescue. A sign of his love. The Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole. And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.

 

In Ephesians 2, God’s love is an action as well. God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved.

 

The same is true of Jesus’ famous words in John 3. For Jesus, God’s love is action. His love is revealed in what he does for you. His Giving. Sending. Lifting up of Jesus in crucifixion for you. God loved the world in this way, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 

 

One of the New Testament’s favorite words for this action-packed love of God is a familiar one, agape. Agape love is love that points back to the source – to God himself who is love. God is agape, love. Self-giving, self-sacrificial love.

 

This kind of love is far different from the ways we think of love. Not only do we see love as an emotion, but so often we also see it as a transaction. “What’s in it for me?,” or “What do I get out of this?.” So often what we call love for others is really nothing more than love of ourselves. In our sinfulness we are the greatest objects of our love. And this is what St. Paul means when he says that we “were dead in our trespasses and sins.”

 

Thankfully, God’s love is not like our love. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. God loves the world in this manner; in this particular way. God gives his only begotten Son to be lifted up and crucified for you. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

 

God loves us – agapes us – with no regard for receiving. Jesus doesn’t ask what’s in it for him. His agape love is wholly focused on others – on you. On saving you, the object of God’s love. God loved the world in this way, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

 

God reveals his love for us in his gracious, merciful, loving action toward us. Just as it was for Israel. 

 

God gave the Israelites a sacramental sign back in their wilderness days. The Israelites had rebelled yet again, and grumbled and complained against Moses and against God. In judgment, God sent snakes into the camp, fiery snakes that caused horrific wounds and death. In mercy, God gave a curious antidote, a bronze serpent, the very image of the disease, raised up on a pole so that all the eyes of Israel could look on it. And in looking on it, they would live.

Strange as it sounds to us, that bronze serpent was a tangible token of God’s love for His people, rebellious, stubborn, and sinful though they were. To look on that image trusting in the promise of God was to live, to survive the venomous bite of the fire snakes. It was the only way to survive. 

 

In this we see a picture of humanity and of us. Snake-bitten with the venom of Sin coursing through our systems. It’s killing us and in the process bringing death and destructive. We are born into this world snake-bitten.

For Israel, there was nowhere to go except God’s promise. To look upon the bronze serpent he provided, the sign of his love. We’re no different. There is nowhere for us to go except to where God reveals his promise, his love. To the place where God enacts his love for you in the greatest way possible – the crucifixion of Jesus. 

In mercy and love, God gave His Son. Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life. In His death on the cross, Jesus is the bronzed serpent on the pole, the Antidote, the Cure, the Medicine of Immortality. To look on Him is to believe in Him, that is, to trust Him. 

This is the way God loves you. In giving His Son unto death for you. The Son loved the world by giving His life. God’s love for you is no less tangible than it was for Israel. Israel had a sign, something they could look and see – a bronze serpent. God does one better for us. Not a bronze serpent on a pole, but touchable, tangible, earthly things reveal his love for us – water, word, bread and wine. 

 

God loved you by bringing you to Baptism, by joining you to His beloved Son in His death. God loves you in His beloved Son. The Son loves you in giving you His Body and Blood to eat and drink. God loves you in putting His Word into your ears to hear. 

 

God’s love for you in Jesus is more than a feeling. It is his merciful, gracious, loving action. Jesus given, sent, lifted up, and crucified for you. If anything or anyone in life ever causes you to doubt God’s love for you, you need only look to the cross to see God’s love for you in Jesus. There, Jesus is given and lifted up for all the world to see God’s love for you. 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

Sermon for Lent 3: "Turning the Tables"

 + Lent 3 – March 7, 2021 +

Series B: Exodus 20:1-17; 1 Corinthians 1:18-31; John 2:13-25

Beautiful Savior Lutheran

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

 

Ever read a bible story or passage and after hearing it or reading it, you think to yourself, “what in the world is going on there?”

 

I imagine that same question runs through our mind as we hear John’s account of Jesus cleansing the temple. What’s going on? Why is Jesus fashioning weapons and making a scene in the temple? If Jesus did this today he’d be cancelled for exhibiting toxic masculinity, guilty of a microaggression, and sent to anger management. But of course none of that nonsense is going on. In fact, the emotion John mentions of Jesus is not anger, but zeal. Zeal for his Father’s house consumes Jesus. Zeal is a divine jealousy for the things of God and the people of God. This is his Father’s house, and no one else’s. God’s people are his people and belong to no one else. 

 

Jesus’ cleansing the temple is a sign of something new. The temple needed cleansing because in Jesus, the true and perfect sacrifice had come. In Jesus, the true and greater temple was built – not with hands, but from all eternity, and born of the Virgin to save you.  So Jesus cleanses the temple much like you clear a plot of land before building a new house. Jesus cleanses the temple as a sign that the temple location has shifted, from the stones of Herod’s temple to the solid walls of his own flesh and blood – the temple of his body – that will be crucified, destroyed, and in three days raised up again.

 

Still it’s quite the scene in John 2. Picture the livestock barns from the Puyallup fair set up around the sanctuary. Or tables currency exchange booths in the narthex. It was all rather chaotic. Oxen. Sheep. Pigeons. And moneychangers. All present in the courtyard area. Then Jesus starts wrapping leather straps together, and driving, herding them all out of the temple. Imagine the sound of coins cascading and ricocheting off the stone pavement, tables flipping like a bad family game night. 

 

It’s no accident that John tells us this all goes down at the time of the Passover. Passover means sacrifice. Blood. Atonement. Rescue. Remember John the Baptist’s words: Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The sacrificial Lamb, the atoning sacrifice. And in the OT, there’s only one place to do that – the temple.

 

In the Old Testament, following the pattern of the Tabernacle, the temple was the place where God dwelled with his people. Where God made himself known to his people. Where God met his people and gave them his holiness. Where God forgives sin. Where God and man are reconciled. 

 

The OT tabernacle and temple were the answer to the question – where do I go with my sin? After all, sin demands , requires a sacrifice, a payment, an atonement, a cleansing. God gave his answer in the form of the temple, the sacrifices, the blood. In God’s  you wanted forgiveness you went to the temple where God promised to forgive your sin and make atonement. But all of that – the tabernacle, the temple, the sacrifices, the oxen, sheep, and pigeons – they were all meant to point to the perfect sacrificial Lamb of God.

 

To Jesus. 

Jesus drives out the sacrificial animals and the money changers for he is the new temple. He is the perfect sacrifice. In Jesus, the true and perfect Passover Lamb of God has come. And he makes atonement by a greater exchange, not of gold or silver coins, but of his holy, precious blood, and his innocent suffering and death. 

 

Like God’s people in the Old Testament, our sin demands, requires a sacrifice. Payment. Atonement. Cleansing. Where will we find that? By our own hands? Certainly not. How can stained hands cleanse or purify anything? How can we stand before the Father when our hearts are so often consumed with zeal for wrongdoing and sin, with idolatry and misuse of God’s name? With nothing in our hands but our failure to honor authority, to care for our neighbor, to remain pure in heart and mind, to speak well of our neighbors’ reputation, to be content? God’s Law reveals our sin and a need for a a temple, for sacrifice – just as it did for Israel. Sins demand sacrifice, sacrifice demands a temple.

 

So, where do we go with our sin? Not to the temple in Jerusalem, but to the one whom the temple in Jerusalem pointed to. The one who fulfilled and accomplished everything that temple stood for. The one who stands in God’s presence with clean, purified, and pierced hands for you. The one who cleansed the temple and who cleanses you, casting aside anything and everything that comes between you and his promises.

 

You go where Christ is, where His Word is, where the Supper of His Body and Blood is. You go to the body of Christ. That is His temple.

 

Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up, Jesus said. The Jews wanted a sign. That was the sign. His death and resurrection. His sacrifice for sin and his rising again to new life. Jesus is the sign.

 

The stunning climax of this account is the revelation that the sacred temple of Jerusalem has been eclipsed and made obsolete. Jesus has come. Jesus is the temple. Jesus is the place where God and man are reconciled. Jesus is the place where one goes to meet God. Jesus is the place where God makes himself known to his people. The temple is irrelevant. Jesus is the only temple anyone needs. When Rome destroyed Herod’s temple in 70 AD, it was of little consequence to the community of believers—Rome had already destroyed the Temple decades before…but as predicted he rose, and he lives.

 

And in Jesus, you live. From the new and greater temple of his crucified and risen body, God’s holiness now extends to all nations, to all people, to you. 

 

In Jesus you are reconciled to the Father. Holy in God’s sight. Forgiven. Redeemed. Jesus is your payment for sins. Your atonement. Your new temple. In Jesus you hear the Scriptures – as the disciples did after Jesus’ resurrection – and believe the word he speaks to you. In Jesus, you receive the true Passover meal of Jesus’ holy body and blood. In Jesus, the temple of God in human flesh, simple water and words are given to cleanse and purify you that you, in His saving name, become a temple of the Holy Spirit. 

 

Jesus’ disciples didn’t understand this until after Jesus had risen from the dead, after the temple of His body had been destroyed and in three days He raised it up again. Your body too is a temple, a dwelling place of the Holy Spirit. It too will be destroyed in death. And like the body of Jesus, He will raise you too, as He Himself rose. The Sin and Death destroy this body of yours, nevertheless Jesus will raise it up again. Not in three days, but on the Day of His appearing.

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.