The final two words from the cross

Posted on April 2, 2021 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Good Friday

Isaiah 52:13-53:12  +  John 18:1-19:42

Matthew, Mark, and Luke all tell us that, just before He died, Jesus cried out with a loud voice. But none of them tell us what He cried out. Isn’t that strange? They left it to John, the last Gospel writer, who was standing there at the foot of the cross as the only apostolic witness, just as we always leave it to John to guide us through our Good Friday reflection. Jesus’ loud cry was one four-syllable word in Greek, Tetelestai!, It is finished! The sixth word from the cross.

What is the “it”? “It” was His entire life of obedience in the sinner’s stead, the life that Jesus had been leading as mankind’s Substitute from the moment of His conception. “It” included His active obedience, the things He gladly and willingly did in obedience to God’s Law. “It” included also His passive obedience, the things He suffered, the things He gladly and willingly allowed to be done to Him, from the insults He took, to the beating and floggings, to the condemnation before the Jewish and Roman courts, to the nails and the crown of thorns. One righteous life had been lived, from start to finish, without a single transgression, without a single mistake. Satisfaction for the sins of men had been provided. Forgiveness for all sins had been merited; the earning of forgiveness for all sinners was complete. No one else should dare try to add anything to the life and sufferings of Jesus in order to earn his salvation, in order to make atonement for his sins, in order to earn back God’s favor, in order to earn God’s forgiveness. Heaven has been purchased by the Son of God for all the sons of men. It is finished.

Those were the words of Jesus’ dying cry, His sixth word from the cross. But they weren’t His very last words. Luke is the one who records that seventh saying for us: Father, into Your hands I commend My spirit. 

It’s “Father” again, after the tormented cry moments before, “My God, my God.” Because all is finished. The cup of God’s wrath, poured out vicariously on Jesus, on Jesus in our place, had been emptied. There wasn’t a drop left, not for Jesus, not for anyone who takes refuge in Him by faith. After all His hard work, Jesus’ Sabbath rest had finally come. His spirit would be kept safe in His Father’s hands in Paradise while His body rested in the tomb until the third day, just as the spirits of all believers are kept safe with Christ while their bodies await the resurrection at the Last Day. The dying Lord Jesus is victorious in death. He’s at peace. This is the end, but only as the planting of a seed is the end for the seed. After it’s planted in the earth, after it dies, it springs up into a new plant, into a new and much more glorious life. So, too, with Jesus. So, too, with all who trust in Him.

Now that we’ve heard all seven words of Jesus from the cross, now that we’ve watched as the Lamb of God, the great Passover Lamb was slain, we should take a moment to ponder the rest of what St. John told us about what happened there at the cross of Jesus and its connection with the Passover.

When the soldiers came to Jesus and saw that He was already dead, they did not break His legs. But one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out.

Do you remember what you heard on Sunday morning in the reading from the prophet Zechariah? They will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn. And one will say to him, “What are these wounds between your arms?” Then he will answer, “Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.”

And what of this blood and water that flowed from His side? Remember the rest of what Zechariah prophesied: And in that day it shall be that living waters shall flow from Jerusalem, and the LORD shall be King over all the earth. The blood and water testify to the death of the Lamb of God, who, by His death, earned the right to be exalted to the highest place and the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

But the blood and water also testify to how the Lamb’s blood would flow from Jerusalem, to be applied to the doorframes of the Israelites houses like the blood of the first Passover lambs, to be applied now to sinners’ hearts. God’s instrument for applying that blood, the blood of Christ shed on the cross, for applying the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ to sinners, would be Holy Baptism, the sacred water that washes us in the blood of the Lamb. Our instrument for receiving that blood of Christ connected with Baptism is faith. As the writer to the Hebrews says, Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. And for those who are safe inside the house, safe inside the Church of Christ, baptized in His blood, Christ’s blood also flows to us, down through the ages, in a special way, as it did for the Israelites, in a family meal, where we feast on the Lamb and drink His blood, safe inside the house from all the destruction of sin, death, and the devil.

Give thanks today for the Lamb who was slain, who is worthy to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing. Rejoice in His victory! And take comfort in the fact that you have been buried with Him through Baptism into His death, that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we, too, should walk in a new life. Amen.

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Imitating the loving servant-heart of Jesus

Posted on April 1, 2021 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Holy Thursday

1 Corinthians 11:23-32  +  John 13:1-15

Every year on Maundy Thursday, we rightly commemorate the institution of that great Sacrament of the Altar, the New Testament in Jesus’ blood that He instituted and gave on this night, for us Christians to eat and to drink, proclaiming His death, and our faith in His death and resurrection, until He comes again in glory. This New Supper takes over for the old Passover meal. The Passover meal had a lamb on the table commemorating Israel’s divine deliverance from slavery in Egypt. But finally, on this Holy Thursday, the lamb on the table, together with the rest of the Old Testament symbols and pictures, fades away like a shadow, as the Christ, whom they foreshadowed, to whom they pointed, fulfills over the next 24 hours all that was written about Him.

But our Gospel this evening reminds us of another strange event that took place on Maundy Thursday either after, or more likely before, the institution of that Supper: the washing of the disciples’ feet, where we see the love and the humility and the servant-heart of Jesus on full display.

John tells us that Jesus knew His hour had come. And soon, already in this upper room in Jerusalem, His soul would be troubled and sorrowful. But before that happened, as the Old Testament Passover part of the supper came to an end, John tells us that Jesus was thinking about something else. He was thinking about how He had come from the Father, how the Father had placed all things into His hands, and how He was just about to leave this world and return to His Father. And, He was thinking about His great love for His disciples. “Having loved his own who were in the world, He loved them until the end.”

He would demonstrate that love throughout the next night and day in countless ways. He would teach His disciples some final teachings. That was love. He would pray for His disciples and for us who would believe through their preaching. That was love. He would warn His disciples about falling into temptation. He would ask for them to be let go as the guards came to take Him away. He would not stop Judas from betraying Him, or defend Himself before the Jews or before Pilate. He would not save Himself and get down from the cross. That was love.

But see how John highlights this other act of love that Jesus performed on that night—something only he records in his Gospel. He got up from supper, set aside His good clothes, wrapped a towel around Himself, poured some water, got down on His knees, washed His disciples’ feet, and wiped them with the towel He was wearing around His waist. Of all the pictures we have of Jesus during Holy Week, isn’t this one strange?

It isn’t strange at all, if you think about it. As Jesus said not long before this, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.” Jesus is the Servant of the Lord, as Isaiah calls the Messiah several times. He came to serve sinners, in humility and in love. His service was genuine, because His love was genuine. He really put His disciples ahead of Himself, not only in His actions, but also in His heart. When we remember that Jesus came from the Father and was returning to the Father, and that the Father had given all things into His hands, it makes His humility and His willingness to serve all the more amazing.

There is also some context to this foot-washing that John doesn’t include, but that Luke does. Luke tells us that, during this Thursday evening meal, there was also a dispute among [the disciples], as to which of them should be considered the greatest. But Jesus scolded them. He who is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he who governs as he who serves. For who is greater, he who sits at the table, or he who serves? Is it not he who sits at the table? Yet I am among you as the One who serves.

That dispute may have happened before Jesus washed their feet. Or it may have happened shortly after, which would be all the more amazing and shameful on their part, and yet not so unfamiliar to us. While the disciples are arguing about who’s the greatest, reaching for the position of honor, Jesus—the very Son of God—dishonors and humiliates Himself in front of them all, not in anger, not in passive aggression, but in love, to show them the sin of their pride and how their flesh would always do this, would always shun the servant-role in favor of the worship of self. Then, as Jesus serves them, He demonstrates their need to be served by Him because of their sins, their need to be washed continually by God of their pride, forgiven continually by God for their self-serving nature, even though they have already been baptized and made into believing Christians (except for Judas, who, though baptized, was by this time unbelieving).

But Jesus’ service toward His disciples is also intended as an example, “that you should do as I have done to you.” This isn’t about washing other people’s feet once a year. It’s about Christian humility throughout the year. It’s about Christians, who claim Jesus as their Lord, behaving humbly, like their Lord, toward one another, serving one another in meekness, even as the Lord has served us in meekness.

Jesus knows that our sinful flesh doesn’t want to humble itself, and doesn’t want to play the servant. We think, by nature, that we’re above that kind of menial service, that we should be the ones being served by our fellow Christians instead of the other way around, or at very least, we think it should be 50/50. Parents grow weary of changing diapers and serving their children throughout their childhood years. Children feel entitled to the service of their parents, and complain about the chores they have to do, rather than willingly volunteering to serve their parents or their brothers and sisters. We all think we deserve to be served. Such is our ugly, fallen nature.

But here is Christ, the Lord of all, on the night in which He was betrayed, getting up, putting on a towel, and washing His disciples’ feet, teaching us, first and foremost, about our desperate need to receive His service in the washing away of our sins. And then this feet-washing serves to set a pattern for us of humble, loving service to one another.

The love of God is fully on display on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday as Jesus humbles Himself further and further and further. Let His humble servant-love serve both for your comfort and for your example. And let His Holy Supper serve to forgive your failures and to add strength to your service. Amen.

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Words 3, 4, and 5 from the cross

Posted on March 30, 2021 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Holy Tuesday

Last night, we spent a moment thinking about Jesus’ first two words from the cross: Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do. And, Assuredly I say to you, Today you will be with Me in Paradise. This evening we’ll give the next three words some attention.

The third word of Jesus is recorded only by the Apostle John. When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing by, He said to His mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” Then He said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour that disciple took her to his own home.

Several believing women were there at the foot of the cross, along with the Apostle John, who often referred to himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” He was almost certainly the youngest of the disciples, maybe only a teenager, and possibly also a cousin of Jesus on Joseph’s side. The Romanists insist that Jesus is here giving Mary to the Church, to be a mother for all Christians, and bidding all Christians to pray to His mother for help. But there’s no indication of anything symbolic in these verses, especially given the explanation that John literally took Mary into his own home from that moment. What is Jesus doing here? He’s seeing to it that His earthly mother, the one whom He was charged by His Father to honor in the 4th Commandment, was taken care of after He was gone by the disciple to whom He was closest in this life and to whom He Himself, as the Lord of the Church, would grant the longest life on earth, to be there to care for Mary for the rest of her earthly life. Truly Christ was an obedient, loving Son, both to His Father in heaven and to His mother on earth. It’s that very obedience, that very righteousness—that genuine love from the heart—that covers all who believe and are baptized, as if we had been perfectly obedient, perfectly righteous sons and daughters in the sight of God.

If Jesus was this devoted to honoring His mother while He was hanging from a cross, what honor will you not show to your father and mother and to your Father in heaven? What honor have you not shown? That’s, again, as we said last night, why you need the atoning death of Christ and His perfect righteousness:  to show you what true love looks like; to show you how you have fallen short of it and earned God’s wrath for yourself; to show how Christ made amends for your sins and makes you acceptable to God through faith in Him; and to show you how to love as your Savior did and does..

Now, the first three words from the cross were all spoken before noon, in the first few hours of Jesus’ crucifixion, which began at about 9 AM. From about noon until 3 on that Good Friday, darkness covered the earth and Jesus suffered in silence. As we heard on Sunday from Zechariah’s prophecy, It shall come to pass in that day that there will be no light; the lights will diminish. It shall be one day which is known to the LORD—neither day nor night. At about 3 PM, the last four words were spoken in quick succession. The fourth word: Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?, that is, My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?

These are the first words of Psalm 22, the words of the Messiah at the very end of His suffering, spoken in Aramaic, which was probably Jesus’ first language, the language of the heart. This is the prayer of the innocent Man whom God still causes to suffer, the innocent Man who feels the weight of the injustice of His crucifixion, knowing that He didn’t deserve this, knowing that His Father could have removed it, but didn’t. But it was the Father’s will to crush Him, Isaiah says, that we, who deserve that punishment, might go free.

And yet, you have to know the rest of Psalm 22 to understand: Jesus isn’t whining. He isn’t blaming God for being unjust. On the contrary, the Psalm goes on, You have answered Me! For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; Nor has He hidden His face from Him; But when He cried to Him, He heard! Jesus knows that God is about to deliver His Son from this suffering. God is about to receive His soul in death, and thus seal Him as the Redeemer of the world.

Then it seems that the darkness lifted. As Zechariah prophesied, But at evening time it shall happen that it will be light. The Father heard the cry of His Son. And John is the one who records that Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, I thirst.

Again, continuing with the same Psalm 22, which described ahead of time the Messiah’s anguish, His crucifixion, and the taunts and jeers of His enemies, Jesus is experiencing exactly what the Psalm predicted: My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and My tongue clings to My jaws. So, with His fifth word, He called out softly for a drink, I am thirsty, preparing to cry out the sixth and possibly the greatest word in a loud voice, the word we’ll wait till Good Friday to hear. Of course, it wasn’t a drink of cool water they gave Him, but a taste of sour wine, a form of vinegar, lifted up to Him from a sponge on a pole made of hyssop. Even that was in fulfillment of prophecy, a prophecy from Psalm 69, You know my reproach, my shame, and my dishonor; My adversaries are all before You. Reproach has broken my heart, And I am full of heaviness; I looked for someone to take pity, but there was none; And for comforters, but I found none. They also gave me gall for my food, And for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. No, Jesus had no one to comfort Him in those final moments. But no matter. He had accomplished His mission. He had fulfilled His Father’s will to the letter.

Let these three words from the cross give you hope. The perfect Son fulfilled everything the Law required of Him and of you, providing you with a perfect robe of righteousness to wear before God by believing in Him. He suffered unjustly and felt the weight of it, but it had to be that way, the Just suffering unjustly for the unjust, to bring you to God. And His cry of thirst sealed the final prophecy that He had to fulfill, so that He could be the source of living waters to all who thirst for righteousness. Amen.

 

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The first two words from the cross

Posted on March 29, 2021 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Holy Monday

There are always so many things we could focus on during Holy Week. The upper room. The Garden of Gethsemane. Peter’s denials. The trials before the Sanhedrin. The trial before Pontius Pilate. The walk to Calvary. The crucifixion. And the burial. This year, let’s turn our attention to the seven precious words (or sayings) that Jesus spoke from the cross.

We’ll focus on Jesus’ words, but there were other words spoken at the cross, and it wouldn’t hurt to mention them briefly.

There was Pilate’s word, inscribed on a sign above Jesus’ head in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. We abbreviate it INRI, Iesus Narazenus Rex Iudaeorum, Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews, words that Pilate refused to change, in spite of the complaints from the Jewish leaders, words that perfectly and, I might even say, poetically describe Jesus’ kingly act of giving His life as the ransom for the world’s sins.

There were the soldiers’ words as the quarreled over Jesus’ clothing, deciding in the end to cast lots for His one-piece garment, in fulfillment of Psalm 22.

There were the words of the chief priests, scribes, elders, and passersby who mocked Jesus cruelly and relentlessly. You who destroy the temple and build it in three days, save Yourself! If You are the Son of God, come down from the cross…He saved others; Himself He cannot save. If He is the King of Israel, let Him now come down from the cross, and we will believe Him. He trusted in God; let Him deliver Him now if He will have Him; for He said, ‘I am the Son of God.’

And finally, there were the words of the centurion and the guards who witnessed the unnatural earthquake, the rocks splitting, and the graves opening the moment Jesus died, and the truth was undeniable, even to those idol worshipers, Truly this was the Son of God!

But we turn now back to the words of the Son of God Himself, the final words He uttered in His state of humiliation.

Only Luke records the first saying: Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.

For whom was Jesus praying? The “they” in the surrounding verses are specifically the soldiers who nailed Jesus to the cross. They, of all people, really had no idea that they were nailing their God, their Creator, their Savior to the cross. They were doing their duty, carrying out the execution of a condemned criminal. Pilate knew better; he had spoken with Jesus and heard about His kingdom that is “not of this world.” He knew Jesus was innocent, and yet condemned Him anyway. Herod and the Jews who had called for Jesus’ crucifixion knew better. They had heard all about Jesus’ words and works. They had the Old Testament prophets crying out to them, telling them exactly who Jesus was.

Still, none of them really knew, really understood the ramifications of their actions. So Jesus prayed for them, prayed that His Father in heaven would forgive them. Now, a prayer for God to forgive is not the same thing as a declaration that God has forgiven someone. Praying for someone’s forgiveness doesn’t effect their forgiveness, doesn’t give them a clean slate before God or righteousness before God. That comes only through faith in Christ Jesus. But to hear that same Jesus praying for your forgiveness, as you’re nailing Him to the cross? That is the very word of Christ that breaks through stone-hard hearts and brings some to repentance, to trust in this Jesus as the One who now stands at the right hand of God interceding for us. His prayer for forgiveness is able to create the faith by which we’re forgiven.

And some of the Jews and some of the Romans were later converted; even the crucifixion of the Son of God was forgiven them in the waters of Holy Baptism, as Peter declared to them on the day of Pentecost. If Christ was willing to forgive those who tortured and killed Him, for whom will He refuse to pray, “Father, forgive”? Whom will He refuse to forgive in the cleansing waters of Baptism? It is Christ who pleads for us. Who will condemn?

The second word is also recorded only in Luke’s Gospel. While one of the two criminals who hung at Jesus’ side hurled insults at Him, the other rebuked his fellow criminal and said, the other defended Him and said, “Do you not even fear God, seeing you are under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom.” Jesus replied, Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.

See how Jesus’ prayer for His enemies already had an effect on the thief hanging beside Him! See how the King of the Jews gives free entrance into His heavenly kingdom, and to whom He gives it. To the penitent sinner who confesses his sins and looks to Christ, not for earthly salvation, but for eternal salvation. The thief doesn’t beg for Jesus to help him down from the cross or give him earthly happiness or wealth. He knows he must pay the earthly penalty of death for his crimes. No, he looks over at Jesus, bloody and tortured and hanging on a cross, and he sees a King whose kingdom is not of this world, a King who is innocent before God and man, and yet willing to stay up there on the cross as the sacrifice for mankind’s sin, a King who was even at that moment paying for all the thief’s crimes, redeeming him with His own precious blood, and with His innocent suffering and death. There, hanging from a cross, that thief was reconciled to God through faith in Christ and became our brother in Christ.

The King gives an eternal place in His kingdom to this penitent thief. And He gives it to him “today,” immediately upon the sinner’s death. No purgatory. No paying for his sins before God or being further punished or cleansed after death. On that very day, at the moment of his death, that thief joined the soul of Jesus in Paradise, even as both their bodies rested in the tomb, the body of the thief, until the day of resurrection, the body of Jesus, until only the third day.

If Jesus was willing to pray for the forgiveness of those who mistreated Him, for whom will you not pray? For whom have you not prayed? And when you realize that you have not loved your enemies or prayed for your enemies as you ought, repent. And then remember the King of the Jews, hanging on the cross, not in defeat, but in victory, opening up His heavenly kingdom to all who repent and believe in Him, even to the worst criminals.

That’s why you need the atoning death of Christ and His perfect righteousness: First, to show you what true love looks like; second, to show you how you have fallen short of it and earned God’s wrath for yourself; third, to show how Christ made amends for your sins and makes you acceptable to God through faith in Him; and fourth, to show you how to love as your Savior did and does. That’s why we celebrate Holy Week. That’s why we remember the precious words our Savior spoke from the cross. Amen.

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A day of humility, comfort, and joy

Posted on March 28, 2021 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Palm Sunday

Philippians 2:5-11  +  Matthew 21:1-9

Whether you’re thinking about the Passion History that you just heard from Matthew, or about the Epistle reading from Philippians 2, or about the Palm Sunday Gospel you heard at the very beginning of the service, the humility of Jesus shines through like a bright light. His Holy Week humility was the culmination of what our catechism students have recently learned as Jesus’ state of humiliation. We “watched together” this morning as Jesus lowered Himself further, and further, and further from where He began, which was in glory at the Father’s side as He was “in the form of God,” Paul writes. He was God by His very nature. He was equal with God, and yet His mind wasn’t on grasping and enjoying His highness. It was on emptying Himself, on lowering Himself. And He did lower Himself, not by simply becoming a man, but by taking on the form of man as servant, of man in the condition in which sin has left us: debilitated, needy, afflicted, susceptible to pain and anguish, subject to God’s Law, vulnerable, and even mortal. His Holy Week humility began with the intentional choice of two donkeys to carry Him into Jerusalem, accompanied, not by a conquering army, but by average Israelites, even children. His mind was not on seeking His own glory, but the good of those who were already His people, and the good of those who might yet become His people when they saw how He willingly humbled Himself and made Himself obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

So, as Paul wrote in the Epistle, there’s no room at all for pride among God’s saints, either. No room for looking out for yourself first, or trying to make yourself look good. Today is a day of humility, to watch in awe as Jesus rides humbly into Jerusalem, and to be of the same mind.

Today is also a day of comfort, not a time for fear. We had every reason to fear the wrath of God, the anger of God, the temporal and eternal punishments God sends into the world, because we were and, in a sense, remain sinners like the rest of the world. And those who refuse to acknowledge and repent of their sins still have reason to fear. But today we’re all being called by God to look up from our fear, to look at Jesus, riding into Jerusalem, not to condemn the world, but that the world, through Him, might be saved. It’s a day of comfort, as we ponder God’s zeal—that’s the only word that really describes it—God’s zeal to save sinners, His zeal to make atonement for their sins through the death of His beloved Son, and to call sinners to faith in Christ Jesus by holding His humility and love before our eyes. Today is a day of comfort, when all are invited to become part of Jerusalem, not the city, but the people, the holy Christian Church of God, to become part of it, and to remain part of it, God’s precious people who have God’s love, God’s forgiveness, and God’s promise to get us through the worst of times on this earth, so that we may finish this life in faith and then await the resurrection from the dead.

Today is also a day of joy. Zechariah’s prophecy begins, Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Your King comes to you! The prophet was talking about that day, still 500 some years in the future, from his vantage point, when the Christ would ride into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. He really came. He really showed up as King to conquer the devil and to rescue sinners from the devil’s kingdom. And He is still here today, in a special way, where two or three are gathered in His name, and in another special way, where His body and blood are joined to bread and wine. Today is a day of joy, because Zechariah tells us that your King is righteous and having salvation. And that salvation is from everything—everything in its time, and in God’s perfect way. Salvation from sin. Salvation from the devil. Salvation from eternal death in hell. Salvation from earthly enemies, whether viruses, or tyrannical governments, or violent neighbors, or loneliness. Salvation that doesn’t mean we are no longer troubled by these things, but salvation in that they cannot snatch us out of God’s hand or threaten the joy we have in Christ’s victory for us. All our enemies must serve His good purposes for His people, and we must stand victorious in the end. And so today is a day of joy, to rejoice in the presence of your King and to know that He hears your Hosanna’s and is pleased with them, pleased to have every one of you here as His own, precious, blood-bought people, celebrating this day of humility, this day of comfort, this day of joy. Amen.

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