Second Sunday of Easter

Second Sunday of Easter (C)

April 27, 2025

Text: John 20:19-31

Alleluia!  Christ is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!

            I confess it.  I have this deep longing to see Jesus.  With these eyes.  To touch Him.  To hear His Voice in these waxy, stopped up ears.  To talk to Him.  To have a give and take.  Questions answered.  Concerns addressed.  And to know, from His own mouth, that all I’ve believed, all to which I’ve dedicated my life… that it’s true.  That all that is wrong, will be, and is being, righted.  That the End will be everything He’s promised.  That it’s worth it to endure all this… the devil, the world, my own stinking sack of sinful flesh and bones.  I confess it.  I’d like to see Him.  To meet Him.  And maybe then I’d never doubt again.  Maybe then I’d have no trouble holding fast.  Maybe.  Maybe. 

            So I have some sympathy for St. Thomas.  Thomas is my middle name, after all.  “Doubting Thomas,” we call him, virtue-signaling our own self-righteousness.  Well, don’t we want the same thing?  Okay, maybe not to poke around in the wounds.  That’s a bit much.  Though, certainly, to see them.  And… yes, to handle His crucified, now risen body.  Be taken up into His embrace.  Satisfy the five senses, that it really is true: Jesus Christ is risen from the dead.  And to know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that that is the answer to everything.

            Thomas wanted that.  And he got it!  He wasn’t with the disciples that first Easter evening when Jesus appeared in their midst and showed them the wounds.  And when they told Thomas, he didn’t believe their testimony.  He insisted on seeing for himself, and touching, poking, inserting his digits in the nail holes.  Only then would he believe. 

            My, how things changed when the Lord came again, eight days later (as we are gathered, here today, eight days later), and this time Thomas was among them.  Jesus gives Thomas the invitation.  “Go head.  Put your finger here in my hands.  Stick your hand into my side.”  We don’t know if Thomas does it.  But we do know that all that doubting business is out the window.  In utter astonishment, he confesses: “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28; ESV).  What a wonderful, high, orthodox Christology, by the way.  Thomas knew, “This Man standing before me, with visible, mortal wounds, yet risen and living… this Man is my God!”  What makes the difference between the man who doubted just moments before, and the man who now makes this confession?  You know what I think it is?  The wounds, yes.  And this: The words!  The creative and performative Words Jesus speaks, and it is so.  What are they?  “Do not disbelieve, but believe” (v. 27).  And he does.  “Let there be light” (Gen. 1:3).  And there is light.

            And here is the point.  The important thing for Thomas, and therefore for us, is not the seeing.  We Lutherans know better than that.  Seeing is not believing.  Two things transformed doubting Thomas into believing and confessing theologian Thomas.  The presentation of the wounds.  And the Word of the Lord that makes things so.  Well, we have that.  Right here and now.  Jesus is speaking His creative Word of Life to us at this very moment.  And then He’s going to give us His body… the body with the holes in it, that was nailed to the cross.  And His blood… the blood poured out from the holes and the riven side.  The Word and the wounds.  We’ve got ‘em.  He gives ‘em.  Hidden in the mouth of a preacher and under bread and wine.  And, this is counterintuitive, but it is actually better for us that Jesus does it this way, than just suddenly appearing to us face to face.  He could do that.  He is here, after all.  Bodily.  But He doesn’t.  Why might that be?

            If you were sitting at home one evening in your favorite chair, pondering… maybe a glass of wine… quiet… solitude… thinking over the questions you have, the concerns you’d like Jesus to address, the answers to your doubts… and suddenly, wam, there is Jesus, in your living room, visibly…  Well, first of all, it’d probably scare you to death.  Remember (and we know this particularly from Luke), when the risen Jesus appeared to the Apostles, their first reaction was generally mortal fear.  That is why Jesus had to speak His Word of Peace: “Peace be with you” (John 20:19, 26).  But then, let’s say you have your conversation.  And it’s wonderful.  It’s everything you’ve dreamed of.  And you go to bed with a peace unlike you’ve ever felt before, and you sleep like a baby.  And then you wake up, and…  Did that really happen?  Was it a dream?  Was it that glass of wine?  Am I crazy?

            Signs and wonders have a shelf life.  I think this is what St. Peter means, when he’s reminiscing about seeing the Transfiguration on the holy mountain, and he says, essentially, “that was wonderful.  But now, understand, we have something more sure.”  And what is that?  “the prophetic word… to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts” (2 Peter 1:19).  You can know, very easily, what really happened, as opposed to what you dreamt, when you read it in the Word.  When you hear it proclaimed.  The Word is the vehicle the Lord has given, by which we can know with certainty what is really true.  And it is a powerful Word, the breath of the risen Lord, imparting His Holy Spirit… Jesus “breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’” (John 20:22).  And the result is living faith in the Lord Jesus Christ: “these [things] are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (v. 31).  These things are written, that you may confess with St. Thomas, that “this Man, with the mortal wounds, yet risen and living, is my Lord and my God!”  “Do not disbelieve, but believe.”  In fact, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (v. 29).  Who believe on account of the disciples’ testimony.  Who believe on account of the Words.

            The Word and the Wounds.  Scripture, Preaching, and Sacrament.  It is the encounter you are longing for.  Oh, I know, you still want a local and visible presence, not just an aural and sacramental one.  I get it.  That will come.  Eternally.  In the End.  But in the meantime, here He is.  Jesus Christ.  Your Lord and your God.  And you can talk to Him about all the things that trouble you and cause you to doubt.  In fact, you should.  We call that prayer.  And if you don’t have the words, and don’t know what to say, just peruse the Psalms.  You’ll find the words there.  And just sing a few of the hymns in your hymn book.  They will help you.  And know that, though you cannot see Him, He is there.  Listening.  And if you want to hear His voice, just open up to the Gospel and read. 

            Let’s not forget our dear sister, St. Ellie Warmbier, who laid down in her bed one night, propped up on her side, and opened up the Scriptures.  She wanted to hear her Savior’s voice.  She began to read.  The Words impressed themselves on her mind.  The Words of Jesus, her Lord and her God.  And she was listening.  And then she looked up to see Him there.  And hear Him with her own ears.  And that is the position the nurse found her in the next morning. 

            That is how it will be with you.  All at once, you will see Him face to face.  Not as in a daydream or a fairy tale, but really, tangibly, bodily.  Heaven is more real than anything you’ve ever experienced in this life.  You’ll see Him.  Risen, but with the wounds.  And you’ll hear Him.  The voice you’ve always known since He made you His own.  And touch Him.  The body you’ve embraced at the altar, Lord’s Day after Lord’s Day.  And He will console you, and wipe away your tears.

            And then, at just the right moment, He will raise your body from death.  And He’ll raise St. Thomas, and St. Ellie.  And together, we’ll cry to Him, “My Lord and my God.”  Because the Lord will have taken away all our doubts.  And believing… well, it’s not simply that we will… we do… we have life in His Name.  Alleluia!  Christ is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.                 

The Resurrection of Our Lord

The Resurrection of Our Lord (C)

April 20, 2025

Text: Luke 24:1-12

Alleluia!  Christ is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!

            Remember.  “Remember how he told you…” (Luke 24:6; ESV).  Remember what?  “(T)hat the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise” (v. 7).  “And they remembered his words…” (v. 8).  Remember.  Remember what He said.  Remember what He has now done.  Remember… Jesus, who died for you on the cross, making atonement for all your sins, is now risen from the dead.  Bodily.  Victorious over sin, death, and the very devil.  As He promised.  And beloved, that changes everything, and makes all things new.

            Remember that when your sins trouble you.  Persistent sins.  Occasional sins.  Sins of the past that insist on haunting you.  Guilt.  Shame.  Fear.  Remember… Your Lord Jesus Christ has taken all those sins away.  He absolves your guilt and covers your shame, so there is no reason to fear.  Because all of that has been put to death in His body on the tree.  And He, Himself, is risen, and lives.  You are baptized into that reality.  His death is your death.  His resurrection is your new life now, and bodily resurrection on the Last Day.  His atonement has done your sins to death.  His righteousness is your justification before God.  Remember that.  Remember.  That is what He says.

            Remember that when the devil tempts or accuses you.  When he tempts you, say to him, “My dear devil, my Lord Jesus suffered and died for me on the cross, and is risen, and lives for me, and loves me.  How can I now deny Him by rebelling against Him and living for myself?  No.  Be gone, Satan.  I live in my Jesus, and for my Jesus.  I love my Jesus, who so loves me.”  And when he accuses you, that wily serpent, that enemy of mankind, then heed the advice of Dr. Luther: “When the devil throws our sins up to us and declares that we deserve death and hell, we ought to speak thus: ‘I admit that I deserve death and hell.  What of it?  Does this mean that I shall be sentenced to eternal damnation?  By no means.  For I know One who suffered and made satisfaction in my behalf.  His name is Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  Where he is, there I shall be also.’”[1]  Christ is risen.  Therefore, I live.

            And remember that when death alarms you.  In the face of terror or tragedy.  When you grieve the death of a loved one.  When one you love, or you yourself, suffer mortality’s symptoms, death’s hors d'oeuvres of pain, disease, or injury.  Remember it in your last hour, when you hear the bell tolling for thee.  Jesus died and rose again, as He said.  And now, what does He say to you?  “I am the resurrection and the life.  Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die” (John 11:25-26).  Remember that Jesus has blazed the trail.  He walked through the valley of the shadow and blasted a hole out the other side.  Now, He leads us through death, to life everlasting.  Even as He rose from the dead, bodily, so He will raise us, bodily.  Remember that, because that is what He says. 

            Remember that when all you can see with your mortal eyes is the brokenness and filth of it all.  The fallenness.  The insanity.  The whole world in dark delusion.  Remember: On the first Day of the week, at early dawn, the women came to anoint a dead body.  But they didn’t find one.  Instead, they found that the stone had been rolled away, and that the tomb was empty.  And two men in dazzling apparel… it is safe to say they are holy angels… reminded them.  They ought not look for the living among the dead.  “He is not here, but has risen.  Remember how he told you” (Luke 24:6).

            Beloved, remember.  Remember the Words.  Remember by hearing them again and again, at every opportunity.  By reading them, confessing them, and being immersed, by God, in them.  And then, in the face of all that is wrong, and sad, and hurts you, say, boldly and confidently: “Nevertheless, Christ is risen!”  And then, with Dr. Luther: “Nevertheless, I am baptized.”  That is, “I, too, have died with Christ, and have been raised from death with Christ.  My sins are forgiven.  I am loved.  The serpent’s head is crushed.  And death?  Death is living on borrowed time.  Alleluia!  Christ is risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!  He is making all things new.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen. 

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[1] Luther: Letters of Spiritual Counsel, Theodore G. Tappert, Ed. (Westminster/John Knox, 1955) pp. 86-87.

Vigil of Easter

Good Friday Tenebrae

Good Friday Tenebrae

April 18, 2025

Text: John 19

            The Gospels record seven words, or sayings, of Jesus from the cross.  The hymn, “Jesus, in Your Dying Woes,” LSB 447, though we aren’t singing it tonight, is a good meditation on all seven words, and may be a good exercise for your private devotion this evening, or tomorrow, as you anticipate our Lord’s resurrection.  As we heard the Passion, the account of our Lord’s suffering and death, from the Gospel according to St. John this evening, the Spirit confronted us with three of those seven words: “Woman, behold, your son! … Behold, your mother” (John 19:26-27; ESV), “I thirst” (v. 28), and “It is finished” (v. 30).  Tonight, I’d like to say a word about each of these. 

            “Woman, behold, your son! … Behold, your mother.”  See how Jesus cares for His dear mother, Mary.  See how He cares for the disciple whom He loves.  It is as David prays in the Psalm: “God settles the solitary in a home” (Ps. 68:6).  Oh, my Jesus, what would you teach me here?  Our Father, who lives in eternal relation to His Son, and to the Holy Spirit, in the perfect Communion of His own tri-unity, has created you and me in His image, to live in relation and perfect Communion with Him, and with one another.  Sin has broken our relation to God, our Communion with Him, and it continually breaks our relation and Communion with each other.  On the cross, the Lord Jesus stretches out His arms to bring together again what sin has separated, to mend what is broken and make it whole.  For you.  Your relationship to God restored.  And so also your relationships to one another.  With whom do you need reconciliation?  Pursue it by the power of Christ’s cross.  His blood cleanses you of all sin: Your sin against God.  Your sin against others.  Others’ sin against you.  So go… forgiven by God… and forgive.  And confess your sins to your neighbor, and be forgiven.  And also, rejoice.  It is not good that the man should be alone.  So God has given you a Family.  His Family.  Those do the will of the Father (Mark 3:35).  Those who believe in Jesus Christ, and are united with Christ.  The Baptized.  The Church.  God puts you in relation, in Communion.  He points to you and says to His Church, “Woman, behold, your son,” your daughter.  He points to His Church and says to you, “Behold, your mother.”  And behold your brothers and sisters in Christ.  By His blood and death the Lord Jesus gives you to live in faith toward Him, and in fervent love toward one another.

            Then, “I thirst.”  It is not merely cracked lips and parched tongue, longing for liquid relief, of which Jesus speaks.  He is drinking the cup of God’s wrath over your sin, to the bitter dregs.  He is doing it in your place.  Because He thirsts for a better cup for you, the cup of grace, the cup of blessing which we bless.  Oh, my Jesus, what must I know of Your thirst?  The Blessed One hungers and thirsts after your righteousness (Matt. 5:6), your justification.  And He will only be satisfied by providing you with His own perfect righteousness, credited freely to your account.  It can only happen by His emptying Himself, pouring Himself out, paying your debt.  And that is what He does in His suffering.  Now, when He cries out, the bystanders take a hyssop branch… that is the branch used to paint the doorposts and lintels of the Israelites with the blood of the lamb the first Passover in Egypt, the night of the Exodus… they take a hyssop branch, and with it they lift a sponge soaked in wine-vinegar to his lips.  So it is, again, as David prays in another Psalm: “They gave me poison for food, and for my thirst they gave me sour wine to drink” (Ps. 69:21).  What is happening?  Jesus is ingesting the poison.  He is soaking up the sour.  On the cross, Jesus frees you from all bitterness and gall.  Give it up to Him.  He swallows it up to the very last drop.  It is no longer yours to savor.  So… exchange, now, sour for sweet.  There is no more wrath.  Not from God.  It is all expended on Jesus.  Therefore, hold no more wrath toward anyone else.  That would be poison to you.  Instead, take up the Cup of Salvation, the atoning and cleansing blood of Jesus Christ that restores you to God, and to His people, in one Holy Communion.  And call on the Name of the Lord.  Render thanks (Ps. 116).  Drink, and be satisfied.  Be healed.  Be whole.  Jesus thirsts for your thirst thus to be quenched. 

            And finally, “It is finished.”  What is finished?  Again, the wrath of God.  The Sacrifice of Atonement.  Your sin.  Your death.  Oh, my Jesus, how may I rest in Your finished work?  Our Lord won our salvation on the cross, but He distributes His victory to us in the divinely appointed means of His Word and His holy Sacraments.  It is as David prays in yet another Psalm: “it shall be told of the LORD to the coming generation: they shall come and proclaim his righteousness to a people yet unborn, that he has done it” (Ps. 22:30-31).  He has accomplished it.  He has brought it to completion, to fulfillment.  He has finished it.  We receive it here and now in the preaching.  Jesus speaks His Word from the cross, and so His Word goes out from the cross, to deliver the cross into your ears.  And by water, onto your body.  And by bread and wine, His true body and blood, into your mouth, into your body.  To sweep you up into His redemption, body and soul. 

            Beloved, live in His finished work.  Live in His Family.  Drink deeply from His Cup.  Your sins are forgiven.  And you know that this Holy Week does not end in death, with a dead and impotent God.  Night has come.  That is true.  But already, the sun is poised to rise.  Already, we anticipate the rays of light cracking through the stone-sealed tomb.  Take your Sabbath rest tomorrow, and prepare for the coming of the Dawn.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.               

Maundy Thursday

Palm Sunday/ Sunday of the Passion

Palm Sunday/ Sunday of the Passion (C)

April 13, 2025

Text: John 12:12-19; Luke 22:1-23:56

            Hosanna is a Hebrew word that means “Save us!”  We use it as an exclamation of praise, and it certainly is that, and was used that way in the Scriptures.  But it is first of all a prayer, and it is a prayer for our most basic need.  Salvation.  The word is directly related to the name “Joshua,” our Lord’s Hebrew Name, Yehoshua, Yeshua, “YHWH saves.”  Hosanna, we pray.  And when any Christian prays that prayer, God in heaven hears and answers.  He answers with Jesus.  He sends His Son.  God comes down.  In the flesh.  He comes to save.  “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!” (John 12:13; ESV).  So the people cried, praying Psalm 118, as the Lord Jesus entered Jerusalem on a colt, fulfilling the Scripture.  It was recorded by the Prophet Zechariah: “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!  Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem!  Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey” (Zech. 9:9).  “Hosanna,” the people cry, “save us!”  God responds by sending His Son, whose Name means “The LORD saves.”  Hosanna.  Yeshua.  Prayer and response.  Jesus is always God’s answer to our prayer.

            Hosanna.  Save us.  This is what King Solomon prayed for at the dedication of the Temple.[1]  Solomon prayed that God would always hear the prayers of those who pray toward the place of which God promises, “My name shall be there” (1 Kings 8:29).  In the Old Testament this was the Temple in Jerusalem, the dwelling place of the Ark of the Covenant with its mercy seat (the throne of God!), and the place of Sacrifice.  These things pointed forward to Jesus, the One who “comes in the name of the Lord,” who is Himself the mercy seat and the sacrifice.  Solomon prayed that God would hear all who pray toward the Temple in their many and various afflictions, and that for the sake of His Name He would rescue, release, forgive, save.  That is, after all, the pattern of our God.  He heard the cries of His people in Egyptian bondage.  He sent Moses to speak in His Name, and He Himself led the people out of their slavery, through the Red Sea and the wilderness, into the Promised Land.  He led them with His own presence in the pillar of cloud by day and fire by night.  He dwelt with His people.  His glory descended on the Tabernacle.  He met with Moses face to face.  Make no mistake.  This is Jesus.  The LORD heard the prayers of His people, Hosanna, save us.  His answer is Jesus. 

            You wouldn’t know this from the English translation, but again and again in the Psalms and throughout the Hebrew Scriptures God’s people pray some form of the word from which we get “Hosanna.”  It is translated “save.”  Save me.  Save us.  Save the king.  Simply: Save.  In other words, again and again the people of God, even in the Old Testament, pray the Name “Jesus.”  Isn’t that amazing?  And God answers, finally, and decisively, by sending Jesus.  Hosanna.  Save us.  Jesus.  The LORD saves.  It reminds me of the hymn we sang in the midweek service a couple of weeks ago, “Jesus, in Your Dying Woes” (LSB 447), every verse ending, “Hear us, holy Jesus.”  Or the very moving closing hymn last Sunday, “Lamb of God, Pure and Holy” (LSB 434), as we cry at the end of each verse, “O Jesus!  O Jesus!”  It was the cry of the 21 Coptic martyrs on the beach in Libya in 2015, as their throats were slit by Islamic terrorists.  Jesus!  The Lord saves!  Lord, save us.  Hosanna. 

            So it is no accident that the people cry “Hosanna,” as our Lord rides into Jerusalem to accomplish His saving work.  In addressing that word, that prayer, to Him, they are confessing Him to be the Messiah!  They are confessing Him to be God’s answer to their prayers.  Now, to be sure, they may not understand just what it entails that Jesus is the answer to their Hosannas.  We know that many were expecting Messiah to claim the Kingship of Israel in such a way as to deliver the nation from Roman tyranny.  Others wanted healing miracles and bread in abundance.  And lest we forget, this crowd has assembled because Jesus had just raised Lazarus from the dead.  We all want a King who can do that.  But Jesus is not a politician.  And even though He can actually deliver on His promises, and does that very thing, His Kingdom is not of this world.  The great mystery of it all is this: God’s answer to our Palm Sunday prayer is the Passion of our Lord.  God’s answer to our Hosanna is God dead on the cross.  That is the relationship between what we did at the beginning of the service with our palms and procession of joyful singing, and what we did shortly after, as we solemnly heard the account of our Lord’s suffering and death for us in its entirety from the Gospel according to St. Luke.  Hosanna, we pray.  Save us.  The Lord does it, by suffering and bleeding and dying.  This is not what anyone expected.  But it is how the Lord accomplishes our salvation.  Jesus reigns from the cross.  Jesus saves us on the cross.  Our prayer is answered on the cross.  This is what Holy Week is all about.

            And what of us now?  The cross was nearly 2000 years ago, and still we have reason to cry, “Hosanna!  Save us!”  There are the sins that beset us, the relationships we have broken, the loneliness, the shame, the despair that can set in deep down in our souls.  There is cancer.  There is war.  There are the promises of politicians, mostly broken, and nearly all of them impotent… every one of them, without exception unable to save us.  There is deep anxiety because we know that things are not right.  We need saving.  And if the cross is God’s answer, we need help if we are to see how.  A distant God who died for you two millennia ago, but has no contact with you now, is not a real Savior.  But that is not our God.  Remember that God answers our Hosanna by coming.  He comes down.  Jesus comes.  That is how He delivers the salvation of the cross.  He comes to you, in the flesh, just as surely as He came into the womb of the Virgin Mary, just as surely as His hands and feet were nailed to the tree and His sacred, kingly head crowned with thorns.  He comes to you in water and words and bread and wine, delivering the gifts of His salvation.  It is His voice you hear, forgiving your sins.  It is His blood with which you are washed in the font.  It is His body you eat and His blood you drink, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.  This is the medicine that heals you, body and soul.  His flesh is the bread of life in abundance.  He is the King who redeems you from the tyranny of sin, of death, and of the devil.  He is risen from the dead, and He will call you out of the grave on the Last Day, just as He called Lazarus.  And you will never die again.  He promises.  And He delivers.  Hosanna is a prayer for all occasions.  We always need His saving.  And He always saves.  “Hosanna,” we pray.  “Jesus,” God answers. 

            It is right, then, that the prayer, “Hosanna, save us,” has also become an exclamation of praise.  For His saving us is an accomplished fact in Christ crucified and risen from the dead.  You will see it when He comes again in glory.  Oh, how we long for that Day.  Come, Lord Jesus.  Hosanna.  Come, and save us.  He will.  He is coming soon.  In the meantime, He does not leave us on our own.  We sing the song of the Palm Sunday crowd every time we come to the altar.  We sing the Sanctus: “Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna in the highest… blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord” (LSB 195).  We pray “Hosanna,” and what does He do?  He comes down and feeds us with His body and blood.  He forgives our sins.  He saves us.  “Hosanna,” we pray.  God’s answer is Jesus.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.          

  

 

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[1] He does not use the word “Hosanna,” but here he connects God’s salvation and His Name.

Lenten Midweek V

Lenten Midweek V: “Faith, Love, and the Keeping of the Commandments”

April 9, 2025

Text: 1 John 5:1-5

            St. Augustine summarizes our text: “To love the children of God is to love the Son of God; to love the Son of God is to love the Father.  Nobody can love the Father without loving the Son, and anyone who loves the Son will love the other children as well.”[1]

            Love, though, we must understand, is always practical, always active.[2]  You know this already, and I’ve said it ad nauseum, but if you don’t know, know it now: Love is not a feeling.  It is not an emotion (though it is wonderful when good feelings and emotions accompany love).  Love is decision.  It is action.  It is an act of the will.  It is seeking after the good of, and doing good to, and for, the beloved.  So John says, essentially: You want to love God, and therefore your neighbor?  Do the Commandments.  It’s really that simple. 

            John has in mind, here, the Ten Commandments, but particularly as Jesus divides them for us in the Gospels.  When asked, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” (Matt. 22:36; ESV), Jesus answers, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the great and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.  On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets” (vv. 37-40).

            So, how do you love God (the Great and First Commandment)?  By doing according to the First Table of the Law, as you may remember calling it in Catechism class.  That is, the first three of the Ten Commandments dealing with our relationship to God.  Don’t have any other gods.  God doesn’t want to share you with divine pretenders, frauds, false gods.  Worship Him alone, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Fear, love, and trust in Him alone, and above all things.  Don’t misuse His Name by cursing, swearing, using satanic arts, lying, or deceiving by His Name.  Instead, use it rightly: Call upon it in every trouble, pray, praise, and give thanks.  And remember the Sabbath Day by keeping it holy.  Sabbath, as you know, for New Testament Christians, is not a day (Saturday, like it was in the Old Testament), but a Man, Jesus, in whom we rest, because He has completed the work of our salvation.  We do that, not by despising preaching and His Word, but holding that Word sacred, and gladly hearing and learning it.  So that is the Great and First Commandment: Have God as your God.  Love Him, not just by warm and fuzzy feelings, but by living under Him as your Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. 

            Then, how do you love your neighbor (the Second Commandment like unto the First?)?  By doing according to the Second Table to of the Law, again, as you may remember calling it in Catechism class.  That is, the rest of the Ten Commandments dealing with our relationship to other people.  Parents and other authorities need you not to despise them, but to honor them, serve and obey them, love and cherish them.  And frankly, things go better for your when you do just that.  Your neighbor needs you not to murder him, or harm him, or even just despise him in your heart and make his life bitter.  Your spouse needs you not to be unfaithful, and all your neighbors need you to not to misuse their bodies for your own pleasure.  Your neighbor needs you not to take his stuff, gossip about him, or covetously scheme to take away the blessings God has bestowed on him.  Instead, love for your neighbor leads you to do concrete things that help him in his physical need; that promote good and godly marriages and procreation, chastity and modesty; that help each to enjoy the blessings God has given in terms of property, prosperity, reputation, and security.  Love your neighbor, not simply by having a big heart for him (as ambiguously wonderful as that may be), but doing what he needs you to do for him, and not doing what will hurt or harm him. 

            And this overcomes the world.  You know this, the world… as in the unbelieving mass of people ruled (temporally) by Satan and the demons… the world does not love God or the neighbor.  There is a lot of talk about love for humanity, love for our fellow-man (or woman, or feline-identifying person, or whatever).  In the world, you live for yourself.  That’s it.  Your comfort.  Your convenience.  Your preferences.  Whatever brings you, personally, pleasure.  “Me first!”  You see this in the way people drive.  You see it in the way people interact in public places.  Heads buried in screens.  Few, if any, greetings.  Few, if any, “pardon mes”.  This is just scratching the surface of the mountain of evidence.  We see it particularly in our political discourse, and how we treat those who think differently than our favorite talking heads tell us we think.  Christians are not immune to this attitude.  Where you find it in yourself, repent.  Turn.  Change your mind.  Eyes (and ears!) back on Christ.

            Instead, loved by God, forgiven and redeemed by the death and resurrection of Christ, the Law of God having been perfectly fulfilled by the Lord Jesus and credited to your account… in other words, freed!... do the counter-cultural thing.  Love your neighbor.  Really and truly.  And then, know that loving your neighbor is also loving God, who loves your neighbor as His own.  I mean, really, think about this: One way to love your friends is to love and care for their kids.  If you say you love your friend, but tell him you really hate his kids, I’m guessing that relationship is rather doomed.  Faith in Jesus Christ is always overflowing in love.  Love for God.  Which necessarily means love for those He loves.  And it all flows, as John has said all along, from God’s love for us in Christ.  “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). 

            Jesus’ love for us is not warm and fuzzy feelings in His heart.  It is practical.  It is active.  Remember, in the Upper Room, when Jesus tied the towel around His waist and washed His disciples’ feet (John 13)?  That is the alternate Gospel reading for Maundy Thursday.  We won’t get it this year, but it’s good to call to mind.  He does the washing, and then He commands His disciples, His Church, to do likewise, to do it for one another.  What’s up with that?  I was just having this discussion with my dentist.  “What does the foot washing mean?  Why don’t most Churches have a foot washing ceremony?”  (There I was, mouth full of instruments…)  “Well,” I said, “Jesus was not instituting another Sacrament, or sacramental, or liturgical custom.  Instead, He was teaching us about the active, practical nature of love.”  First of all, His for His disciples.  Jesus, the Son of God and Lord of all, stooped down and did the task of a lowly slave.  Washing the gunk and grime of the dusty, or muddy, excrement-littered first century Palestinian roads from His disciples’ cracked and calloused feet.  But this is about His love for you, too.  Remember how Peter, after Jesus overcomes his initial objections, wants his whole body washed, and Jesus says that he who has bathed only needs to wash his feet?  The bathing corresponds to your Baptism into Christ, where you are washed totally, head to toe, body and soul, by water and the Word, in His righteousness.  He does that for you only once.  One Baptism.  But as you live in your Baptism, you pick up all sorts of filth.  The sins you commit.  The sins committed against you.  And so, He continually washes the gunk and grime and worse from your feet, which is to say, He pronounces His Absolution over you, forgives your sins, time and time again.  As often as you need it.  Which, of course, is a return to your Baptism, the continuing effects of your Bath.  So that is the first thing.  Jesus’ practical and active love for you. 

            But then, you do likewise, He says.  Not literally a foot-washing (although, maybe that, if that is what is needed).  But in love for your neighbor, whom God loves… and in love for God who loves your neighbor… stoop down and do the lowly work.  Put God first, by putting your neighbor ahead of yourself.  Wash off the filth of his sins by forgiving him.  And then do the Commandments toward him by helping him in his every need of body and soul.  Practical, active things.  Thought, word, and deed.  Assume the best about him.  Think good things about him.  Speak encouraging words.  Greetings with God’s blessings.  Are you short on money?  Here, have some of mine.  Are you hungry?  Come to dinner.  And let’s go grocery shopping afterwards.  Need a ride?  Sure, I can help.  Etc., etc.  Put to death in you whatever is inconsistent with that.  “You first,” not “me first.” 

            And see, this isn’t burdensome, because when you love someone, you want what is good for them.  You do this with your kids.  I hope.  You should.  With your spouse.  With your friends.  Do it with your brothers and sisters in Christ, here in the pews.  And with your neighbor in the world, who needs to know Christ.  It is simply living in the love Christ Jesus pours out on you.  You are not doing these things to be righteous for Christ.  You are doing these things because you are righteous in Christ.  Because He is your righteousness. 

            Because He loved you, practically and actively.  He put His flesh and blood into it.  The Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14)…   He loved you to death… His suffering, blood, and death for you on the cross, for the forgiveness of all your sins.  And He is risen, and lives in you.  He loves you (really, practically, actively… He intimately cares for your every need), and He loves in you.  So you love Him, and as a result, you love His children.  Your whole life is lived, loving, and in His love.  St. Augustine, one more time: “To love the children of God is to love the Son of God; to love the Son of God is to love the Father.  Nobody can love the Father without loving the Son, and anyone who loves the Son will love the other children as well.”  Beloved, God loves you.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.          

 

 

 

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[1] Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament XI: James, 1-2 Peter, 1-3 John, Jude, Gerald Bray, Ed. (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2000) p. 221.

[2] John R. W. Stott, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries: The Letters of John (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995) p. 176.

Fifth Sunday in Lent

Fifth Sunday in Lent (C)

April 6, 2025

Text: Luke 20:9-20

            The Parable of the Wicked Tenants is one of only two that appear in all three synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke).  The other is the Parable of the Sower.  Synoptic, by the way, means seen together, and refers to the fact that these three Gospel writers cover much of the same material, like three witnesses giving their own unique perspective on an event (or in this case, events) they witnessed (though, it’s true, in the case of Mark and Luke, they are relying on the eyewitness testimony of others).  At any rate, that all three synoptic writers include this particular parable would seem to indicate that it’s pretty important.  And, indeed, it is.  It is, maybe, Tuesday of Holy Week, and Jesus is teaching in the Temple… the Temple He had just cleansed… anticipating His suffering and death.  The Chief Priests and scribes are ever more intent on arresting Jesus and doing Him in.  This parable will be among the final straws.  What is the parable about?  It is nothing less than a summary of all of salvation history, of God’s interaction with His chosen people, of His pleading with His people to return to Him. 

            The vineyard is Israel, and specifically Jerusalem.  We might also call it, the Kingdom of God.  Incidentally, the Jews would have known immediately that Jesus is riffing on a very famous passage from Isaiah chapter 5 on the Vineyard of the LORD.  We don’t have time to deal with that this afternoon, but it’s worth looking up sometime this week, and comparing it with our Holy Gospel.  In any case, the vineyard owner is God.  The tenants are the Jewish religious leaders… in other words, the Chief Priests and scribes.  And the fruit the owner expects from the tenants is a faithful people.  That is, a people living by faith in their merciful God, the only true God, forsaking all idols, and living a fruitful life.  The LORD expected such a harvest, and the tenants’ only job is to raise such a crop.  Much like a pastor’s only job is to foster a crop of Christians who have no other God than the One who sent His Son in the flesh to die for our sins, who is risen from the dead, who lives and reigns… a crop of Christians living by faith in Him alone, and ordering their lives accordingly.  Any pastor who is not concerned to tend such a crop has no business being a pastor, and you should have nothing to do with him.

            The vineyard owner expected the fruit of such a crop, but the tenants weren’t giving it.  So the owner sent a servant.  And when that servant was beaten and sent away empty-handed, he sent another.  And another.  These, of course, are the prophets.  God sent prophet after prophet to His people Israel.  In Matthew’s version, the servants aren’t just beaten and treated shamefully and sent away empty.  The first one is beaten, the second one is killed, and the third is stoned (Matt. 21:35).  Yet the owner sends even more servants.  And while this refers to the prophets in general, many have pointed out that there may be a particular reference to Isaiah with the one who is killed (sawn in two, according to tradition), and to Jeremiah with the one who is stoned (unwillingly dragged to Egypt, where he preached the people should not go, and dispatched there).  Whether or not the reference is to them specifically, the fact is, prophet is a hazardous occupation to undertake.  Very few prophets died of old age, and none of them lived a peaceful and quiet life.  They faced rejection and persecution at every turn.  People don’t like to be preached to.  And, of course, in rejecting the prophet, the tenants were rejecting the prophet’s message.  And in rejecting the message, they were rejecting the One who sent the message via the messenger.  They were rejecting the vineyard owner.  They were rejecting God. 

            Still God sent His messengers, His prophets.  This is just how God deals with people… This is how He deals with us!  Behold His patience.  Behold His lovingkindness.  He is longsuffering.  He is merciful.  Once again, we witness His prodigality… His recklessness, His wastefulness, His extravagance, out of love for us.  If we were the vineyard owners, we’d have called the cops or sent in the army after the first servant was abused.  But what does God do?  He just keeps sending more servants. 

            Then He gets a really bright idea.  “I know!  I will send My Son!  Though they have rejected every servant I sent, abused them, killed them, nevertheless… surely they will respect My Son!”  If we didn’t know this is God, we’d call Him foolish.  But we do know this is God, and as Paul says, “the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Cor. 1:25; ESV).  What do they do to the Son, these tenants (the Chief Priests and scribes!)?  They say, “This is the heir. Let us kill him, so that the inheritance may be ours” (Luke 20:14).  And they throw Him out of the vineyard… take Him outside the city walls of Jerusalem… and kill Him… Crucify Him. 

            How could God do this?  How could He allow it?  What on earth is He trying to accomplish?  Surely He knew this would happen!

            Yes, He did know.  And behold, the great surprise.  In killing the Son, the vineyard is given… well, not to the tenants.  That is over.  The tenants have sealed their fate.  The owner will destroy those wicked tenants, and that is a prophecy of the Roman siege of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple in AD 70.  But the vineyard will be given to… others!  And who are the others?  How about the tax collectors and sinners Jesus was always criticized for hanging around, eating and drinking with them.  The poor.  The unclean.  Those in need of healing and mercy.  And most scandalous of all in the first century Jewish mind… Gentiles! 

            And what has happened is the fulfillment of Psalm 118, one of the great hallel Psalms sung at the Passover, maybe even the hymn Jesus sang with His disciples on His way to the Garden of Gethsemane.  “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.  This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes” (Ps. 118:22-23; cf. Luke 20:17).  That isn’t just a saying.  Jesus is that stone.  A cornerstone joins wall to wall, length and width, at its very foundation, and determines the construction of the whole house.  In His death on the cross, Jesus joins Jew and Gentile, whosoever believes in Him, into the New Israel, the Body of Christ, the Holy Christian Church.  The others are the Church.  The vineyard… we might call it the Kingdom of God… is given to the Church.  Which is to say, to you.

            Now, be warned.  Whatever there is in you of the Chief Priests and scribes that wants to keep all the fruit for yourself, reject His messengers, and therefore His message, be your own god, worship other gods, keep back your sins from His merciful atonement, insist on your own righteousness, rely on your own righteousness rather than His justification by grace, etc., etc. … Whatever there is in you of that, must be broken in pieces on Christ, the Cornerstone.  You must be broken in pieces on Christ… in repentance.  Otherwise, the Stone will crush you on the Day of Judgment.  Either way, you must come to the end of you.

            But then, here we are again at the foolishness of God, aren’t we?  What happens when you are broken in pieces?  What happens when you die to yourself?  When you die with Christ?  The Lord, who specializes in resurrection from death, picks up your shattered pieces and puts them back together again, better than ever.  He builds you into His building, His House, His Temple, His Body… as a living stone, to quote St. Peter: “As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:4-5).  Or, as St. Paul puts it in his letter to the Ephesians, you are “members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord” (Eph. 2:19-21).

            That is what God was doing when He sent His Son.  Giving you the vineyard.  Building you into His Kingdom.  And now, note… He is not a tyrannical Landlord, demanding we give Him all the fruit of the vineyard, while we enjoy none of it.  No.  As it turns out, in another great surprise, in giving Him the fruit, it all becomes ours.  He gives it to us.  He gives us to enjoy the fruit, now, with Him.  Not as tenants, but as members of His Household.  His children.  His heirs with Christ, and in Christ.  Well, what else did you think you were doing when you come to the Lord’s Supper?  Taking your place at Table in your Father’s House.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.