Sermon Thursday March 20, 2008
Mandy Thursday
Brothers and sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Tonight, on Maundy Thursday we remember the night that our Lord was betrayed. Why would we take time to remember a night of betrayal? Why, in a time and culture today where real loyalty and faithfulness seem to be so rare, would we take time to remember a night of betrayal? One reason is because on this night, our Lord gave us a gift. On this night when He was betrayed our Lord gave us the blessed gift of the sacrament of Holy Communion.
On this night when He knew full well what was taking place, when the devil was so present in the minds of our Lord’s betrayers, our Lord Christ Jesus was thinking not of Himself but of His disciples; those who were gathered there that night and those who would come in the next generations. As He sat and broke bread with the very one who would betray Him into the hands of the Roman authorities and with the other disciples who, in all honesty, also betrayed Him in many other ways, as He sat and broke bread with them He gave them a gift; the gift of the promise of His continued presence in the blessed sacrament of Holy Communion.
But this sense of grace in the midst of wrath, or life in the midst of death is nothing out of the ordinary for our Lord. The setting that our Lord chose to institute the gift that He gives us in this sacrament is the Passover meal. And that cannot be ignored. This meal that Jesus and the disciples were partaking in immediately before Jesus instituted Holy Communion was a Passover meal.
Passover itself is a season where another great moment of grace in the midst of wrath, or life in the midst of death is remembered. Passover is the remembrance of when our Lord told Moses to have all the Israelite households in Egypt sacrifice a perfect lamb and then take blood from that lamb and mark the doorpost and the lintel of the houses in which they live.
And then that night the Lord was going to pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn in the land of Egypt, both human and animals. But when God saw the households that had been marked with the blood of the lambs that God had told Moses to tell the people to sacrifice, He would pass them over and they would be saved from God’s wrath. That was God’s promise to Moses and the Israelites.
This is a very disturbing image of God, for in order to recognize the grace and mercy that was extended to those whose households had been marked with the blood of the Passover lamb, we must also recognize and acknowledge the wrath and vengeance that was shown to the other homes. And we don’t like to do that. We don’t want to do that. We run from these dark and disturbing images of our Lord.
Earlier this week I saw a video of a brief interview of a very famous person, who on one hand professes to be a Christian, but on the other hand holds to some ambiguous spiritual beliefs that seem to contradict with some essential tenets of Christianity. This person was asked how they reconcile those spiritual beliefs with their Christian beliefs.
The person responded by telling a story of one day being in church and hearing the preacher speak of God being a jealous God. This person realized that they were not comfortable with that image of God as a jealous God. And so in spite of the fact that God’s Word in scripture clearly states and shows that there is this vengeful and jealous side to God, this person just decided that they didn’t believe it.
And so then this person started talking about all these different books that they had read and philosophies that they had studied that helped them make sense of all this. The person tossed around the phrase “take God out of the box” several times. So essentially when this person was confronted with something in God’s Word that they weren’t comfortable with, they just tossed it aside and filled in the gaps with philosophy. But I think this is a reflection of what we all tend to do in one way or another.
When there is an image of God that makes us uncomfortable we run from it. Or we rationalize it, or we allegorize it. And maybe it’s not just the vengeful side of God that makes us uncomfortable. Sometimes the gracious image can be just as disconcerting. If Christ Jesus can, in His final moments, extend grace, forgiveness and the promise of eternal life to the thief who was mocking Him right along with anyone else just moments before his dying confession, then who else does Christ Jesus extend that grace to? That’s the irony. When we run from the image of God that is presented to us in His Word in scripture, we are the ones putting God in a box. We are putting God in our box of reason, logic and what feels comfortable to us.
On the other hand when we don’t run from these images and we confront them head on, then we open ourselves up to see the grace that our Lord extends in the midst of these dark and vengeful moments. We can see that through it all, whether it’s the vengeful God who makes us squirm or the disproportionately gracious God who makes us cry ‘no fair’ God’s primary motive through it all is the salvation of His people. That disturbing image of God taking the lives of the firstborn of all those Egyptian households would lead to the Pharaoh finally releasing God’s people from captivity, as the Lord had demanded of Pharaoh several times through Moses.
And it is that blessed event that the Passover meal remembers and thus immediately before instituting Holy Communion Jesus and the disciples were remembering the passing over of God’s people with a Passover feast.
And all of this was taking place within the context of a betrayal; a betrayal of the Son of Man into the hands of the authorities who were persecuting Him. This was all taking place in the midst of betrayal and death. But it is a betrayal and death that would usher in for us freedom, forgiveness and new life.
Once again we would see wrath and forgiveness, and death and new life. But the wrath this time would all be received by the One perfect and spotless Passover lamb of God, Christ Jesus who would soon lay down His life so that you would have new life in Him. And the new life that would come about in the midst of this wrath would not be limited to Israel but would be extended to all who would believe in this perfect and sinless Passover lamb, Christ Jesus. It is extended to you and it is, as it says in the very words of institution ‘for you.’
And our Lord Jesus continues to extend this forgiveness to you through the blessed sacrament of Holy Communion which was instituted that night. For the meal of the Lord’s Supper is bound to the words of promise contained within it; that within this meal you receive Christ’s body and blood given and shed for you for the forgiveness of your sin.
Later in the interview that I mentioned earlier. The famous person was asked what they thought of Jesus. The person basically said that they believed Jesus came to show us how to live and treat each other. But there was no mention of the cross or the empty tomb. When we find an excuse to dismiss one uncomfortable image of God soon we’re dismissing all of the images that make us uncomfortable, and ultimately we end up taking Jesus off the cross.
But without the cross there can be no empty tomb. Without the cross there can be no promise of a day when the old will be done away and all things will be made new. And without the cross there can be no celebration of the Lord’s Supper in Holy Communion through which you are able to see, taste, touch, and feel your forgiveness in Christ, and are empowered through the nurturing and sustaining of your faith to live out the commandment that you receive in our Gospel lesson; to love one another as Christ has loved you so that your neighbor will know that you are one of Christ Jesus’ disciples.
Amen
Brothers and sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Tonight, on Maundy Thursday we remember the night that our Lord was betrayed. Why would we take time to remember a night of betrayal? Why, in a time and culture today where real loyalty and faithfulness seem to be so rare, would we take time to remember a night of betrayal? One reason is because on this night, our Lord gave us a gift. On this night when He was betrayed our Lord gave us the blessed gift of the sacrament of Holy Communion.
On this night when He knew full well what was taking place, when the devil was so present in the minds of our Lord’s betrayers, our Lord Christ Jesus was thinking not of Himself but of His disciples; those who were gathered there that night and those who would come in the next generations. As He sat and broke bread with the very one who would betray Him into the hands of the Roman authorities and with the other disciples who, in all honesty, also betrayed Him in many other ways, as He sat and broke bread with them He gave them a gift; the gift of the promise of His continued presence in the blessed sacrament of Holy Communion.
But this sense of grace in the midst of wrath, or life in the midst of death is nothing out of the ordinary for our Lord. The setting that our Lord chose to institute the gift that He gives us in this sacrament is the Passover meal. And that cannot be ignored. This meal that Jesus and the disciples were partaking in immediately before Jesus instituted Holy Communion was a Passover meal.
Passover itself is a season where another great moment of grace in the midst of wrath, or life in the midst of death is remembered. Passover is the remembrance of when our Lord told Moses to have all the Israelite households in Egypt sacrifice a perfect lamb and then take blood from that lamb and mark the doorpost and the lintel of the houses in which they live.
And then that night the Lord was going to pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn in the land of Egypt, both human and animals. But when God saw the households that had been marked with the blood of the lambs that God had told Moses to tell the people to sacrifice, He would pass them over and they would be saved from God’s wrath. That was God’s promise to Moses and the Israelites.
This is a very disturbing image of God, for in order to recognize the grace and mercy that was extended to those whose households had been marked with the blood of the Passover lamb, we must also recognize and acknowledge the wrath and vengeance that was shown to the other homes. And we don’t like to do that. We don’t want to do that. We run from these dark and disturbing images of our Lord.
Earlier this week I saw a video of a brief interview of a very famous person, who on one hand professes to be a Christian, but on the other hand holds to some ambiguous spiritual beliefs that seem to contradict with some essential tenets of Christianity. This person was asked how they reconcile those spiritual beliefs with their Christian beliefs.
The person responded by telling a story of one day being in church and hearing the preacher speak of God being a jealous God. This person realized that they were not comfortable with that image of God as a jealous God. And so in spite of the fact that God’s Word in scripture clearly states and shows that there is this vengeful and jealous side to God, this person just decided that they didn’t believe it.
And so then this person started talking about all these different books that they had read and philosophies that they had studied that helped them make sense of all this. The person tossed around the phrase “take God out of the box” several times. So essentially when this person was confronted with something in God’s Word that they weren’t comfortable with, they just tossed it aside and filled in the gaps with philosophy. But I think this is a reflection of what we all tend to do in one way or another.
When there is an image of God that makes us uncomfortable we run from it. Or we rationalize it, or we allegorize it. And maybe it’s not just the vengeful side of God that makes us uncomfortable. Sometimes the gracious image can be just as disconcerting. If Christ Jesus can, in His final moments, extend grace, forgiveness and the promise of eternal life to the thief who was mocking Him right along with anyone else just moments before his dying confession, then who else does Christ Jesus extend that grace to? That’s the irony. When we run from the image of God that is presented to us in His Word in scripture, we are the ones putting God in a box. We are putting God in our box of reason, logic and what feels comfortable to us.
On the other hand when we don’t run from these images and we confront them head on, then we open ourselves up to see the grace that our Lord extends in the midst of these dark and vengeful moments. We can see that through it all, whether it’s the vengeful God who makes us squirm or the disproportionately gracious God who makes us cry ‘no fair’ God’s primary motive through it all is the salvation of His people. That disturbing image of God taking the lives of the firstborn of all those Egyptian households would lead to the Pharaoh finally releasing God’s people from captivity, as the Lord had demanded of Pharaoh several times through Moses.
And it is that blessed event that the Passover meal remembers and thus immediately before instituting Holy Communion Jesus and the disciples were remembering the passing over of God’s people with a Passover feast.
And all of this was taking place within the context of a betrayal; a betrayal of the Son of Man into the hands of the authorities who were persecuting Him. This was all taking place in the midst of betrayal and death. But it is a betrayal and death that would usher in for us freedom, forgiveness and new life.
Once again we would see wrath and forgiveness, and death and new life. But the wrath this time would all be received by the One perfect and spotless Passover lamb of God, Christ Jesus who would soon lay down His life so that you would have new life in Him. And the new life that would come about in the midst of this wrath would not be limited to Israel but would be extended to all who would believe in this perfect and sinless Passover lamb, Christ Jesus. It is extended to you and it is, as it says in the very words of institution ‘for you.’
And our Lord Jesus continues to extend this forgiveness to you through the blessed sacrament of Holy Communion which was instituted that night. For the meal of the Lord’s Supper is bound to the words of promise contained within it; that within this meal you receive Christ’s body and blood given and shed for you for the forgiveness of your sin.
Later in the interview that I mentioned earlier. The famous person was asked what they thought of Jesus. The person basically said that they believed Jesus came to show us how to live and treat each other. But there was no mention of the cross or the empty tomb. When we find an excuse to dismiss one uncomfortable image of God soon we’re dismissing all of the images that make us uncomfortable, and ultimately we end up taking Jesus off the cross.
But without the cross there can be no empty tomb. Without the cross there can be no promise of a day when the old will be done away and all things will be made new. And without the cross there can be no celebration of the Lord’s Supper in Holy Communion through which you are able to see, taste, touch, and feel your forgiveness in Christ, and are empowered through the nurturing and sustaining of your faith to live out the commandment that you receive in our Gospel lesson; to love one another as Christ has loved you so that your neighbor will know that you are one of Christ Jesus’ disciples.
Amen
posted by Steve at 12:01 PM
1 Comments:
THAT WAS AMAZING! AND I AM USING CAPS FOR A REASON-THAT HAS TO BE, PERHAPS THE BEST SERMON I HAVE EVER HEARD. AMAZING.
THIS LINE IS TOO GOOD:
"But this sense of grace in the midst of wrath, or life in the midst of death is nothing out of the ordinary for our Lord."
BEAUTIFUL
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