The claims that required vindication

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Sermon for Judica – Lent 5

Hebrews 9:11-15  +  John 8:46-59

Vindicate me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation! That was the opening verse of today’s Introit, from Psalm 43. Vindicate me, O God! That’s the cry of a righteous man who has been unjustly accused of unrighteousness, of a truthful man who has wrongly been called a liar, of an innocent man who has been unjustly accused and judged and condemned as a criminal. It’s a plea to God, who sees the truth, to stand up for the one who is being falsely accused, to rescue him, to make him victorious over his accusers. Men may get it wrong. They may treat the just man unjustly. But in the end, God will sort it all out and see to it that the righteous are vindicated and that the unrighteous are condemned.

Now, if Christians who have been falsely accused can pray this Psalm—and we can!—how much more the Son of God when He is falsely accused! And that’s exactly what we see happening in today’s Gospel. This Gospel is a fitting preparation for Holy Week as Jesus’ bitter enemies, the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem, spoke to Him with utter hatred and contempt, falsely accusing Him of all sorts of things. Next week, we’ll watch Jesus being falsely accused before the Jewish Council and before Pontius Pilate on Good Friday, and we’ll marvel at His silence. But in today’s Gospel, which takes place several months before Holy Week, Jesus does not remain silent at all. In fact, He doubles down and makes even bolder claims before the unbelieving Jews—claims that would, eventually, get Him killed, claims that would, eventually, require vindication from God.

“Which one of you convicts me of sin? And if I am telling the truth, why do you not believe me?

The Pharisees and other unbelieving Jewish leaders had been scolding Jesus on this day for His teaching. They had been boasting about their lineage from Abraham. “How dare you claim that you are some kind of savior, that we need you, that you were sent from God? We’re Abraham’s children. We’re the chosen people of God, Jesus! You’re a nobody!” And yet not one of them could prove anything Jesus said to be untrue. No one could point to any sin He had committed. Everything He did proved that He was telling the truth, and yet they still refused to believe Him. Here He tells them why that’s the case: He who is from God hears God’s words. This is why you do not hear, because you are not from God.

In other words, God’s children listen to God’s Word. The fact that people refuse to listen to Jesus, refuse to believe in Him, proves that they are not God’s children. That’s an accusation from Jesus, and how much of our society, of our world, would be on the receiving end of such an accusation! “You won’t listen to God’s Word. You insist on making up your own truth, your own right and wrong, your own doctrines and beliefs, your own way of salvation. You who do this—you are not God’s children.” That’s the accusation Jesus made against the unbelieving Jews. It’s the same accusation He continues to make against the unbelievers of the world. And people today mostly react the same way the Jews did to that accusation:

The Jews answered and said to him, “Do we not rightly say that you are a Samaritan and that you have a demon?”

They mocked Jesus as a Samaritan, a half-breed, an outsider, a worshiper of a false god, and even possessed by the devil. The world does the same thing today. They hold up their own false version of God—sometimes, even their own version of Jesus!—as the true God and label Bible-believing Christians as the mean ones, as the intolerant ones, as the ones on the wrong side of history.

Jesus answered, “I do not have a demon, but I honor my Father, and you dishonor me. I do not seek my own glory; there is One who seeks it and who judges.”

Notice, Jesus doesn’t launch into a grand defense of His words or His ministry. He doesn’t dabble in philosophy or apologetics. He simply denies having a demon, and claims that He is honoring His Father. He even claims that God seeks honor for Him, for Jesus, and He threatens the unbelieving Jews, that God will judge the one who does not honor Jesus. Then He adds an astounding promise:

Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.

Death comes for us all. Everyone knows that. Imagine hearing someone claim that their words were the key to avoiding death. Now, what does it mean to keep Jesus’ word? It means, first, to believe He is telling the truth about God, about Himself, about us, about right and wrong, and about the way of salvation from death, which is through faith in Him as the Conqueror of death, sent by God to save sinful human beings who are otherwise destined to die, and to suffer death forever. But it means more than believing it to be true. Keeping His word also means actually acknowledging and repenting of our sins, trusting in Him for the forgiveness of sins, and seeking to put His word into practice in how we think and speak and behave in this world. Those who keep His word will never see death, will never taste death. That’s not a promise that our bodies won’t give out. It’s a promise that, when they do, our souls will not experience even a moment of hell or of separation from God, but will go on living with the life that we have in Him even now, and that, one day, our bodies will be raised and perfected and joined back together with our souls.

But all that was too much for the Jewish leaders. Then the Jews said to him, “Now we know that you have a demon. Abraham died, and so did the prophets. And you say, ‘If anyone keeps my word, he will never taste death.’ Are you greater than our father Abraham, who died? And the prophets died. Who do you make yourself out to be?”

They just can’t believe. They can’t believe anyone would be so bold, to claim that He can keep people from dying. That’s even crazier than claiming that God created the universe in six natural day—which those Jews likely believed. But to them, Jesus’ words couldn’t possibly be true, because if they were, that would mean that He was greater than Abraham, greater than the prophets. It fact, it would mean that Jesus was truly sent by God, was the Lord of life and the Ruler over death. And they were not going to accept that.

Jesus answered, “If I honor myself, my honor is nothing. It is my Father who honors me, of whom you say that he is your God.

The Father had been honoring Jesus throughout His ministry, in every miracle Jesus performed, in every perfect outcome of everything Jesus said and did. That’s why we really need to take note during Holy Week next week, because during that Holy Week, some 2,000 years ago, for about three days, the Father would not publicly honor Jesus. Instead, He would allow Him to be utterly dishonored by men. Why? And would the Christ ever be vindicated? That will be our focus next week.

For now, Jesus just keeps doubling down on His claims. You do not know him; but I know him. If I were to say, ‘I do not know him,’ I would be a liar, like you. But I do know him and keep his word.” Not only does Jesus call His detractors, “liars” for claiming to know God when, in fact, they didn’t know Him, but He adds another claim, almost as a taunt. Your father Abraham was glad that he would see my day, and he saw it and rejoiced. Then the Jews said to him, “You are not yet fifty years old! And you have seen Abraham?” Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.”

You know, there are many, many so-called Christians today who claim that Abraham never believed in Jesus, and, therefore, modern Jews will also be saved without believing in Jesus. But in this text Jesus proves them all to be liars. Abraham did believe in Jesus. He saw Jesus from afar and put his faith in Him and rejoiced in Him, the distant Seed of Abraham who would come and be a blessing to all nations. In fact, when Abraham encountered the LORD God, even back in Abraham’s day, the truth is, he encountered the person of Jesus, though not the Man Jesus, because, unlike the rest of us, Jesus existed before He was born. In fact, He existed before the universe was born, from the beginning, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, Jesus is. Or as He puts it, “I AM.”

This is the One whom you worship, dear Christians. The LORD, the great I AM, the Seed of Abraham, the Son of God and the Son of Man. This is the One who confronted the unbelievers in Israel, who spoke the truth to them but was called a liar, who was righteous but who was branded as unrighteous, who was innocent, and yet who was, eventually, put to death. They couldn’t do it on that day, because, as John says, His hour had not yet come. But it would, and we’ll spend next week hearing about it in detail. The accusers and enemies and murderers of Christ would have their day. And Jesus cries out through the Psalmist, Vindicate me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation! For a few days, it would appear that the Father didn’t hear Jesus’ plea. But all that would change on the third day, when Christ’s vindication would come.

You, too, will be vindicated, eventually, against all the false accusations people make against you, against all the mistreatment of the world, against all the apparent victories of the devil, who has been pummeling and pummeling the true Christian Church on earth for a long time now. When you suffer unjustly, when you’re unjustly accused, when the world condemns you, when the devil comes for you, when death itself comes for you, don’t lose heart. Say, Vindicate me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation, against unjust persecution, against sin, death, and the power of the devil. And you’ll see. God will vindicate you, just as He vindicated His perfectly innocent Son, to whom you belong, because, unlike the unbelievers in our Gospel, you are children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. Amen.

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The Giver of earthly and heavenly bread

No video is available for today’s service due to technical difficulties. Audio of the sermon (as preached in Silver City) is available here:

Sermon for Laetare – Lent 4

Galatians 4:21-31  +  John 6:1-15

At the beginning of this Lenten season, we saw how Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness at the beginning of His ministry, deprived of bread by His heavenly Father. You remember what the devil came and suggested at the end of those 40 days? If You are the Son of God, then turn these stones into bread. Jesus didn’t do it, of course. Could He have done it? Well, we see in our Gospel today that He certainly had the power to do it. But He chose not to do it, because even if, on some level, He, as a man, had wanted to provide bread for Himself, He knew that His Father didn’t want that, and Jesus wanted, above all else, to do His Father’s will.

As we see in today’s Gospel, Jesus had the power and the willingness to provide bread for more than 5,000 people at once. But He wanted to provide them with a different kind of bread, too, not just once, but continually and forever. Unfortunately, that’s not what most of the people that day wanted. Do you?

All four Evangelists record the feeding of the five thousand. But John records a few details that the others omit, so we should take special note of those. One of those details is that this miracle took place near the time of the Passover, when the people’s thoughts should have been turning toward God’s deliverance of Israel from slavery in Egypt through the blood of the Passover Lamb. This would be, not Jesus’ final Passover, but His second-to-last one. His popularity had been growing and growing for the first two years of His ministry, but this event would actually mark the beginning of a year of declining support and growing opposition, and we see the main reason why at the end of today’s Gospel.

At the beginning, all was well. The crowds had followed Jesus around the Sea of Galilee and had spent the day with Him, hearing Him teach and having their sicknesses healed. Toward the end of the day, Jesus decided to provide a meal for them, not only as a kindness, but also as another teaching opportunity. He started that teaching with His own disciples, testing them to see if what they had seen and learned from Him over the last two years would provide a good answer to the question, Where shall we buy bread, that these may eat?

Now poor Philip had seen Jesus do all sorts of miracles over the past two years. He was one of those first disciples who was there to see Jesus’ first miracle of changing water into wine. But in the moment, when all he sees are thousands of hungry people, he forgets Jesus’ power to help. He thinks only of what man can do. How can we come up with enough money to buy bread for so many? It’s impossible.

Andrew didn’t do much better. He, too, was one of those very first disciples who accompanied Jesus to the wedding at Cana. But all he could focus on was what man can do. What are five loaves of bread and two small fish among so many? Still, a question is better than an outright denial, because it left it up to Jesus to answer the question.

He would empower the disciples to do what they thought they couldn’t do. He would have them provide food for the people, after He provided it first to them. They had the people sit down, as He told them to. They brought the five loaves and two fish to Jesus. Jesus blessed them and broke them, and miraculously multiplied them, but then He gave them to the disciples to distribute them to the crowds, as much as anyone wanted.

Jesus’ divine power is obvious. So is His compassion for the crowds that day and for all who trust in Him. There are also some obvious connections made in the text. The way John puts it, Jesus took the loaves; and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to the disciples, and the disciples to those who were sitting down, sounds very much like another meal Jesus would be instituting in one year’s time. A meal of bread and wine where Jesus would take bread, and when He had given thanks, He broke it and gave it to the disciples, saying, “Take, eat; this is My body.” And from then on, He would not personally distribute His body, but His disciples would stand in for Him, just as they did here with the bread and the fish. He’s the one providing His body with the bread and His blood with the wine. But He has His ministers handing it out to the communicants.

So the bread makes us think of the bread of Holy Communion, and the combination here of eating bread together with the flesh of the fish is another picture of how Jesus gives His flesh together with the bread. That’s true in a special, sacramental way in Holy Communion. But it’s also true in a spiritual way when we “eat the flesh” and “drink the blood” of Jesus by believing in Him, as He says later in John 6, Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. He’s not talking about Holy Communion there. He’s talking about receiving Him by faith and about the life-giving benefit of believing in Him. And the contrast is striking. Adam and Eve physically ate the flesh of a fruit and brought death on themselves. But Jesus offers Himself to us to eat in a spiritual way as the true Tree of Life who feeds us for eternal life.

That’s the real gift Jesus wanted to provide to the 5,000. He showed them that He had the power to provide earthly bread, just as God had done for Israel through Moses in the Old Testament, so that they would recognize Him as their God and Savior, the true Bread that had come down from heaven to give life to all who seek it from Him, to save them from sin, death, and the devil, and to earn for them the forgiveness of sins and eternal life.

But that isn’t what they wanted.

After the crowds filled their bellies, we’re told that they recognized Jesus as the Prophet who was to come into the world, as the promised Christ. But they didn’t worship Christ as their God. They didn’t bow down before Him in humility or in repentance. They didn’t ask Him what He wanted for them or from them. What did they do?

Again, John is the only Evangelist to reveal the motives of the people that day. He tells us that Jesus knew that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, so he departed again to the mountain by himself, alone. Those people wanted a Christ for this earth, a Christ who would lead them in battle against their political enemies, who would make Israel into a glorious earthly kingdom, who would give them peace and prosperity and safety in this world. And they were ready to force Him to do it—as if they could.

The arrogance of it, the folly of it, is astounding! But not uncommon. Many people who seek God seek Him as if He were a vending machine that existed for the sole purpose of giving them what they want, when they want it. They’re interested in how He can make life better for them here on earth. They aren’t interested in His will, or in His Word, or in His honor. We all have to be careful not to view God that way, but to seek His will, in His Word, for His honor.

And what is God’s will for you? What does He want for you? He wants to provide you with daily bread (though usually not in a miraculous way), to provide you with all you need to sustain this body and life. But He wants to do much more than that. He wants to bring you to repentance for your sins and to faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, for the forgiveness of sins. He wants to lead you safely through this earthly life into a better life after this life. He doesn’t want to give you Paradise here on earth, or immediate deliverance from all sorrow or suffering. If that’s what you seek from Him—earthly pleasures and earthly fulfillment—then you’ll be disappointed in the end, as most of the 5,000 were, who began to turn away from Jesus shortly after He fed their bodies, because He began to make it very clear that He had come to be their Savior from sin and their King whose kingdom is not of this world, when all they really wanted was a vending machine.

But you, you who call Jesus your King for the right reasons, with the right expectations, you have every reason to rejoice and be glad, because His will for you remains unchanged. Trust in His power to provide just what you need, no matter how impossible it seems. And trust in His good and gracious will to give you something far, far better than a mini-Paradise on earth, to give you peace with God here, and victory over this world and a place in the true Paradise above hereafter. Amen.

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Back and forth between comfort and condemnation

Notice: The audio for the sermon, the video for the service, and the streaming for the service are not available today due to technical problems. You can access last year’s service for Lent 3 Vespers by clicking this link.

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Sermon for Midweek of Lent 3

Isaiah 43:16-28

Back and forth, back and forth goes Isaiah’s prophecy. Speaking comfort to future Israel in captivity, speaking judgment and condemnation against the Israel of Isaiah’s day for the sins that would lead to their captivity. Back and forth, back and forth. Law, Gospel, Sin, Grace, Judgment, Deliverance, Comfort, Condemnation.

That pattern runs through the whole Bible. It has to, because, as sinful human beings, we can’t just be warned about sin and its consequences one time, and then we’re good to go; we’ll never turn back to sin again. No, the Law works fear and sorrow over our sins, the Gospel lifts up the penitent and comforts us and strengthens us. But until we reach heaven, we will still need the guidance, and the warnings, and, when necessary, the condemnations of the Law, because our sinful flesh will never allow us to maintain true contrition and repentance without that continuous back and forth of God’s Word.

Our text this evening begins with some comforting verses for penitent Israel, sitting in future captivity in Babylon—and also for penitent Christians today as we wrestle with the evil of this world, still plagued by afflictions and persecutions and the devil’s temptations, still separated from our heavenly home: Thus says the LORD, who makes a way in the sea, a path in the mighty waters, who brings forth chariot and horse, army and warrior; they lie down, they cannot rise, they are extinguished, quenched like a wick:

What quality or what fact about Himself does the Lord want us to focus on? He wants us to remember His miraculous deliverance of Israel from slavery in Egypt, how He opened up a way for them through the Red Sea, how He lured Pharaoh’s army to follow the Israelites into the sea with their horses and chariots, and then sent the waters crashing down on Israel’s enemies, leaving their bodies to be swept away by the sea and buried. For as great as that deliverance was, God wants them to focus on the deliverance He is about to accomplish:

“Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. The wild beasts will honor me, the jackals and the ostriches, for I give water in the wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my chosen people, the people whom I formed for myself that they might declare my praise.

The captive Israelites in Babylon would be separated from Jerusalem by a vast desert. But God didn’t have to part the sand dunes of the desert for Israel in a literal way. What He’s promising here is that He will make a way for captive Israel to return to Jerusalem from their captivity in Babylon. In the same way, even though the condition of the Christian Church looks hopeless today as we’re surrounded by a vast desert of depravity, unbelief, violence, and lies, God will make a way for His beloved Church to be brought safely into His heavenly kingdom. That’s the deliverance He’ll accomplish for us on the Last Day, and it should give us much hope.

There’s the word of comfort. But then it’s back to the Law: “Yet you did not call upon me, O Jacob; but you have been weary of me, O Israel! You have not brought me your sheep for burnt offerings, or honored me with your sacrifices. I have not burdened you with offerings, or wearied you with frankincense. You have not bought me sweet cane with money, or satisfied me with the fat of your sacrifices. But you have burdened me with your sins; you have wearied me with your iniquities.

Here God isn’t so much talking to the future captives but to the present people of Israel whose sins would lead to the future captivity. God accuses the people of failing to bring Him the sacrifices that their covenant with Him required. But the captives in Babylon weren’t able to offer sacrifices to the Lord or burn incense. Those things had to happen in Jerusalem’s temple—a temple that no longer existed by the time of the captivity. So God levels this charge against them as a cause of their captivity. Now, the number of sacrifices Israel was bringing before the captivity may have decreased, but as far as we know, the sacrifices in the temple didn’t cease prior to its destruction. But it had become just an outward show, going through the motions. They were “weary” of the Lord. They didn’t bring the sacrifices to honor Him, but out of what had become resentment toward this demanding God whom they no longer loved. They hadn’t “burdened” God with their offerings. Instead, they had burdened Him with their sins.

We always have to watch out for the same thing. Outward acts of worship are worthless if not accompanied by inner repentance and faith. And we should never think that we can make up for our offenses against God by turning around and doing something nice for Him. On the contrary: “I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.”

There it’s back to Gospel again, back to a word of comfort, a word of promise, a word of hope in the fact that our God is a God who forgives sins, and who forgives them, not for the sake of our works, not for the sake of the sacrifices we may bring, but for His own sake, for Jesus’ sake, who made atonement on the cross for all the sins and transgressions of men. It’s a word of hope for us sinners when God promises not to remember our sins any longer, because it means that God’s forgiveness is real, not just an outward act on His part, but a genuine cleaning of the slate, so that He looks at the forgiven with no trace of resentment or bitterness or anger.

But then, once more, it’s back to the Law. Put me in remembrance; let us argue together; set forth your case, that you may be proved right. Your first father sinned, and your mediators transgressed against me. Therefore I will profane the princes of the sanctuary, and deliver Jacob to utter destruction and Israel to reviling.

For the sins of Adam, the first father of mankind, for the sins of the mediators—the priests—of Israel, for all their sins and transgressions, for which they refused to repent, God announces the coming destruction and captivity once again. Even the faithful in captivity, who had been brought to repentance, who had received God’s mercy and forgiveness, needed to remember, over and over, the reason for their captivity, to keep them clinging to the Lord God in faith.

Back and forth, back and forth. The Lord continues to nourish His Church with the Law and the Gospel, followed by more Law and more Gospel. For those who refuse to repent, they should look at the final destruction God brought to Israel after they rejected Jesus, the Christ, and the reviling and antipathy toward Israel that exists even to this day. They sinned against God and then, even worse, they refused to repent of it so that they might be forgiven through faith in Christ Jesus. Learn from their tragic example. Keep listening both to the Law and to the Gospel. And give thanks to the Lord for continuing to provide you with both messages. It’s His way of keeping you going forth in faith so that you don’t fall back into sin and into the condemnation of the impenitent. Amen.

 

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Your Protector against the evil spirits

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Sermon for Oculi – Lent 3

Ephesians 5:1-9  +  Luke 11:14-28

Demons are real. The devil is real—a real spirit-creature, powerful, cunning, ferocious, and relentless. The Bible associates demons with false doctrine, with idol-worship, and with shadowy influence over world governments. You and I may not have obvious encounters with them, or maybe we do and just don’t understand what it is that we’re facing. There was a girl in the city of Philippi who was possessed by a demon at the time of the apostle Paul. It was called a “spirit of divination,” allowing the girl to tell people their fortunes with a supernatural degree of accuracy. It’s not impossible that there are demons involved still today in some cases of fortune-telling, or perhaps in certain conditions that are otherwise diagnosed as illnesses. I have known both Christians and non-Christians who were convinced that they were being troubled, even terrorized, by demons. And I can’t rule out that possibility.

At the same time, I’m skeptical of many modern claims of demon possession as well as modern claims of exorcism. There is no evidence in Holy Scripture that the miraculous gift of being able to cast out demons would continue after the days of the apostles, and most of the claims of modern exorcisms are directly tied to teachers of false doctrine anyway, so even if the possessions are real, the exorcism accounts may not be, or, in a truly diabolical scenario, the demons could be playing along with the false teachers, willingly leaving their host in order to lend support to the false teachings of the false teachers.

Whatever doubts we may have about what’s going on today, there can be no doubt about what was going on at the time of Jesus. Holy Scripture is a dependable witness to such things. Demons were, at that time, most definitely taking control of people’s bodies in various ways, or, as in the case of the fortune-teller, communicating directly with certain individuals, giving them knowledge of things they couldn’t otherwise know. They seem to have swarmed the world at the time of Christ, since we hardly hear anything about them tormenting people prior to that time. And no one was able to help.

Until Jesus came along. Jesus drove out demons easily, with a word, just as He did in today’s Gospel, where a demon was keeping a man from being able to speak. And He didn’t have to do it “in the name of” someone else, nor did He need to ask His Father for permission or power to do it. The Father had given Him the Spirit without measure. As He says after His resurrection, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.”

The people of Israel were rightfully amazed at Jesus’ power, which was unlike anything they had ever seen. But the devil’s children were there, too—not spirit-children or hybrid humans, but human unbelievers whose spiritual attitude was according to the devil’s image instead of God’s. He casts out demons by Beelzebub, the prince of demons!, they accused.

Jesus responds to that accusation with a series of answers. First, he shows how silly it is to claim that He is driving out demons by the power of “Beelzebub.” That’s a Hebrew name that means “Lord of the Flies.” In the Old Testament, it was the name given to the god of Ekron, one of the Philistine cities, and eventually became associated with Satan himself. To say that Satan was helping Jesus to drive out a demon, against the demon’s will, implied that the devil had somehow turned against his own angels, in which case, his kingdom was doomed from within, destined to self-destruct, and would soon cease to be a threat to God’s people. If the devil had turned against his own demons, then they had nothing to fear from the devil any longer.

But that wasn’t the case at all. The devil remains a fearsome enemy of all mankind, and of God’s people, in particular. So, no, the devil was not the source of Jesus’ power.

What about the sons of the unbelieving Jews? By whose power were they casting out demons? And if I cast out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons cast them out? So they will be your judges. I take this to mean that no one else was able to drive out demons, even if they tried. By whom do your sons cast the demons out? By no one! No man could do what Jesus was doing.

So, if Jesus was actually successful at driving out demons (which everyone there admitted), and if it wasn’t by the devil’s power, then there was only one conclusion that they could reach. This was the mighty Seed of the woman whose coming was foretold since the Garden of Eden. Jesus was the One who was to come and crush the ancient serpent’s head.

That’s exactly what Jesus Himself concludes here: But if I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. The kingdom of God is a reference to the reign of the Christ: His invisible reign here on earth, which will be followed by His visible reign after Judgment Day. He then follows up that statement with the example of the strong man, and the stronger man.

This is one of the two major teachings in these verses. The devil, with all his demons, is like a strong man who guards his possessions within his house. People are those possessions, whether or not those people are possessed by a demon. The apostle Paul writes this to the Colossians in chapter 1: God has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins. That means that, before we were brought to faith and baptized into Christ, we were under the power of darkness, outside of Christ’s kingdom, dead in our trespasses and sins, like the rest of unbelieving mankind. All who are outside of Christ belong to the devil, whether their bodies are possessed or not. And if they are possessed, then the devil holds onto them even more strongly.

That’s why it took a stronger Man, Jesus, to come in and conquer the devil and take away his armor in which he trusted. That’s the picture Jesus give us of Himself. Of course He’s stronger than the devil, because the devil is a creation of God, while Jesus is true God and the devil’s Creator. Not that He created him as the evil one, but the angel who became the devil is, by his very nature, inferior to Christ, his Creator. But even as true Man, Christ is stronger than the devil, because He is a sinless Man who fights against the devil with His Father’s full approval. He is the mighty Champion who went to the cross in order to remove from the devil his right to accuse or hold onto anyone who is on Jesus’ side, by faith.

You see how important it is to be on Jesus’ side in this epic spiritual battle? Because there are only two sides. As Jesus says, Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. Who are the Christian’s allies? We may have political allies or community allies who aren’t believers in Christ Jesus. There is a place for that in this world, and Christians and non-Christians can work together and support one another in those earthly endeavors. But in spiritual matters, there can be no such allegiances. As Paul writes to the Corinthians, What fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial (or “Beelzebub”)? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? No, if a person is not on Jesus’ side, by faith in Him and by obedience to His Word, that person is not the ally of Christians and shouldn’t be seen that way. That person remains on the devil’s side.

Jesus then gives us a glimpse into the spiritual realm—something only He can do!—so that we can understand what’s at stake here, how important it is to be squarely on Jesus’ side. He describes what happens when a demon leaves a person. It wanders around for a while, and then it goes back to look at the state of the person whom it left. And if it finds that person’s heart swept and put in order, or “empty,” as it says in Matthew’s account, then it goes back in, and it invites its demonic friends to join it and make that person’s life far worse than it had been before.

This is another key teaching in these verses. The believer in Christ Jesus has the Holy Spirit dwelling in his heart, so that the devil can’t get it. He may be able to get away with terrorizing a person from the outside, for a while, and he can surely tempt a believer, as he was even able to tempt the Lord Jesus. But the one who is clinging to Christ in faith cannot be possessed or controlled by any demon. I can’t think of a stronger warning or encouragement to make sure that, each day, you’re living in repentance and faith, and that you never toy with the things of the devil—idolatry, pornography, sexual immorality, witchcraft, sorcery, fortune-telling, Ouija boards, and all such things. Instead, as Paul said to the Ephesians in today’s Epistle, Be imitators of God, therefore, as his beloved children, and walk in love, as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us as an offering and sacrifice to God, to be a sweet-smelling aroma. But sexual immorality and all uncleanness or greed, let it not even be mentioned among you, as is fitting for saints, nor filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse joking, which are not proper for you, but rather thanksgiving.

After hearing all this from Jesus, a woman in the crowd that day stood up and tried to praise Jesus for His words. But her praise was mis-focused, if you will. Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts at which you nursed! But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it.” Mary, Jesus’ mother, was certainly blessed. But she can’t help anyone against the demons. She can’t help anyone with anything. But Jesus can! And His word can! Hear Him, God the Father said to Peter, James, and John on the Mt. of Transfiguration. So don’t let your faith (or your praise) become mis-focused. Hear Jesus. Trust in Jesus. And do what He says. Put His word into practice. And you will be blessed, which includes being kept safe from the devil and all his evil angels and all their wicked schemes. If you’re with Jesus, you’re with the Stronger Man, and He will be your ever-present Protector against the evil spirits. As St. Paul writes, If God is for us, who can be against us? Neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons…will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

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But now God will come to your rescue

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Sermon for Midweek of Lent 2

Isaiah 43:1-15

At the end of Isaiah 42, God spoke to Israel in their future captivity and reminded them that it was He who had brought about their punishment, because of their sins against Him and because of their refusal to repent. Chapter 43 begins with a great “But now…”

But now, thus says the LORD, who created you, O Jacob, And He who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; You are Mine.

Yes, God had brought about Israel’s punishment. But that didn’t mean that He had forgotten them or abandoned them forever. He had punished them severely. But now, He chooses to redeem them, to rescue them, to claim them again as His own. Why? Had they somehow earned their release from captivity? Not at all! It’s by grace alone that God will step in to save them from their well-deserved punishment for their sins. His grace, as well as all the as-yet unfulfilled promises about the coming Christ, who had to be sent to Israel in the land of Israel.

St. Paul says something similar to the Romans. He spends nearly two full chapters exposing the sins of the pagan Gentiles and of the hypocritical Jews. He ends that accusation with sharp words of condemnation: Whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God… But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe.

The Law condemns everyone and stops the mouth of everyone. But now God has provided redemption through faith in Christ Jesus. And the tender words of God now go out to everyone who believes and is baptized: Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; You are Mine.

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, Nor shall the flame scorch you. For I am the LORD your God, The Holy One of Israel, your Savior;

Israel wasn’t to understand these words as a promise that no calamity would ever strike them on earth again. It wasn’t a promise that they could never drown or never be burned by fire, although sometimes God does literally save from those things, as when He brought Israel through the Red Sea and across the Jordan River on dry ground, or when He saved Jonah from drowning by sending the great fish to swallow him, or when He protected Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace. But this is a solemn promise, to Old Testament Israel and to the New Israel of the Christian Church, that God is with us through every adversity, and that He will let nothing bad happen to us that does at the same time serve His purpose for us, to make everything work together for our good. He is the LORD our God. He is the One who saves us.

I gave Egypt for your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba in your place. Since you were precious in My sight, You have been honored, And I have loved you; Therefore I will give men for you, And people for your life.

Already in the past, God had devastated Egypt with those terrible ten plagues so that the people who were called by His name might go free. He pushed aside the nations that stood in the way of Israel getting to the promised land. Now He will do the same with the Babylonians who were holding them captive and with any other nation that should oppose their return to the promised land. Those nations would fall so that His people Israel might live.

But it’s not as if God just saved Israel for no reason and wiped out good and noble nations that were peacefully minding their own business. All the nations that God displaced for Israel’s sake had it coming for their own wickedness and unbelief. And His salvation of Israel was rooted in the covenant He had made with Israel, a covenant of grace that pointed ahead to the coming Christ as the true Savior of all men. The New Covenant in Jesus’ blood doesn’t guarantee Christians a life of freedom in this world. But it does guarantee that God will watch over us, care for us, and, at the Last Judgment, displace all the wicked and unbelieving so that we, the people of God, can live in peace and safety forever.

Fear not, for I am with you; I will bring your descendants from the east, and gather you from the west; I will say to the north, ‘Give them up!’ And to the south, ‘Do not keep them back!’ Bring My sons from afar, and My daughters from the ends of the earth— Everyone who is called by My name, Whom I have created for My glory.

Here God promises to gather Israel together, to make a way for them back to their homeland after their 70-year captivity. It’s also a promise that God will gather others to the spiritual Israel, just as Jesus Himself said, Other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd. He’s talking about the gathering of the Gentiles into the Holy Christian Church, the gathering of the elect, of everyone who is called by My name, which is exactly what happens every time a person is baptized “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

To summarize some of the next verses, God calls on all the nations to come together as witnesses in a sort of courtroom. Did any other of the “gods” foretell any of these things? Answer: No. Did any other “gods” step forward to save their people? Answer: No. But Israel was God’s witness of all that He had foretold, of all the great works of salvation God had done and was about to do. “You are My witnesses,” says the LORD, “And My servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe Me, and understand that I am He. Before Me there was no God formed, nor shall there be after Me. I, even I, am the LORD, and besides Me there is no savior.” There is no other savior, and yet God Himself named the Son of Mary, Jesus (“Savior”), testifying to the fact that Jesus and the LORD are one.

Our text this evening concludes with these words: Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, The Holy One of Israel: “For your sake I will send to Babylon, And bring them all down as fugitives— The Chaldeans, who rejoice in their ships. I am the LORD, your Holy One, The Creator of Israel, your King.”

God’s final promise here is not a promise of deliverance, but a promise of divine retribution—retribution against the Chaldeans and all who had mistreated God’s people, retribution against all who took pride in their “ships,” in their own power and glory and success, all who dared to persecute Israel and Israel’s God. So, too, in the New Testament, God promises even worse retribution against all who persecute Christ and His Christians. For God’s enemies, these are words of judgment. But for penitent Christians, these words are pure comfort and joy. It’s God’s promise that the devil and all the wicked will perish, while all who believe in the Lord Jesus will not perish, but have everlasting life. Amen.

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