Advent Midweek III:
“Savior of the Nations, Come: His Throne”[1]
December 14, 2016
Text: John 19:16-22
The account of Jesus’
crucifixion may seem a strange reading for Advent. I mean, we’re prepared for
prophecies about His coming and accounts of His birth during this holy season,
but by the glow of Christmas lights and the Yule log, the crucifixion can be… a
bit of a downer. But we’ve missed what Christmas is if we forget why He came.
He came to die. Christmas is what it is in all its glory because of Good
Friday. Otherwise this is just the birth of another baby to another
peasant-girl. And while every birth is special, it’s an everyday occurrence. It
is the purpose of this birth that sets it apart. Jesus is born to die.
And to rise again, but that resurrection can only happen out of death. The
newborn King claims His throne when He is nailed to it for the life of the
world. He dies for His subjects. He dies for all people. He dies for you. And
in so dying, He claims you for Himself. Hark, this is the peace on earth the herald angels were singing about: His death. “Glory to the newborn King.”
No
matter how you cut it, Jesus doesn’t live up to human conceptions of kingship.
The Jews of Jesus’ day were not against the Messiah coming. But they expected a
Messiah who would be mighty and powerful, lead a military revolution, and rule
as earthly King over an independent Israel. When Jesus didn’t live up to their
expectations, they plotted how they might trap Him, arrest Him, and deliver Him
over to death. Jesus’ own disciples were no better. Even after His
resurrection, they asked Him, “Lord,
will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6; ESV). They
were thinking too small. They failed to understand that by His crucifixion
Jesus had restored the Kingdom to spiritual
Israel, the Church, claiming a Kingdom and a people for His own possession,
purchasing us from sin and death by His own sinless blood and death.
Jesus
is not the kind of king we expect,
either. We expect a king who will make our lives better, easier, who will not
allow bad things to happen to us, or who will immediately pick us up and brush
us off if they do. We expect a king who shares our values rather than imposing
His own upon us. We expect a king who will shatter our enemies and exalt us as
the favored nation. In reality, our expectations of the King aren’t that much
different than the Jews and disciples.
Jesus
is none of that. Not in the way we think, anyway. Jesus is the King whose power
is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor. 12:9). Jesus is the King who gives Himself
up totally for the sake of His people. He is the King who comes not to be
served, but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many (Matt. 20:28).
He is the King of the universe, the Son of God, who leaves His heavenly throne
to take up residence in the womb of the Virgin Mary, who becomes flesh and
makes His dwelling among us (John 1:14), who is laid in a manger because there
is no room for Him in the inn, who grows up in a carpenter’s family, who
surrounds Himself with fishermen and other commoners, eats with tax collectors
and sinners, is despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted
with grief (Is. 53:3). This is the King who is betrayed by a kiss, who
willingly gives Himself into the hands of His enemies, though at any moment He
could call upon His Father in heaven and be rescued by more than twelve legions
of angels (Matt. 26:53). This is the King who is tried before earthly rulers,
the Sanhedrin, Herod, Pontius Pilate (who declares Him innocent). His Kingdom
is not of this world (John 18:36). Nor is He a king the world would embrace.
This is the King who is clothed in royal purple, worshiped in mockery by the
soldiers, given a reed scepter and beaten with it, spat upon, and crowned with
thorns. He is scourged and led in royal procession outside of the city, where
He is nailed to His throne, the blessed and holy cross, lifted up and exalted
between two criminals, forsaken of the Father, suffering all hell. For you. For
His subjects. And there He dies. He dies to make you His own, that you may live
under Him in His Kingdom and serve Him.
Pilate
writes the truth. “Jesus of Nazareth,
King of the Jews” (John 19:19). Here He is, enthroned on high, for us and
for our salvation. The devil, the world, and fallen humanity thought they had
conquered this King once and for all that Good Friday. But on the Third Day He
would emerge from the grave victorious over all His enemies. Glory to the
newborn King, who came to die that we might live.
By
nature we rebel against our crucified King. We reject Him as our King and as
our Savior. We want to rule ourselves. We want to save ourselves. Or at least
we want Him to rule and save us on our own terms. We want strength, not
weakness. We want glory, not the cross. But there’s no salvation in that. There
is salvation in no one else, for there is no other Name under heaven given
among men by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12). Jesus is the King. And He
comes to us in weakness, that we might share in His glory. He comes to us in
weakness still: Words and water and bread and wine. But in these weak vessels
there is great power: the Holy Spirit, the washing away of sin, the true body
and blood of Jesus for the forgiveness of sins. Don’t let the appearance of the
vessels fool you, any more than you should let the appearance of the King
Himself in His earthly ministry, suffering, and death fool you. This is
Almighty God come to His people. Because we cannot ascend to Him. He descends
to us. He comes to us, in weakness, by which His power is made perfect.
And
there is no other way. This King must die to save His people. So He does so,
willingly, in love. No earthly King would do what He did. No earthly King could
do what He did. And that is why Christmas is what it is. We don’t celebrate
just because a baby was born. We don’t celebrate because that baby was the
symbol of hope, or even the symbol of God’s love. We celebrate because that
baby is hope incarnate, God’s love in the flesh, poured out on the
cross. Christmas is meaningless without the cross. Even at Christmas we say
with St. Paul, “I decided to know
nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2).
Worship the newborn King by beholding Him on His cross, and receiving the
benefits of that cross as they are delivered to you in the means of grace.
Because in that way you live joyfully in Jesus’ Kingdom. This (Christ
crucified) is King of the Jews. By this, we have God’s peace on earth, God’s
goodwill toward men. In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the
Holy Spirit. Amen.
[1] The theme and many of the points made in this
sermon are taken from Savior of the Nations (St. Louis: Concordia,
2009).
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