Sermon for Lent Service

Mark 14:43–65

THE SECOND ARTICLE

And in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried. He descended into hell. The third day He rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. From thence He will come to judge the living and the dead.

 

What does this mean?

I believe that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the virgin Mary, is my Lord,

 

who has redeemed me, a lost and condemned person, purchased and won me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil; not with gold or silver, but with His holy, precious blood and with His innocent suffering and death,

 

that I may be His own and live under Him in His kingdom and serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness, just as He is risen from the dead, lives and reigns to all eternity.

 

This is most certainly true.

 

We confess in the creed that we believe that Jesus Christ is true God and also true man. These two natures in the one person Jesus Christ is the key to understanding the interrogation by the high priest in the Passion reading tonight from Mark 14.  “Again the high priest asked him, “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” ⁶² And Jesus said, “I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.”

The Jews were very careful, you might say hypervigilant, about the 2^nd Commandment, “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord.” So the high priest doesn’t ask if Jesus is the Son of God, but refraining from using the word “God” says, Son of the Blessed.

These antagonists see Jesus standing in front of them, with his hands bound. He’s powerless, so it seems to escape the armed guards. He doesn’t look like the Son of the Blessed, His only Son our Lord, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity. They only see his humanity, He who was about to suffer under Pontius Pilate, be crucified and then do that very human thing, that mortal thing, die.

But this One person, has these two natures, divine and human. these two natures are joined in Him such that, it will be the human being, the Son of Man whom these his enemies will see when He is glorified, exalted, seated at the right hand of Power, coming to judge the living and the dead.

For those of us who believe, this is beautiful to hear, our Savior Jesus, crucified and killed by evil men will come again in glory. We love to hear it. We love to confess it, to tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

But those chief priests, elders, and scribes, who didn’t believe, when they hear what Jesus says, their hatred is irrational and intense. Our Lord’s words are powerful, no denying. To us who believe, powerful to give life and salvation. To those who refuse to believe, the words of Jesus are powerful to produce hatred, violence, and eternal damnation.

Notice that this Jewish counsel is building their whole case against Jesus around the accusation of Blasphemy – what Jesus said, His words. Blasphemy is saying something against God, something contrary to the Hallowed name of God, something that would hurt His reputation.  They hated Jesus because they hated what He said. They condemned Jesus because they chose to believe that His words were lies.

C.S. Lewis was a Christian writer in the 1940s. In his book Mere Christianity, he wrote:

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

Such a big distinction between those who hear what Jesus, the Son of the Blessed says, and believe it, and those who hear what Jesus says and think He’s lying.

Today the words of Jesus are still heard. And by the blessing of the Holy Spirit, still believed. Words like, “Come to me.” And “leave behind your sins, follow me and live.” For the believer these words are joy and peace. But we can’t be surprised when unbelievers in our world hear what Jesus says and respond with anger. They don’t want a Lord, they want to be their own lords. They don’t want to leave their sins. They don’t want to follow Jesus. They want Him to leave them alone. Sometimes we Christians can get caught in that hatred and the hatred gets turned toward us. It’s like the young man in the Passion reading tonight who was following Jesus  and the mob grabbed his robe and he had to leave it behind and flee naked (Mark 14:51-52). The anger towards Jesus, caused this young follower to suffer.

So let us keep hearing Jesus Words and confessing Who He is, True God, True Man until He comes again. Amen.

Sermon for February 23

Sufficient Grace

2 Corinthians 5:9

 

2 Corinthians 5

7So to keep me from being too elated by the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from being too elated. 8Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. 9But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

 

“My grace is sufficient for you.” That’s what the Lord said to Paul, and what He says to you.

Paul had this thorn in the flesh. He doesn’t say exactly what type of ailment it is, but you can easily imagine it, can’t you. It’s a very visual turn of phrase. Most of us know what it’s like to get a thorn in the flesh. The smallest thing, a speck, can be so debilitating. Paul prays for relief. He prays that it be taken away, repeatedly he prays, three times. But the Lord is working on Paul, to keep him from being too elated, too proud, too self-sufficient. So He answered Paul’s prayer with a “no”, saying instead, “My grace is sufficient for you.”

There are other things that could be said about God’s grace.

·         We say it’s amazing, “Amazing Grace. . . that saved a wretch like me.” When we grow in it, the more we learn of it the more we appreciate it, the more we are amazed by God’s grace, His amazing love of sending His only Son to die for us to save us.

·         We could say it’s extravagant. More than I deserve.

·         We could say it’s surprising grace. Surprising that God would be kind to us, human beings and not just condemn us all out, as justice should demand.

·         It’s refreshing grace, life-changing grace, giving us new birth and renewed hope.

There is so much to say about grace that it might seem underwhelming to just hear “My grace is sufficient for you.”

Well, sufficient is a very useful word. “That’s sufficient” – is what you tell someone who wants something more or something else and that something would be too much for them or wrong for them. It’s what you should tell a rebellious child who despises the healthy food that’s set before him. “I don’t want this, I want . . . “ No, this is sufficient.”

Sufficient, it means, just right, just enough.

Consider how God made you. Your body is sufficient. Sufficient enough for you to still be alive today: Not too strong – to crush everything you touch; Not too weak as to be unable to lift the fork to your mouth.  Just sufficient.  When you think, oh, I wish I were different, better, stronger, prettier, something else, Stop and remember: you are sufficient.

Consider the world the Lord has made for us. It is sufficient for our lives. There are other planets around. Some are too hot. Some are too cold too cold – our earth is sufficient.

Mars has no atmosphere. There’s no air to breathe there, no cool breeze to cool you on a hot day. Jupiter on the other hand is too windy. You couldn’t even stand up. Well, there’s nothing to stand on anyway, it’s just a ball of blowing hydrogen and helium.

Earth is sufficient, tilted on the axis just so, sufficient for seasons.  with a ratio of land and sea, that’s just right allowing for weather: evaporation, condensation. “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater”  (Isaiah 55)

I suppose, We could complain about the weather, but we also ought to remember that it’s sufficient, just right.

Sufficient: that’s a word that should be spoken to a husband tempted to lust someone who has not been given to him. “Love your wife. She is sufficient. Now he’s gotta work on saying other things about her – She’s beautiful inside and out; she’s helpful; she’s probably the best thing he’s got going for him. But at that moment of temptation, he needs to say to himself that the wife of his youth whom the Lord provided for him, is sufficient.

Likewise a wife, who gets to feeling “I wish my husband were more communicative, more aware, more successful, smarter.” That stuff is probably all true. But can you also say, he is sufficient.

The Lord says to you,“My Grace is sufficient for you.”  Not too little  -- not too much.

Too little grace and God comes off as constantly angered by our failings and flaws.

Too much and we have this picture of God as the white bearded permissive Grandpa, who just overlooks all that’s wrong with us.

“My grace is sufficient” – just enough, just right.

Paul prayed for a life that’s easy, free from pain, free from trouble, free from thorns. He wanted something other than grace, something more than grace.

That’s the thinking one has who says, “Yes, I have God’s grace, someday He will take me to heaven. But in the meantime, there’s bigger fish to fry. There are some other favors I need from heaven.” – and these other favors are ultimately less than grace.

“My grace is sufficient for you.” You hear that sentence differently at different stages of you life. A person on their death bed hears their Lord say this and they find peace and rest.  But a young person full of dreams and ambition and self-sufficiency hears this and pays only minimal attention. Be careful. Don’t be too self-sufficient.

Jesus tells a parable today in the Gospel reading, of a sower who goes out to cast his seed (Luke 8:4-15). In this parable, He explains His evaluation of your abilities and potential. There are a number of items in the extended symbolism of this parable. First there’s the sower. As you can usually expect in the Lord’s parables, the subject of the story stands for the Lord Himself. Then he explicitly says, “The seed is the Word of God” (vs. 11). Then all that’s left to decipher the symbolism. What part do you play? The seed is cast into various types and conditions of soil. That’s you. You are the dirt. The Lord Jesus just called you dirt. Not the most flattering comment you’ve ever gotten, is it? What potential does dirt have? If left to itself dirt produces weeds, thistles and thorns. But if tended, if planted with good seed, then it has great potential. Unlike what the environmentalists may believe, dirt is not sufficient in itself. It must find its sufficiency from somewhere else. So you, on your own are not sufficient. You need grace from outside of yourself and that grace comes from the holy life and innocent death of our Savior Jesus Christ.

He plants His invigorating word into you where it sprouts faith and grows to produce fruit a hundredfold, now and forever. Amen.