Celebrating Easter for What It Is

[Below you'll find live stream videos of the traditional and modern Easter worship services of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centercille, Ohio, along with the text of the message for the day. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!]





Luke 24:1-12

It seems that much of the world celebrates Easter. Every year, stores ply their Easter food, Easter candies, Easter eggs, Easter cards, and even Easter wardrobes. None of this has much to do with Easter itself, of course.

In the meantime, in churches around the world, pastors and worship leaders tell their congregations, “Christ is risen!” and congregations respond, “He is risen, indeed!” But I wonder if even we Christians have a clear handle on what it means to celebrate Easter for what it is. Easter, along with Good Friday which precedes it, is, as I’ve said before, the most important event in history. Do we celebrate it as though that were true?

In a sermon preached thirty-two years ago, the late Lutheran pastor and novelist, Bo Giertz, talked about three things that make a happy Easter, that is, an Easter in which we truly celebrate the day for the eternity-changing event it is. I want to point to those three things as we consider today’s Gospel lesson in which Luke the evangelist tells us what happened on the first Easter, the day when Jesus Christ, truly God and truly human, rose from the dead.

The first element of celebrating Easter for what it truly is, Giertz says, is remembering again that Jesus rising from death was “unexpected and unbelievable.” You and I may know–you and I may even be–people who have, medically speaking, been brought back from the dead. We’ve all thrilled at accounts of people’s NDEs, near-death experiences. But none of us know–and none of us are–people who, like Jesus, were dead and buried on a Friday, laid lifeless in a tomb on a Saturday, and raised to life again on a Sunday. It’s not within our normal experience.

When the women–Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and others–went to Jesus’ tomb early on Easter Sunday morning, they had no expectation of learning that Jesus had risen from the dead. Jesus had said many times during His ministry that, as the Old Testament prophesied of God’s Messiah, He was going to die and then rise again. But it was hard for the first disciples to believe that such a thing could happen. It’s harder still to believe that a person who dies and rises, sinless Himself, would do it not for Himself, but for others, you and me, and for every other sinful human being. As the women gazed into the empty tomb on that first Easter Sunday, two men–angels, messengers of God–say, “Why do you look for the living among the dead?  He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified, and on the third day be raised again.’ ” (Luke 24:5-7) It’s now, when the Word of God the Son, Jesus, is preached to them, that they remember and begin to have faith. (Luke 24:8) That’s the power of God’s Word. It can create faith where there has been unbelief.

We shouldn’t be hard on the women for not “getting it” at first, for needing to be reminded of Jesus’ promises. We have the same problem. We confess our faith in Jesus during worship on Sunday mornings and as soon as the service is ended, we’re accosted by our own sinful impulses, by temptation and adversity, and, worst of all by unbelief. Martin Luther spoke for us all when he wrote, “We need to hear the Gospel every day because we forget it every day.”

And if it’s hard for believers like Mary Magdalene and you and me to remember that Jesus has risen from the dead for the whole cosmos, we should have compassion and patience for all the unbelievers in the world who find it hard to believe in Jesus conquering sin, death, and futility through His resurrection.

The Church Council is currently reading a book, The Reason I Believe. It’s a book of Christian apologetics. Christian apologetics seeks to explain the empirical bases for believing in God and the crucified and risen Jesus, God the Son. When I was an atheist, it was partly from reading or hearing Christian apologetics, as in Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis and Who Moved the Stone by Frank Morison, that my mind was opened to the possibility of faith in Christ. Christians need to know how to lovingly and respectfully respond to the skepticism and unbelief many feel about faith in Christ. But apologetics will not cause people to believe in Jesus. A man I know used to say, “I accept the fact that Jesus rose from the dead. Why do I need to follow Him?” It’s only the Word of God, shared with compassion, respect, and patience by many Christians, that will create faith in the risen Jesus Christ. That’s how I came to believe in Jesus and in Easter. The Bible tells us that “faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ…” (Romans 10:17) It’s the Word about Jesus, and the Word alone, that creates faith in Christ and the outrageous good news that, “Jesus Christ is risen from the dead!” Christians need to learn to speak it to all the world.

The second element in celebrating Easter for what it is, Giertz says, is to remember that “the Resurrection is a fact, a unique fact.”  

As to its facticity, we have more documentation of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection, closer to the events themselves, than we do for many of the most prominent figures of ancient history.

And it isn't just ancient documentation that underscores the truth of Jesus' resurrection. Israeli theologian and historian Pinchas Lapide, an orthodox Jew, did not become a Christian and claimed that Jesus was only the Messiah for Gentiles, concluded, "I accept the resurrection of Easter Sunday not as an invention of the community of disciples, but as a historical event." Based on the facts and Jesus' track record, Lapide also concluded that Jesus would return to this world at the end of history.

Jesus' resurrection is also a unique fact. We may be inspired by the words and actions of human beings in history or by the beauty of the universe God created, but only Jesus, risen and living, can forgive our sins, cover us with His grace, make us new, and give us life with God to be enjoyed even now in this imperfect world and one day to be enjoyed in the perfect peace of eternity when we live in His direct presence. Only Jesus can say, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die.” (John 11:25-26)

The third thing that lets us truly celebrate Easter is that “Jesus’ resurrection has decisive consequences for us all.”  Jesus’ resurrection was the beginning of the transformation God is going to bring to all who belong to Him. Jesus’ Easter victory over sin and death–our sin and death–shows us that when He returns to this creation at the end of its life, the old heavens and the old earth will pass away and the new heavens and new earth will come into being. It will be a new creation: free of sin, death, and futility.

The risen Jesus Himself shows us what this new creation will be like for those who believe in Him. For the most part, on that first Easter, Jesus’ disciples failed to recognize Him in His risen form. He seemed like just another man. But He was different. Jesus was like Himself, but different, new. He still bore the scars of His crucifixion and, like any other human being when hungry, asked for something to eat. But He also walked past walls into locked rooms. He was unbound by space or time. When Jesus raises believers in Him from the dead, we will no longer be bound by the constraints of this universe, nor by sin, death, or unbelief. The Bible says that believers in Jesus already are children of God and that while “what we will be has not yet been made known…[we do] know that when Christ appears [that is, when He returns], we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2) This is the greatest and most amazing consequence of Easter: Because Jesus died and rose for us, all who believe in Him, we will one day be like the risen Jesus. Today, Jesus is with us through His Word, the Sacraments, and the Church. On the day when He returns to this world, He will call us from death and raise us to live in God’s presence in, as The Small Catechism puts it, “in righteousness and purity forever.”

Friends, we can celebrate Easter with joy because, on Easter, God did something unexpected and, from a human perspective, unbelievable, the Resurrection of Jesus, in which we can only believe by the power of God’s Word.

We can also celebrate Easter with joy because Jesus’ resurrection is an accomplished fact, attested to by more than five hundred practical, hard-headed, less than perfect, self-centered people, Jesus’ first followers who, despite their imperfections, risked and, often, without anything to be gained in this world and much to be lost. gave their lives to pass on the good news that they had seen and witnessed, that Jesus Christ, truly God and truly human, actually died and actually rose from the dead to give forgiveness and eternity to all who believe in Him.

We can also celebrate Easter with joy because Easter has consequences for all who believe, consequences that will last for all eternity. Even as He faced the cross, Jesus could exalt over the eternal consequences of His crucifixion and resurrection for all who believe. As He told God the Father in prayer, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand.” (John 10:28)

We have good reason to truly celebrate Easter, folks. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Amen

Life for the Journey

[Below you'll find the live stream video of this past week's Maundy Thursday service with the people ad friends of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio, and the text of the message.]



Luke 22:7-20

On Maundy Thursday, we remember two things about the meal Jesus shared with the twelve apostles on the Thursday before His crucifixion.

First, we remember the new commandment, or, as in the Latin from which the word Maundy comes, a new mandatum, a new mandate, that Jesus gives to His Church on Thursday of the first Holy Week. Jesus commands, mandates us to love each other with the same self-sacrifice with which He has loved us. If that commandment doesn’t alarm us and drive us to repent for our sin, asking God to love others through us, we’re living in a state of denial. That’s because none of us can fulfill this commandment in our own power or goodness. We need Jesus, remembering that He tells us the total truth when He says, “apart from me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)

The second thing we remember on Maundy Thursday, the topic that will occupy us this evening, is Jesus’ institution of the sacrament of Holy Communion.

Holy Baptism, of course, is the sacrament by which Jesus gives us new life, Holy Communion is the sacrament by which Jesus sustains us in our life with Him. After Jesus was baptized at the Jordan River, He was led by the Spirit to face temptations in the wilderness. After you and I are baptized, until we die and are called from the dead by Jesus to live with Him in a sinless eternity, we still live in this world, wrestling with the temptations and tests thrown at us by the devil, the world, and our own sinful selves. The Gospel of Matthew tells us that after Jesus was in the wilderness for forty days, God sent angels to minister to, to take care of, Jesus. (Matthew 4:11) In Holy Communion, Jesus ministers to you and me directly and personally. He gives us His own sinless, eternally triumphant self. “This is my body given for you…,” He says. And, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.” (Luke 22:19-20)

Our Gospel lesson for tonight begins with Jesus sending two of His disciples–Peter and John–into Jerusalem to make preparations so that He could celebrate the Passover Seder with His disciples. In sending Peter and John, we see that Jesus is bringing both the fulfillment of the old covenant and instituting the new covenant. Under the old covenant, the one between God and His people, the Jews, it was customary for two men from a family to go to the outer courts of the temple in Jerusalem so that the Passover lamb their families would eat during the Seder dinner could be slaughtered. They would then take the slaughtered lamb back to the homes or inns in which the meal would take place. But, in a break from tradition, Peter and John weren’t sent to do this on behalf of their biological families. Jesus would have this meal with His new family, the family of God called together by His Gospel Word, the Church. You’ll remember Jesus once said, “My mother and brothers are those who hear God’s word and put it into practice.” (Luke 8:21) Here are Peter and John putting Jesus’ Word into practice, preparing to celebrate a meal that encompasses not just one’s relatives, but all people who believe in Jesus.

Passover was the central festival of the Jewish calendar. It memorialized that moment when God’s people, then enslaved in Egypt, were set free and sent off to the land God promised them. Before the first Passover, God instructed His people to prepare for the tenth and final plague God brought on Egypt. The angel of death would take the life of the firstborn in every home and barnyard in Egypt unless the blood of a sacrificed lamb was smeared on the doorposts of those places. Blood is the means by which oxygen, the breath of God, gives life to every human being and every vertebrate animal. Blood is the means by which carbon dioxide, the toxic gas produced by respiration, is taken out of the tissues of the body. Blood then is life. When Cain killed his brother Abel in the Old Testament book of Genesis, his blood–his taken life–cried out to God. At the first Passover, the blood of the lambs, whose death was for the people who trusted in God, barred death access to the lives of the firstborn.

Another festival of the Jewish year was Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. On this day, a perfectly unblemished lamb was sacrificed at the temple. The lamb bore the sins of God’s people from the previous year. After it was sacrificed, the priest would sprinkle the people with the blood of this perfect lamb. By this means, the people were covered with life from God and the toxic impurity of their sin was removed from them. The problem was that under the old covenant, the effects of the sacrifice lasted, at the most, only a year. And so year after year, God’s guilt-plagued people were called to offer yet another lamb, to be covered once again by its blood. Even at that, people would often offer sin sacrifices throughout the year.

Friends, we too, would be plagued by sin and uncertainty about our standing with God were it not for one thing: Jesus has instituted a new covenant in which we can rest. John the Baptist talked about this new covenant when, pointing to Jesus, He said, ““Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29) The sin of the world, of the whole world, of every time and every place, including our sin, yours and mine.

Under the old covenant, priests daily, made sacrifices of lambs, doves, and grain to first, purify themselves of their own sin before they then offered sacrifices of people who came to the temple laden with guilt. Nothing but these constant sacrifices could assure people their sins were forgiven or carry them from death to life. But, referring to Jesus as our great high priest, the book of Hebrews tells us, “Unlike the other high priests, [Jesus] does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. [Sinless Himself] He sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself.” (Hebrews 7:27)

In Holy Communion, we don’t sacrifice Jesus on the cross again. That’s bad theology, intimating that what Jesus did on the cross wasn’t good enough. Controlling the timetable and circumstances ordained by God, Jesus offered the sacrifice of His innocent body and blood on the cross once and for all. This is why when biblically heedless people ask you when you were saved, you can confidently answer, “On a hill outside Jerusalem two thousand years ago.” Jesus has already done everything necessary for your sins to be forgiven by God and for you to have life with God. As I’ve said before: When Jesus said before dying on the cross, “It is finished,” He meant it! The apostle Paul wasn’t lying when He said, “If you declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Romans 10:9) We become Christians not because we’ve made a decision for God, but because God made a decision for us. He decided to die for us! “While we were still sinners,” the Bible says, “Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8) So, friends, in Jesus Christ, our sins are already forgiven. The only question is, do we believe in Him?

This is where Holy Communion comes in. While our salvation has already been accomplished and God’s decision for us is unchangeable, even when the Holy Spirit’s Word has convinced us to believe in Jesus, we can get wobbly in our walk with God. The devil, the world, and our sinful selves constantly press us toward unbelief. They lie to us, telling us we’re not good enough, that Jesus didn’t really die and rise, that we’re too bad and the world is too bad for the good news of new and everlasting life with God through faith in Jesus to be true. On top of that, life can batter us with setbacks, tragedies, and difficulties. “Pastor, I believe in Jesus,” someone told me recently, “but my life is so hard right now.” Holy Communion happens when the word of Jesus, along with Jesus’ promises to us, meets the bread and the wine and Jesus tells us, “This is My body and This is My blood. What I accomplished at the cross and tomb was for you. Your sins are forgiven. My good news is for you. I will never leave you nor forsake you. (Hebrews 13:5) Though your sins are like scarlet, I make your life as white as snow (Isaiah 1:18). As far as the east is from the west, so far have I removed your sin from you. (Psalm 103:12) I am with you always, to the close of the age. (Matthew 28:20) All who believe in Me will not perish, but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)”

Friends, life in this world is hard. But we are blessed that during our journey through this life, Jesus gives us Himself, body and blood, in, with, and under the bread and the wine, and fills those who receive Him in faith with life that never ends. Amen

Who is Jesus for Us?

[Below you'll find live stream videos for both the traditional and modern worship services of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio as well as the text of the message. Have a blessed Holy Week!]





John 12:12-19

People love to make Jesus over into their preferred image of Him. For example, an evangelical celebrity not long ago said that, despite what Jesus tells us as His disciples, turning one’s cheek to an enemy is un-Christian. (He actually said that!)

Efforts to change Jesus into a co-conspirator in our favorite sins or to reduce Him to a buddy we can control are nothing new. The Gospel of John tells us that after Jesus had miraculously fed a crowd of more than five-thousand people, the crowd wanted to turn Him into an earthly king accountable to their desires. So, Jesus went off to a mountain by Himself. (John 6:15) Jesus will not be the king the world wants. He will only be the king we need.

Today is Palm Sunday, commemorating Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on the Sunday before His suffering, crucifixion, death, and, ultimately, resurrection.

The events of this day press this question on us: Who is Jesus for us?

It’s the most important question we will ever be asked, the very question Jesus posed to His first disciples when He asked them, “Who do you say that I am?”

On that first Palm Sunday, Jesus was hailed by crowds. Because of that, there was a surface air of celebration. But Jesus was surrounded either by people who saw Him either as a buddy king to be used for their own ends or as a threat by those who, by their knowledge of Old Testament Scripture, had a sneaking suspicion of Who Jesus really was (and is) and so, wanted to get rid of Him.

According to John in today’s gospel lesson, John 12:12-19, there were two streams of crowds flowing into Jerusalem that day. There was the throng that had come there, as Jews did every year from throughout the Mediterranean basin, for the Passover. There was also a crowd that had followed Jesus from nearby Bethany, where, just a few days before, He had raised His friend Lazarus from the dead.

This confluence of people shows us how they see Jesus by their words and actions. They hail Jesus with words from Psalm 118. “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the king of Israel!” (John 12:13)

These words may seem innocent or innocuous to us. But, “Hosanna,” meaning Save, and the rest of what the crowds say had a specific meaning for the Jewish people. Historically, the words were cried out to Jewish kings who had won military victories. Palm branches too were waved during such celebrations of battles and wars won.

The message of the crowds was clear: “We’ll follow You, Jesus, as long as You do our bidding. So, re-establish the Kingdom of Israel by force. Lead us in a military battle to overthrow both Pilate and Herod. And then, give us what we want–the booty of war–as Your loyal followers.” They were itching for a fight and all they needed was for Jesus to give the orders.

But the crowds were to be disappointed. Jesus makes it clear that He hasn’t come to Jerusalem to lead an insurrection or win a military victory. John says that “Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it.” (John 12:16) When Jesus did this, you can be certain that there were groans of disappointment from some in the crowd.

In telling us about this, John cites words from Old Testament prophecy, Zechariah 9:9: “Do not be afraid, Daughter Zion; see, your king is coming, seated on a donkey’s colt.” Through the prophet Zechariah, who lived in the sixth century BC, God had announced that He was going to send the Savior Messiah to make all things right between God and the universe He had created.

But this Messiah would be no warrior king!

Warrior kings may temporarily change the borders of nations in this temporary universe.

But those kinds of kings can’t change people born as enemies of God into God’s friends.

Nor can they give mortal human beings everlasting life.

Nor can they make us citizens of a new and eternal kingdom in which every tear will be dried, every need will be met, every relationship healed, and every vestige of the filth of our sin will be removed from us.

The world’s conqueror-kings cannot give sinners the gracious covering of God’s own righteousness.

Only Jesus can do that.

Horses were instruments of war in the ancient world, the means by which armies killed and conquered. This is why in those days, the Jewish people, so often the victims of conquering armies, hated horses. Donkeys, on the other hand, did the work of peace. Zechariah’s prophecy said that the Messiah would not conquer humanity’s common enemies of sin, death, and darkness by violence, war, or the exercise of political power.

The Messiah would instead, humbly bring the Kingdom of God to all who believe in Him not by making war, but by the death He died for our sin on a cross and by the resurrection with which God the Father rewarded Jesus’ righteousness. Centuries before, through the prophet Isaiah, God had revealed that this would be how the Christ would conquer the reign of sin, death, and darkness over us. “We all, like sheep, have gone astray,  each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him [on Jesus, the Messiah] the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6)

Then, after offering up His sinless life to take the punishment for our sinful natures we deserve, out of His great love for all, Jesus the Messiah would give forgiveness and eternal citizenship in the Kingdom of God to all who believe in Him.

The crowds in Jerusalem for the Passover had no interest in the Kingdom of God or in eternal life.

They wanted vengeance on the Romans and the Herodians, control of their country, and prosperity. Many, like the Zealots or maybe Judas Iscariot, still joined in shouting for Jesus after their disappointment in seeing Jesus on a lowly donkey, thinking they could use Him for their purposes.

But some in Jerusalem knew that Jesus couldn’t be used. The Pharisees look at the Palm Sunday spectacle and say to each other disgustedly, “Look how the whole world has gone after him!” (John 12:19) The Pharisees know that Jesus is, as John the Baptizer called Him, “the Lamb of God, Who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29) They get it that Jesus is God the Son, the Word made flesh. And for them, as would become true for Pilate, Herod, the Sanhedrin, and the selfish crowds, Jesus was not a Messiah to be welcomed, worshiped, and trusted, but a threat, a threat to their way of life.

Even today, Jesus threatens us. He threatens our desire to be our own gods and our ambition to have lives focused on ourselves, our appetites, our interests, and our preferences.

The world turned against Jesus during that first Holy Week. Good Friday and Easter Sunday proved the world wrong for having done so.

Because of the death on a cross Jesus humbly faced and endured, Philippians 2:9-11 tells us “God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,  in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

This then, is Who Jesus really is: God, Savior, King, Redeemer, Who humbly bore the cross you and I deserve so that we might eternally share in His resurrection victory.

So, we come back to the question of Palm Sunday: “Who is Jesus for you?”

Jesus never sat on an earthly throne, was never serenaded by bands playing Hail to the Chief, never won a war or an Oscar or a Grammy or a Nobel Prize. But through His humble submission to death for us, He won eternity for us.

Will you daily welcome Jesus as your only Lord, your God, your King, Messiah, and Savior? Jesus tells us elsewhere: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6) Follow the King, Jesus, to everlasting life with God. Amen

Ruth and Jonah (Midweek Lenten Worship, Part 5)

[Below are the live stream of this Wednesday's midweek Lenten worship from Living Water Lutheran Church and the text of the message presented at that time.]



Jonah 3:10-4:11

When we began our midweek Lenten journey with the Old Testament books of Ruth and Jonah, we said that they present us with at least five important questions for our lives as disciples of Jesus Christ today. The fifth and most important of those questions is this: “How do we see Jesus in these two books?”

Explicitly, we’ve mentioned that when Boaz redeemed the inheritance of Ruth’s husband, he foreshadowed Jesus redeeming us from our slavery to sin and death. 

And Jesus Himself compared Himself to Jonah: Like Jonah bearing condemnation for his own sins in the belly of a great fish for three days, Jesus was in the heart of the earth from Good Friday to Easter Sunday bearing the full weight of our sin. 

The God we meet in both the books of Ruth and Jonah–Yahweh, I AM–is the same God we see in Jesus, unwilling to see any die condemned by their sin without giving them the opportunity to receive the saving Word of God. More on that in a moment.

The last verse of Jonah, chapter 3, tells us: “When God saw…how [the Ninevites] turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.” 

This is a moment of triumph for God’s powerful Word, both the Law that condemns we sinners for our sin and the Promise or the Gospel that frees sinners from condemnation as it enables us to repent and believe in God. 

Nearly nine centuries after the events in tonight’s lesson, Jesus said that “there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.” (Luke 15:7) As Nineveh turned from its evil and turned in faith to God, there must have been a party in heaven. Nineveh had been dead in its sin and was alive again. Nineveh had been lost to God and now was found. (Luke 15:32; Ephesians 2:1; Colossians 2:13)

But Jonah wasn’t interested in joining heaven’s party. Jonah 4:1: “But to Jonah this seemed very wrong, and he became angry.” (Jonah 4:1) 

In the original Hebrew in which this verse was written, you see that Jonah accuses God of doing evil. He prays to God: “Isn’t this what I said, Lord, when I was still at home? That is what I tried to forestall by fleeing to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity.” (Jonah 4:2) 

Jonah had hopped on a boat for Tarshish when God called him to prophesy in Nineveh at the beginning of this book because he was afraid that if he preached God’s Word to the Ninevites, God would accept the city’s repentant faith!

We were at a party one night years ago and I ended up talking with a woman whose husband had left her for another woman several years before. It had been a sinful violation of the ex-husband’s marriage vows. During this party, the woman wanted my assurance that God would never forgive her ex-husband. I told her I couldn’t do that, that I was counting on the God revealed to us all in Jesus, Who died for our sins on the cross, to forgive my sins and to restore me to fellowship with God as I daily turned to Him. If her ex-husband repented and turned to Christ, he would be forgiven by God, I told her. The woman simply could not accept that.

How gracious and forgiving are we willing for God to be? 

In Jonah 2, the prophet, who had turned away from God, was saved from death when God sent a fish to swallow him up. There, Jonah had declared, “you, Lord my God, brought my life up from the pit…”  (Jonah 2:6) Jonah was more than willing for God to be gracious to him, but not to the Ninevites. 

Jonah tells God that if God is going to forgive the Ninevites, Jonah would prefer that God take his life. God ignores Jonah’s impudence and asks him: “Is it right for you to be angry?” (Jonah 4:5) 

Jonah doesn’t seem to answer this question and instead, goes east of the city, builds a shelter, and waits to see what will happen to Nineveh.

God tries to teach Jonah a lesson. He sends a plant that provides shade for Jonah. Jonah loves it. But then God sends a worm to eat and destroy the plant, the way Jonah wanted God to destroy Nineveh. When the plant dies, Jonah is distraught. He’s even more upset when a fierce scirocco and a blazing sun come his way and Jonah once more says he’d rather be dead. God asks, “Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?” Jonah insists that he has every right to be angry and that he’s so angry he still wants to be dead. (Jonah 4:9)

Three times, Jonah tells God that he wants God to take his life. It’s a measure of God’s patient grace for rebellious believers that He doesn’t comply with Jonah’s demand. 

Instead, He comes back at Jonah with His Word. God tells Jonah: “You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?” (Jonah 4:10-11)

And that, friends, is how the book of Jonah ends. We don’t know whether Jonah repents and turns back to God or not. But God’s words to Jonah confront us with a question: Will we gladly share the good news of life with God through faith in Jesus with the Ninevites of our time?

Ruth and Jonah have given us clear indications as to how we should answer this question, as well as the five questions with which we began this Lenten season. We’ve seen that, 

1. God’s reign is to extend over every part of our lives. 

2. God cares about all people. 

3. God patiently woos and tracks down believers like Jonah who rebel against Him sending His Word to convict them of their sin and convince Him of the grace He offers to all sinners. 

4. He welcomes former unbelievers like Ruth, the sailors headed for Tarshish, and the people of Nineveh when they repent and believe in Him.

And, as to question #5, about how we see Jesus in Ruth and Jonah, it turns out, as we mentioned earlier, that the God we meet in the Old Testament is the same God we meet in the New Testament in Jesus Christ. 

He is, as Jonah himself describes Him, “gracious and compassionate…slow to anger and abounding in love.” (Jonah 4:2) 

Although God forces Himself on no one, there’s never been anything that God has wanted more than to see all people come to a saving, repentant faith in Him. 

The God of the Old Testament told His own rebellious people through the prophet Ezekiel, “As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, people of Israel?” (Ezekiel 33:11) 

And God the Son, Jesus, tells all the world that, “...God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:17)

This is why God sends you and me into the world today, as He sent Jonah to Nineveh long ago. People may and do spurn Him and His forgiving love, but God wants to save all people!

After visiting Phyllis at Bethany this past Sunday, I swung by Kroger. I went to the deli. I found one of the employees having a tough day. While another employee took care of my order, he wrote a note on the back of a party platter form and handed it to me. It said, “Please! Please! Pray for…my son…” 

There are people in our daily lives hungry for the God we know in Jesus. These are the people to whom Jesus has sent us. He commissions us to “...go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you…” (Matthew 28:19-20) 

At the end of tonight’s lesson from Jonah, we find a sullen prophet, resentful of God’s grace for others. May we, by contrast, be disciples so grateful for what Jesus has done for us at the cross and the empty tomb that we can’t keep from telling all the world this sacred truth: “...there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…” (Romans 8:1) There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Amen!