Prepared to Meet Jesus

[Any congregation without a pastor, whose pastor is strapped for time, or whose pastor becomes sick or is called away, is welcome to use this sermon for December 8, the Second Sunday of Advent. Sunday School classes or adult small groups should feel free to use it, if you think it would be helpful, as well.]

Luke 3:1-20
Today is the Second Sunday of Advent. This season, of course, is one of preparation. We prepare for the celebration of Christmas remembering when Jesus, God the Son, came to us as a sinless human baby to save us from sin and death. We also prepare for the day when Jesus will come again to judge the living and the dead and to usher those made righteous through their faith in Him into “the new heaven and earth” He has reserved for all who believe in Him.

But how can you and I be prepared to meet Jesus, either when we see Him after He calls us from our graves or, if we’re still alive when He returns, we witness Him descending from heaven?

The answer is given in today’s Gospel lesson, Luke 3:1-20. Before John the Baptist was born, his birth was foretold to John’s father, Zechariah, by an angel. The angel said that John would appear among God’s people before Jesus began His public ministry “to make ready for the Lord a people prepared…” (Luke 1:17) And in today’s lesson, we’re told how God was going to use John to prepare people to meet Jesus when He came to them: “...he went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” (Luke 3:3)

Now, there’s something we should say before we move on. John’s baptism was different from Christian baptism, the baptism practiced by the Church since the first century. As with Christian baptism, John’s baptism brought people “the forgiveness of [their] sins,” but we should notice three differences.

First, John did not baptize people in the triune name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Second, John’s baptism didn’t bring the gift of the Holy Spirit, as Christian baptism does today. Remember, in our lesson, John the Baptist says, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming [Jesus], the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”

And third, John’s baptism did not baptize believers into Jesus’ death and resurrection. Only those who have undergone baptism in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, as we are baptized today in the Church, share in the overwhelming blessing that the apostle Paul dedclares in Romans 6: “We were buried therefore with [Christ] by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” (Romans 6:4) In Christian baptism, we die with Christ and we rise with Christ!

But John’s baptism did prepare people to meet Jesus by giving the gift of repentance to those he baptized.

It may seem strange to speak of repentance as a gift. When we think of repentance, we likely see one or two unbiblical pictures in our minds. We may picture grim-faced people living in perpetual sorrow for their sins. Or, in a related image, we may picture people engaged in constant good works to impress God with their holiness, hoping that by their good lives or good works they can reverse the condemnation they deserve for their sins.

Repentance isn’t just acknowledging our imperfections. Most people will do that. “I’m not perfect,” we’ll say. But being a sinner and our sins are a lot more than being imperfect, as though our sins were akin to hitting a wrong note while singing or calling up the wrong suit while playing euchre.

The word translated in verse 3 of our gospel lesson as sins is ἁμαρτιῶν. It’s a word that means to miss the mark. You and I were born into sin. By birth and inclination, we are sinners. That means that we’re born wanting to do and we often do anything and everything but what God’s law commands of us. We don’t want to love God and we don’t want to love others. Instead, we want to be our own gods, decide our own destinies, and do things our own way. We sinners miss the mark of holiness and righteousness that God’s Word tells us is the basic requirement for having life with Him, now and in eternity. There is absolutely nothing about us that commends us to life with God or to be forgiven by God. We fall short of that, as Paul puts it, “...all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…” (Romans 3:24)

Repentance then has two parts and both parts are things done by God to us, not things we do for God or others. Both parts of repentance are done by God to us through the proclamation of His Word, whether through believers (including preachers), through reading His Word, or receiving His Word in Holy Baptism or Holy Communion. God wants to give the gift of repentance in both of its parts in this sermon today. I pray you will be open to receiving this gift.

The first part of repentance is contrition. The Apology to the Augsburg Confession, a basic statement of faith in the Lutheran tradition, says that contrition “takes place when sins are condemned by God’s Word.” We are condemned by God’s Word when we recognize how we utterly fail to meet God’s standards as enunciated in the Ten Commandments. When we hear God’s Law, we’re inclined to justify ourselves by saying things like, “I may take God’s name in vain, but I don’t commit adultery,” or “I may not regularly take advantage of the sabbath by gladly hearing and learning God’s Word, I’ve never stolen anything,” or “I may bear false witness by my gossiping, but I only worship God.” But God’s Word doesn’t let us off the hook that easily. James 2:10 tells us, “...whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.” The first part of repentance, contrition, happens when God’s Word convicts us of the fact that we are sinners guilty of profaning all of God’s Law and that we’re worthy of only condemnation and hell for our sins–the bad we have done or thought and the good we have failed to do or think.

But it’s here when, in the words of Lutheran confessions, we experience “the true terror of the conscience…[feeling] that God is angry with sin” and we grieve that we have sinned, that God comes to us with another Word. It’s the Word that John proclaimed at the Jordan. It’s the Word of the Gospel about the crucified and risen Jesus that gives us the gift of faith.

Listen, friends, God knows that you and I are sinners and that if we were to meet Jesus when He comes naked in our sin, we would be without hope for life with God. But Jesus Christ came into this world, led a sinless life, bore the condemnation for sin that you and I deserve on a cross, and then rose from the dead to bring forgiveness, resurrection, and eternal life with God to all those who, by the power of the Gospel Word, repent and believe (have faith in) Jesus.

When repentance, both contrition and faith, are worked in us by the Word of God, we are saved from sin and death. We are justified before God, declared innocent not because we are sinless but because the Savior Who died and rose for us is sinless. We belong to God forever. Jesus says, “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life…” (John 3:36) And He says, “...this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” (John 6:29) And Jesus tells us, “​​For God so loved the world,[a] that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16) And God’s Word tells us of this saving, faith-giving, Word, “...since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Romans 5:1)

In Jesus Christ, friends, all your sins–all that you’ve done, said, or thought that grieves God for the hurt it has brought to Him, to your neighbor, or yourself–all your sin is forgiven.

Daily repentance, daily receiving the Word of God that tells us both the truth about our sin and the truth about God’s grace, is how God prepares us to one day–maybe today or tomorrow–to meet Jesus face to face.

Receive these gifts of contrition and faith again today, friends, and be prepared to live with your Savior now and forever. Amen

[Saint John in the Wilderness by Jose Leonardo, 1635]

Jeremiah, Part 16

Jeremiah, Part 15

Hold Your Head High...Jesus is Coming!

 [This sermon is based on the Gospel lesson for this coming Sunday, December 1, 2024, the First Sunday of Advent. Congregations without pastors or whose pastors are unable to deliver sermons this week may feel free to use it if you find it helpful.]

The Gospel Lesson: Luke 21:25-36

During a recent eleven-day stay at a hospital in Rouen, France, one of my nurses keyed words in her native French onto the Google Translate app of her smartphone, then told me in English, “You’re too brave. You should cry.” Her words were kind and I didn’t feel brave. But I knew this was not a time for crying. 

I was in the hospital because I had acquired salmonella bacteria somewhere in England. By the time we arrived in France for a river cruise, I was sick. I got sicker over the next three days. I became severely dehydrated, my kidneys shut down, the defibrillator in my chest was activated, and, at one point, I collapsed in our bathroom. I was only sporadically aware of my surroundings when I was taken by ambulance to a major hospital. I was aware enough to know how hard all of this was on my wife, that my earthly life hung in the balance, and that I needed to pray. 

I didn’t cry though. The reason was simple. By the power of God’s life-saving Word about Jesus Who died and rose for sinners like me, by this Word that gives me the holy gifts of repentance and faith in Christ, I know who I belong to. I know that Jesus had once uttered a Word from the cross that applies to me as much as it did to the crowds who growled for His death on Good Friday, as much as it applies to you: “Father, forgive them [forgive him, forgive her], for they do not know what they are doing.” I didn’t cry because I know that Jesus is the Savior Who has erased the power of sin and death over sinners like me. And like all believers in Jesus, I can say with Saint Paul, “there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.” (2 Timothy 4:8) I didn’t cry because I knew–I know–through the faith in Jesus God has given to me through Word and Sacrament, that Jesus, crucified and risen, has accounted this sinner righteous in the eyes of God. I have been made fit by Christ Himself, to live with God forever. With that old Easter hymn, I can say, that in Jesus Who fought to save me at cross and empty tomb, “The strife is o’er, the battle done; Now is the Victor’s triumph won! Now be the song of praise begun. Alleluia!”

The Gospel lesson for this First Sunday of Advent, finds Jesus with His disciples during Holy Week. A short time before, Jesus had cleansed the temple of extortionists who exploited people who had come to worship and offer sacrifices to God. Not long after the events recounted in today’s lesson, Jesus will be arrested, tried, and nailed to a cross for our sins, then rise from the dead to set believers eternally free of sin, death, and condemnation. At this moment though, Jesus is talking with the disciples.

One of them has commented on how beautiful the temple is. But Jesus tells the disciples that soon–in an event which we know happened in 70 AD–the temple, where people repeatedly offered sacrifices for their sins, would be destroyed. The temple, of course, would no longer be necessary because Jesus is the one perfect sacrifice that destroys the hold of sin and death over us; all who trust in Jesus have everlasting reconciliation and life with God. But the temple was such a central part of the lives of good Jews like Jesus’ first disciples that, shocked, they asked, “Teacher, when will these things be, and what will be the sign when these things are about to take place?” (Luke 21:7)

Jesus proceeds to tell the disciples about all the events and circumstances that will surround the destruction of the temple. Soon though, Jesus shifts to a discussion of the events and circumstances that will surround the end of the heavens and the earth of this creation. 

This old creation exists under a death sentence. When Adam and Eve, our ancestors, fell into sin, they ushered chaos, death, and darkness not just into the lives of each of us, all of whom will one day die, but into the whole created order God once made in love for us. 

And so Jesus tells the disciples and us that, “there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves, people fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world. For the powers of the heavens will be shaken.” (Luke 21:25-26) Some will try to brave it out or laugh it off. But in the end, all who place their hopes in what this dying creation has to offer will cry. The end of this universe and the ends of their lives will give rise to grief and tears.

Their sadness and grief will only be heightened when they see, as all people then living will and as all called out of their graves by Jesus will, what Jesus says will come next at the end of this cosmos. “And then,” Jesus says, “they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.” (Luke 21:27)

At that moment, for many, the crying will really begin. Why? Because, having refused to take seriously Jesus’ call to repent, that is, to turn away from sin–away from putting their hope in anything or anyone other than God, away from honoring God’s holy name, away from joining God’s people and gladly hearing His Word, away from honoring parents and those in authority, away from cherishing others’ lives, away from reserving sexual intimacy for the beds of husbands and wives, away from respecting the property and reputations of others–after refusing to repent, then refusing to trust in Jesus for forgiveness, hope, and life, they will know they stand naked before God in their sin. They will know there is no hope for them, no one to go to bat for them as Jesus pronounces their sentence: “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness…” (Matthew 7:23)

But for those who have welcomed Jesus, at the baptismal font, at the Communion table, in the Word proclaimed, taught, and shared, Jesus’ coming at the end of this world will be a time of rejoicing. 

They will eagerly crane their necks to see their Savior Jesus Who will tell them–Who will tell you, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” (Matthew 25:34) 

And then you, dear saint, who by the power of Jesus, the Word of God made flesh, believe in Him as your Lord, God, and King, you will be ushered into the new heaven and the new earth, and incorruptible and indestructible eternal kingdom in which God will wipe every tear from your eye and where sin, and death, and slights, and arguments, and wars, and pain will be no more! 

This creation will be burnt and dissolved, but you who believe will be forever new in the presence of the One Who made you and died for you and rose for you.

And so, as we watch this world lurch toward its end point and as we ourselves age and decay, Jesus says, “when these things begin to take place, straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” (Luke 21:28) Whether any given day is your best day or your worst day, Christian, you can hold your heads up and hope because even now, you are one day closer to seeing Jesus. And then, you will see the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise to you: “the one who endures [the one who daily repents, daily turns to Jesus, daily receives forgiveness and new life through Jesus, the one who endures] to the end will be saved.” (Matthew 24:13) 

What a promise! Don’t yield to anxiety and fear. Hold your heads high, pray, and watch. Jesus is coming and all will be well.

Jesus tells you today: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (Luke 21:33) And the Savior Jesus, by His death and resurrection, shows you that His promise is true…and that it is true for you.

Amen!

 

Jeremiah, Part 14

Jeremiah, Part 13

Jeremiah, Part 12

Jeremiah, Part 11