God is never enough for Jerusalem, and yet He is

Posted on March 18, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

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Sermon for Laetare – Lent 4

John 6:1-15  +  Exodus 16:2-21  +  Galatians 4:21-31

The familiar title of today’s Gospel is “The Feeding of the 5,000.”  That’s a fine title.  It’s what Jesus did for the 5,000 men (plus women and children) who had followed him over to the other side of the Sea of Galilee.  He fed them.  Before they even asked, before they ever realized they had a need, Jesus foresaw the need they would have and he took care of it in that kind and loving miracle in which Jesus multiplied 5 loaves of bread and two fish into enough food not only to feed a bite to each of those 5,000 plus people, but to fill them up and have 12 baskets full of pieces leftover.

But you could just as well put other titles to these verses from John 6.  “The beginning of the end for Jesus.” “Jesus’ last day of being liked.”  “The day before everyone abandoned Jesus.”  Or how about this?  “5,000 proofs that God is never enough.”

That’s been the story of human history since the very beginning.  What more could God have given Adam and Eve in paradise?  They literally had everything, even God himself – everything, except for a piece of fruit from one tree. And God wasn’t enough for them.

What more could God have given Israel in the wilderness?  Less than three months before he had rescued them from slavery in Egypt with a mighty hand and outstretched arm.  He had given them the Passover – the blood of the Lamb to mark their doors and save them from death.  He had rescued them from Pharaoh’s armies, brought them through the Red Sea on dry ground, gave them a miraculous supply of water in the desert and his promise to bring them safely into the Promised Land.

But it wasn’t enough.  They grumbled and complained.  Where’s our food, you evil wicked Moses, you evil wicked God?  So God gave them manna, bread from heaven – bread that would appear on the ground every day for forty years while they wandered through the wilderness, every day except for Saturdays, one day a week, because he gave them twice as much miraculous bread on Fridays to get them through the Sabbath.  And still they went out on Saturdays looking for it – “Hey, God, where’s our bread?”

What more could God have done for the people of Israel at the time of Jesus?  In the Person of Jesus the Christ, God had given them Himself.  Himself, in the flesh, to teach them with a human mouth, to heal their diseases, to cast out their demons, to give them words of eternal life, words that would save their souls from death and forgive them their sins so that they could stand before God in peace and safety.

But the people of Israel weren’t really interested in the words of life that Jesus spoke.  John tells us why they followed Jesus that day in droves:  because they saw the signs that he was doing on the sick.  No matter.  Jesus taught them anyway, and at the end of the day, he said, These people have followed me out here and they will be hungry.  I’ll provide food for them, just like I did at the time of Moses.

And just like at the time of Moses, the people were very impressed – for a moment.  And then they wanted to seize Jesus and force him to be their king, to provide bread for them like this all the time, to do for them whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted.  What they didn’t want from Jesus, as we find out on the very next day – was Jesus’ Word.  What they didn’t want was to acknowledge Jesus as the Son of God.  They didn’t want to eat his flesh or drink his blood, as he said they must if they would see eternal life.  They wanted Jesus to provide them with bread, but they didn’t want Jesus to be their Bread of life.  They wanted Jesus to provide an earthly safety net for them, but they didn’t want Jesus to be their Safety from divine wrath.  They saw Jesus as a means to an end – the end being a better, happier, more comfortable life on earth.  They wanted the things Jesus could provide for their earthly lives.  They just didn’t want Jesus.

As I said before, this was the beginning of the end for Jesus.  The day after he fed the 5,000, most of his followers abandoned him.  John tells us in this text that the Passover was near – not the Holy Week Passover, but the one before.  Over the course of the next year, the people of Israel would grow to hate Jesus more and more, until, at the following Passover, Jerusalem would put the Bread of Life to death.

The name for this Sunday is somewhat ironic.  Laetare!  Rejoice with Jerusalem!  The irony is that, in the Person of Jesus, God gave Jerusalem every reason in heaven and on earth to rejoice.  But she didn’t. And that’s the way it always goes.  God is never enough for Jerusalem.

Ah, but, who is Jerusalem?  This is where it really hits home. Jerusalem is the Church of God.  Jerusalem is you.

So there’s no need for you to pretend that God is enough for you, that is, for your sinful nature.  There’s no need for you to pretend that you actually are perfectly and always satisfied with God and what he gives, that you truly worship him with your whole heart and would gladly go hungry and starve to death rather than abandon him.  You don’t need to hide from the truth that you’re only willing to follow him just so far, to give up just so much for God – and then after that, no more.  The 5,000 in our Gospel today lived from day to day on signs, signs they could see with their eyes in order to keep believe in Jesus and following Jesus.  You may not need signs every day, but you know that you crave them, these visible signs of God’s goodness in your life, and if you don’t see the ones you really want to see, if God doesn’t provide in the way you’d like him to provide, or if God allows tragedy strikes, you know that the doubts arise, and that part of you wants to leave Jesus, too.  And many Christians do.

Let’s give that a name.  It’s called idolatry.  It’s the worship of self.  To keep the First Commandment is to fear, love and trust in God above all things, so that if all things and all people were taken away you, you would still be perfectly content to have God.  But deep down in your corrupt, sinful nature, it isn’t God you crave above all things.  Instead, it’s God whom you blame for not having the things you crave.

But God already knows that, doesn’t he?  He isn’t surprised or disappointed to “find out” that you really don’t love him with your whole heart, in spite of all his goodness to you, just as Jesus was not surprised when the 5,000 men he fed ended up abandoning him.  Jesus knew what he would do on the day he fed the 5,000, and he also knew what they would do.  And he served them anyway.

God knew what Adam and Eve would do in the Garden of Eden, but he created them and provided for them anyway, and then, after they rejected him, he chose them again and promised to send a Savior to rescue them from their wicked rebellion.

God knew that Israel would rebel against him in the wilderness, and yet he rescued them from slavery in Egypt anyway and he provided bread from heaven for them anyway and kept proving to them over and over and over again that he was good, even though they were not, that he was faithful even when they were faithless.  He provided not only food for them, but the means for making atonement for their sin – through the multiple bloody sacrifices offered by the priests, in the tabernacle, on the altar that God provided.

And in our Gospel, while the people had their eye fixed on their daily bread, John shows us where God had his eye fixed – on the Passover that was at hand.  On providing, not only bread for one day, but the bloody sacrifice of his Son, our great High Priest, who, within a year, would make satisfaction for all of man’s idolatry, for all the sin of men, in the tabernacle that God provided – the body of Christ, on the altar that God provided – Calvary’s cross.

So, God is never enough for Jerusalem, and yet he is.  He is enough.  He has done enough to wash away all your sins and iniquities, to wipe your idolatries away out of his sight, to make you into his dearly loved children.  By sending this Gospel to your ears and his baptismal waters to your body, God has done enough to call you to repentance and faith in Jesus Christ, so that you do not turn out like that crowd of 5,000 that followed Jesus around like a dog looking for a treat.  Instead, he calls you to trust in Jesus, not just for bread, but for life; to look to him, not just for this or that thing, but for the daily forgiveness of sins, because he knows how weak and frail you are.  God gives himself to you to eat and to drink, so that you may have life, even life in abundance, his life, his promises, his fatherly wisdom to protect you and provide for you in just the right way, every time.  God gives himself to you, O Jerusalem, and God is enough.

Which Jerusalem are you, then?  The one for whom God is never enough, or the one for whom he is?  Paul spoke of two Jerusalems today in the Epistle, didn’t he?  There is the Jerusalem from below and the one from above.  There is the group of people who call themselves Christians for whom God will never be enough, and then there is that group of Christians who feel exactly the same way, and yet have been convinced by the Gospel to repent each day of their idolatry and to believe in the God who is enough, and more than enough, because they know the love of Jesus who loved us and gave himself for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.  For those who know his love revealed in the Gospel and handed out in Word and Sacrament, Jesus isn’t just barely enough, is he?  There are 12 baskets full of pieces leftover, 12, the number of the Church, enough to see you through every dark day of this life and safely into the next.  The love of Jesus is enough, not just to feed a multitude of unbelievers, but to preserve for himself a remnant of believers, a Holy Christian Church on earth, a Jerusalem from above, Christians who know good and well that God will never be enough for Jerusalem – even for their own sinful hearts, and yet, the death and resurrection of Jesus have convinced them, that he is enough, and then some.  Let it be so for you.  Amen.

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Only Jesus can help against the demons

Posted on March 11, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

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Sermon for Oculi – Lent 3

Luke 11:14-28  +  Exodus 8:16-24  +  Ephesians 5:1-9

Demons are real.  And they are evil.  And they are dangerous. Men are wicked enough by birth, all on their own, sinful and corrupt enough, evil enough to practice every kind of wickedness imaginable.  But add to that the wickedness and the power of those fallen spirit creatures we call “demons,” ruled by the chief demon himself, God’s enemy, the devil – how can God’s children survive?

They almost didn’t back when the nation of Israel was enslaved and mistreated by wicked Pharaoh and the Egyptian people.  It seemed impossible for God’s people Israel to ever break free out of their slavery.  How could they possibly stand against the ruler of Egypt with all his armies and all his power? How could they resist him when he had demons on his side?  Even when God sent Moses to bring them out of slavery through those impressive signs and wonders and miracles, by those terrible plagues that God sent against Egypt, there were demons at work.  Moses threw down his staff and it became a snake, but the magicians of Pharaoh did the same things.  The first two plagues – of water turned to blood, of calling up frogs to infest the land – the magicians were able to replicate those plagues.  Now, there are only two sources of supernatural power – either God or the demons.  God was working through Moses.  The demons were working through Pharaoh’s magicians.

There were demons at work at the time of Christ.  There were demons at work behind the scenes, stirring up a powerful opposition to the Word and work and person of Christ.  And there were demons at work tormenting people’s bodies, too, inflicting all sorts of pain and maladies, like the muteness and blindness (as Matthew tells us) of the man in the Gospel.

There are demons at work today, make no mistake.  The demons are right now trying to bring as much of hell up onto this earth as they possibly can.  And that doesn’t just mean in the violence and the moral decay of our society, which is, by now, almost complete.  Because the demons already have dominion over the unbelieving world.  Everyone who is not reborn of water and the Spirit through Holy Baptism and faith in Christ is still a child of the devil and a subject of his kingdom.  It’s no triumph for the demons when unbelievers act like unbelievers.

But they score a great victory when they can entice Christians to act like sons of the devil.  The demons would have no one imitating God, as Paul encouraged the Ephesians to do. They would have no one walking in love as dearly loved children. Instead, there are demons at work today, targeting Christians in all kinds of ways, confusing the doctrine of Christ with all sorts of demonic doctrines, creating animosity and divisions right in the midst of Christian congregations and synods, leading Christians back into those willful sins that make it impossible for faith to survive – all for the purpose of bringing us back out of God’s kingdom into the devil’s kingdom, and stopping the victorious march of the Gospel through the world.  There are demons at work today, whether you take notice of them or not.

Pay attention to the Gospel.  Only Jesus can help against the demons.

The demons seemed to be winning at the time of Moses, back in Egypt, until the third plague struck.  When God told Moses to call the plague of gnats against the land of Egypt, the magicians tried, but were unable to reproduce that plague through their secret arts.  The demons couldn’t help them anymore.  They were defeated. And so the magicians knew, Moses is being helped by One who is more powerful than the demons.  “This is the finger of God!” they told Pharaoh.

So, too, at the time of Jesus, the demons seemed to be winning, tormenting the people of Israel with false comfort, false hope, false trust in the Law of Moses for their salvation, or on the other side, the demons were torturing people with despair and hopelessness. They were also tormenting people physically.

Until Jesus came and started doing what no one else could do, freeing people from demonic control, casting out demons one after another.  Jesus never met a demon he couldn’t cast out with a word.

That amazed some people.  Finally!  Someone more powerful than the demons had come!  Finally the Lord had come to help his people.

But it bothered others.  It bothered them because they hated Jesus’ preaching. They hated what he said.  They didn’t believe he came from God.  They didn’t want his salvation.  So they saw his power over the demons, and instead of interpreting it as God coming to help his people, they accused Jesus of being in cahoots with Beelzebul, the “chief fly” who was lord over the flies – sort of a Jewish term to mock the devil.

But Satan doesn’t cast out Satan, Jesus showed them.  If the devil’s kingdom were divided against itself, it would soon self-destruct and God wouldn’t even have to bother saving anyone out of it.  If the devil casts out the devil, then the Christ might as well not even bother coming.

But the devil isn’t divided against himself, and man cannot save himself out of the devil’s kingdom and the devil’s power.  His kingdom is a strong kingdom and he has the vast majority of mankind as his prisoners and as his loyal subjects.  And he has a whole host of demons as his loyal warriors.  Mankind doesn’t stand a chance against the devil’s kingdom.

Unless… what if someone stronger came?  What if someone came who could fight against the devil and his demons and defeat them?  Then there could be freedom for those who were trapped in the devil’s kingdom.  Then there could be hope and future in God’s kingdom.  But if it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.  The finger of God showed itself when God rescued Israel from slavery in Egypt.  The finger of God showed itself again when Jesus came to rescue sinners out of slavery to sin, death, and the devil.  Only Jesus can help against the demons.

You want to be on the right side in this conflict.  You want to be with Jesus, not against Jesus.  Because while the devil’s kingdom will always appear to prosper on this earth, it’s those who enter Christ’s kingdom by faith in him who are the sons of God, the saints of God, and their victory will be revealed when Christ comes again.

And to be “with Jesus” doesn’t just mean to think nice thoughts about him once in awhile.  To be “with Jesus” means to hate sin. It means to believe what he says, that you’re a sinner who needs his help, his divine help as the Son of God and the Son of Man.  You need the help of his righteousness and his blood shed on the cross.  You need the help of Jesus’ forgiveness against the demons, because you’re not strong enough to take them on.  You have no strength at all.  But he does!  And he fights for you.

Satan has a strong grip on this world, but the Son of God has defeated him and defeats him still.  The devil has no power over the Son of Man, because the Son of Man never once listened to the devil, never once gave into the devil.  The Son of Man entered the devil’s stronghold and defeated him by shedding his blood on the cross and removing forever the devil’s right to condemn those who trust in Christ.

Jesus redeemed you from the demons by his death and resurrection.  Jesus claimed you and rescued you from the demons in Holy Baptism.  And you need him still!

Because even though the Gospel of Jesus has cast out the demons and brought you into the Kingdom of your dear Father, they do not rest, as Jesus warns us in the Gospel.  They wander about for awhile, and then come back to see if there is room for them in the heart from which they were once cast out, and if they find a place, they make life many times more miserable than before.

What is the solution?  Again, only Jesus can help against the demons.  “Blessed are they who hear the Word of God and keep it!”  The Word of God is your God-given defense against the demons.  The Word of God is what drove them away 2000 years ago, and the Word of God is still what drives them away.  And you have that Word preached to you.  You have that Word available to you in your home. You have it placed into your mouth and poured down your throat.

Don’t imagine for a moment that you’re strong enough to ward off the demons without it.  Because they are everywhere. The devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.  Understand that, wherever there is a child of God, wherever the forgiveness of sins for the sake of Christ is being proclaimed, wherever the Sacraments of Christ are being administered in accordance with his institution, there the demons will be constantly knocking at the door, trying to get back in.  There are demons at work in every form of lovelessness, pitting Christians against one another.  Do you think church is a safe place?  The only “safe” place is if you’re still trapped in the devil’s kingdom.  There he’s not fighting to get you.  He’s already got you. So understand what’s going on when everything in your life seems to be pushing the Word of God and prayer and piety onto the back burner.  Understand what’s going on when discord and strife erupt in our midst, when anger and bitterness are allowed to fester and hard feelings are allowed to simmer.  It’s the demons knocking at the door.

All of these attacks you should expect in a gathering of Christians.  All of these attacks you should expect to find in your life.  But “we are not ignorant of his schemes.”  We know this is how the devil works.  So let us turn to Christ for help!  Pray!  Hold onto the Word of God and keep it close.  Recognize the demonic influences among us.  Live each day in humble repentance and faith in the Son of God, and then, as dearly loved children, walk in love with one another, even when your fellow Christian doesn’t love you back.  The demons are at work, but there is a Savior from the demons whose name is Jesus Christ.  Only Jesus can help against the demons.  His help is strong.  His help is sure and certain for all who call upon him.  Amen.

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Hiding in God, not from God

Posted on March 7, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon on Psalm 32

You can almost hear the joy in his voice – you can almost see the subtle smile on his face as King David intones the Psalm, “Blessed – happy, privileged – is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the LORD counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit.”

Why?  Why does David – why does God call blessed the one whose sins are forgiven?  The forgiveness of sins doesn’t put food in the pantry.  It doesn’t guarantee you lots of friends or family to spend time with.  The one whose sins are forgiven goes through just as many earthly hardships, just as much pain and sickness and suffering as the unforgiven – sometimes more!  The one whose sins are forgiven still mourns at the funeral home, and the one whose sins are forgiven will, one day, be mourned at the funeral home by others.  King David knew that full well.

So why does David call “blessed” the one whose sins are forgiven? Because the one who is forgiven doesn’t have to try to hide from God anymore – something that’s totally impossible to do anyway, although most people still try.  The one who is forgiven has God for a gracious Father, and the Son of God, Jesus Christ, for a Savior, friend, King, and brother.  The one who is forgiven has no condemnation to suffer, no wrath of God to endure, no hell to look forward to.  The one who is forgiven has the sanctifying Spirit of God dwelling in his or her heart, and the righteousness of Christ covering his or hers sins, and the inheritance of resurrection from the dead and eternal life to look forward to, not to mention the promises of God to make even all things in this life work together for their good.  That’s why the one who is forgiven is blessed.

Now the big question – who is that?  The answer is, not the one who hides from God, but rather the one who hides in God.

To hide from God is to live a lie.  It’s to make up a fake reality for yourself – and maybe for others, too – in which you’re doing just fine, when you aren’t doing just fine. To hide from God is to be constantly looking over your shoulder making sure God isn’t watching.  It’s to pretend that you have no sin to confess when you know very well that you do have sin to confess.  That’s why David says the man is blessed “in whose spirit there is no deceit,” in other words, who doesn’t pretend before God that he’s doing just fine, that he has no sin, or that his sin isn’t so terrible. That’s what the Apostle John says, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”

Kind of like Adam and Eve in Garden of Eden, after they ate from the forbidden fruit.  What did they do?  They hid.  First they tried to hide their nakedness with fig leaves.  Then they hid behind the bushes and the trees when God came walking into the garden.  Did they really think they could hide their sin from God by hiding themselves from God in the Garden?

Do you really think you can hide your sin from God by refusing to confess it?  Do you think you can cover it up or whitewash over it so that God will not see?

David puts it this way, “For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.”  To keep silent about your sins instead of confessing them to God through his representatives on earth will never end well.  Because whether you confess your sins or not, God sees them.  But when you try to hide them, when you try to cover them up and put on a happy face or a godly façade, there is no forgiveness there, because you’re hiding from the very God who wants to help you.

And how does he help you?  He helps you by giving you a place to hide, a safe place where there is no guilt or shame for the sinner but only help and deliverance.  God gives you himself as your hiding place.

“You are a hiding place for me,” David says.  Isn’t that something?  The very God against whom we have rebelled and sinned, the God whom we have offended offers himself to you as a place of refuge.  Very specifically, the hiding place – the forgiving place – is Christ himself who suffered the wrath of God against sin so that now his blood forms a shield over all who take refuge in him.

And how do you enter that refuge, that hiding place?  David tells you, “I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity;      I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,’” and you forgave the iniquity of my sin.”  Through confession of sins, through the Absolution both spoken and eaten and drunk in the Sacrament, through the faith in Christ, the divinely appointed hiding place for sinners, you are now the one who is forgiven. By faith in Christ, the LORD no longer counts any iniquity to you, but instead the righteousness of Christ is counted to you.  You are now the one who is blessed.

Therefore, David says, let everyone who is godly offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found.  You see, right now, today, as you hear his voice, as you hear the Gospel, God is letting himself be found by you.  Right now, as he places his minister before you to hear your confession and announce God’s forgiveness, God is findable.  He is findable right here in the ministry of the Word, right here in the Office of the Keys where he breathed his Holy Spirit and authorized his servants to forgive.  He doesn’t guarantee that you’ll always have that opportunity in the future, if you should choose to keep hiding your sins from God. Then the day may come when you look for God but won’t be able to find him.

Don’t let that happen to you.  God is a hiding place for you now and he can be found today in the preaching of his Word and in the use of the Keys.  “I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you,” says the LORD.

Only “Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you.” Don’t be stubborn.  Don’t be like the horse or mule that has to be ruled by bit and bridle, by tragedy and hardship.  Many a Christian can tell you how they were living their lives in hiding, in denial, refusing to admit their sin, refusing God’s help through the Church, refusing God’s help in Word and Sacrament, and it took God using a tragedy in their lives to wake them up to the harsh reality that they were hiding from their Helper all along.

Don’t hide from your Helper.  Hide in your Helper at all times, in the wounds and the blood of Christ and in his promise of forgiveness to the one who confesses and trusts in him.  In him, you don’t have to cover up your sin or live a lie, because in him there is forgiveness.  In him there is perfect safety and steadfast love.  In him you are counted as righteous.  In him you are blessed, not because you have no sin, but because of God’s gift of forgiveness.  So be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!  Amen.

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The faith of the Canaanite woman – an unlikely evangelism text

Posted on March 4, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

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Sermon for Reminiscere – Lent 2

Matthew 15:21-28  +  Genesis 32:22-32  +  1 Thessalonians 4:1-7

Let’s say you invited a friend to come to church with you today, a friend who doesn’t have a church of his or her own. Of all the Bible texts you would want your friend to hear, would you have picked the historic Gospel for today in which that Canaanite woman came to Jesus for help for her suffering daughter, and Jesus only helped her after first ignoring her cries for help, then seemingly insulting her ethnicity, then implying that she was worth about as much as a little dog begging for crumbs at the table.  Not your typical come-and-learn-about-Jesus evangelism text, is it? It may be an unlikely evangelism text, but I think it’s perfect, even as Jesus himself is perfect.

Because, what do we learn about Jesus in this Gospel?  We learn that Jesus helps anyone who comes to him for help.  Really?  Anyone?  Yes, anyone.  Even…a woman? Yes. Even…a woman of Canaanite ancestry, a race that had been cursed by God himself?  Yes. So, even a poor man?  Even a rich man?  Even a little baby?  Even an elderly person? Even a Jew or a Gentile? Even a white man or a black man, Hispanic, Arab, German, Asian, Indian?  Even a sinner of the very worst kind? Yes, anyone who comes to him for help. Even me?  Even you? Yes.

The Canaanite woman in our Gospel had a desperate need that only divine intervention could help her with. Her daughter was being tortured by a demon. She heard that Jesus was able to cast out demons by the power of God, and that he was the “Son of David,” as she called him, the promised Messiah for Israel, but not only for Israel.  She heard that this Jesus was willing to help anyone who comes to him for help, whether Jew or Samaritan or otherwise.  And she was convinced by that report that Jesus would help her, too.

And, also important, she knew where to find Jesus.  It’s not that he visited her in her home, or went knocking on her door for an evangelism visit or preached with a megaphone from a street corner.  Not at all.  But what did he do?  He simply entered the region where she lived – the region of Tyre and Sidon, just north of the land of Israel.  He came close enough for her to seek and find him.

And how does he help?  By making it seem for awhile like he is unwilling to help.

Take that, human reason! Our sinful human reason figures we have to make Jesus attractive to people, that we have to sell people on Jesus, or on our church if we want people to come.  And, of course, that means making everything as pleasant and enjoyable as possible, making sure everything is readily understandable to the outsider here in our service, seeing to it that we make Jesus seem as warm and as welcoming as we want him to be.

And yet, that’s not what Jesus himself does, is it?  Oh, sometimes he does.  Sometimes it’s “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest!”  But sometimes, Jesus can seem downright aloof, disinterested, and standoffish, as in our Gospel today, without apologizing for it.

Just as the angel of the Lord in Genesis 32, as if he were Jacob’s enemy, made Jacob wrestle with him all night for that blessing at the end, so Jesus, as if he were her enemy, made the Canaanite woman in the Gospel face three apparent rejections before finally helping her.

First, there she is, crying out after him in the streets, “Have mercy, O Lord, Son of David!” But he doesn’t answer her a word. Now, how to interpret his silence?  There’s more than one way  Here’s how the devil would have had the woman interpret his silence: Jesus is a jerk.  Jesus isn’t the good and kind helper you heard about.  He’s mean.  He doesn’t have time for you. He’s uncaring, or at least, he could care less about you.  Just forget about him and find your own solution to your problem.

But there’s another way to interpret Jesus’ silence.  He hasn’t said, “NO!”  He hasn’t said, “GO AWAY!”  He hasn’t said, “I DON’T HAVE TIME FOR YOU!”  Maybe his silence means, “Don’t stop crying out to him!  Keep wrestling!  Keep going to him for help!”

Then, the second trial the woman had to overcome.  Jesus’ disciples seem to be rather embarrassed with the whole situation.  This foreign woman just keeps calling out after them, and Jesus is doing nothing – neither helping her nor telling her to go away, just letting her make a fool of herself in front of everyone.  It’s awkward.  It’s uncomfortable.  It doesn’t really make Jesus look too good, either.  “Lord, just send her away.”

His response – maybe more to the woman than to them… “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Again, there are two ways to interpret that.  The world would have the woman interpret it this way:  Jesus hasn’t come to help you and he never will, because you’re not the right kind of person.  You have the wrong skin color, the wrong accent, and a reputation as a godless sinner.  Jesus came to help other people, not you.  So stop groveling in front of Jesus. Go find your own solution to your problem.

But there’s another way to interpret Jesus’ words.  Sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel… Well, he didn’t say that I’m not one of the lost sheep of Israel.  Didn’t God say to Abraham that he would make Abraham the father of many nations?  Didn’t the Old Testament prophets speak of the Son of David bringing non-Jews into the house of Israel?  Didn’t Jesus once say, “I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.” So there’s still hope!  I could be one of the lost sheep of Israel, even though I’m Canaanite by blood!

Then there’s the third trial for her faith. That woman came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” And he answered, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Those words sound harsh. But here, again, there are two ways of interpreting his words.  The sinful flesh would have the woman interpret them this way:  Jesus just called you a dog!  How rude! You’re better than that! You deserve better than that! As if the Jews are the special children at the table and you, by no fault of your own, have to beg like a dog!  Well, stop begging.  Get up, pick up what’s left of your pride and go home. You should never have come to Jesus for help.

But then there’s that other way of interpreting Jesus’ words, the way of faith that fully admits, I am no better than a dog.  I’m a sinner.  I deserve nothing from God, certainly not a seat at the children’s table. That’s true.  But neither did he actually call me a dog.  He didn’t say I’m not one of the children.  Either way, he’s giving me hope, because if I’m a child, then I get the loaf of bread. And if I’m a dog, then I get the crumbs. And crumbs of God’s grace are more than enough.

“Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.”  What an amazing answer!  The good report she had heard about Jesus sustained her through the attacks of the devil, the world, and her own sinful nature. It sustained her through Jesus’ apparent rejection and kept her eyes firmly fixed on Jesus, who will help anyone who comes to him for help.  It’s as if the words of the Introit were emblazoned on her heart, “Remember, O LORD!  Remember Your tender mercies and Your loving kindnesses, for they are from of old.”

Now, when you hold the Lord’s own tender mercies and loving kindnesses before his eyes and ask him to remember that – now you’ve got him.  Now you’ve caught him – or rather, he’s allowed himself to be caught and he’s committed to giving the help you need.  O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

You see what a great evangelism text this Gospel is?  It tells the truth.  It’s brutally honest about sin, and Jesus and the Christian life. It doesn’t try to paint the Christian life as a glorious journey through the world where prayers are always answered instantaneously for those who “really believe,” and where everyone’s always smiling and happy and bubbly.  See how difficult it was for this woman in the Gospel who “really believed,” who had a great faith!  But it was worth it in the end.  Jesus never once told people what they wanted to hear. But he always told them what they needed to hear, and dealt with them as they needed to be dealt with for their own eternal good.

That’s offensive to those who think they deserve something from God, to those who think they don’t need Jesus’ help, as if they can handle their problems without him, as if everything will be just fine without him, to those who refuse to confess that they are poor, miserable sinners.  But, you see, those people need to be offended by God’s Word, because they’re fooling themselves right now and face God’s bitter judgment with no help from Christ, the Mediator.

But it’s such a comforting Gospel to the ones who come to Jesus for help, because it presents the real Jesus, who says hard things, who is never politically correct, who isn’t trying to sell you a product or take your money, who doesn’t always answer prayer immediately or in the way we might like, who promises that those who follow him will bear a cross of suffering for it, who often appears as an enemy.  And yet, He is the real Jesus who, behind the appearance of hostility, is the best friend you will ever know; who is so good and merciful that he took the sins of the world to the cross and gave his life as a sacrifice, and rose from the dead so that he might give the gifts he won – forgiveness of sins, eternal life and salvation to anyone who comes to him for help.

So what can you tell people?  You can tell them the truth, “You need help. Jesus will help anyone who comes to him for help.”  And then, don’t forget to tell them where exactly they are to come to find Jesus for his help.  Tell them honestly, “You will not find Jesus at work.  You will not find him sitting at home watching TV or hiking in the mountains. You will not even find him in your prayers. You will find Jesus at my church.  You will find him here, in Holy Absolution, in the preaching of the Word of Christ, in the Baptism and the Holy Supper instituted by Christ.  This is where he helps – here, in the congregation of saints, here in his Word and Sacraments. This is where you will find him.  Come and see!”

But be prepared.  Because the Sunday your friend or acquaintance decides to come to church with you just might have for the Gospel reading a Gospel like the one you heard today with Jesus behaving in ways that even Christians might consider unconventional.  That’s OK.  Don’t ever be afraid of the truth.  Stories like the faith of the Canaanite woman may be unlikely evangelism texts, but whenever Jesus’ name is proclaimed in truth, there the Holy Spirit is calling people to faith.  May it be so today, in Jesus’ name.  Amen.

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Christ earns the world back from the devil

Posted on February 26, 2012 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

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Sermon for Invocabit – First Sunday in Lent

Matthew 4:1-11  +  Genesis 3:1-21  +  2 Corinthians 6:1-10

Our Lord, Jesus Christ, was baptized.  He stepped forward in the place of all mankind to be the righteous one, the obedient one, the law-keeper – because every other man since Adam has been a law-breaker.  He was God, and he came from God to earn back what man had lost, to earn sinners back out of the devil’s kingdom that they might enter into his own.

As soon as Jesus was baptized, he heard the words from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”  And right away, the Father sent his beloved Son into the devil’s lair to suffer. Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.

A forty-day fast, with nothing to eat or drink.  One day for every day that it rained during the Great Flood when God wiped sinful mankind from the face of the earth. Forty days. One day for every day Moses spent up on Mt. Sinai receiving the Law from the hand of God, the Law that Israel was supposed to keep. One day for every day Moses spent again up on Mt. Sinai receiving the Law again from the hand of God after Israel bowed down and worshiped the golden calf. One day for every day the twelve Israelite spies spent spying out the land of Canaan to test God and see if he had lied to them about the promised land. One day for every year Israel spent wandering in the wilderness, grumbling and complaining about the bread God provided for them every day.

During these forty days of fasting and temptation, in every case Jesus stood firm where Israel had failed, where Adam and Eve had failed, where you and I have failed.  In every temptation, Jesus resisted the devil and wielded the Word of God as a weapon to defeat him.  Those forty days of suffering and resistance were all spent for you.

In each of the three temptations mentioned in this text, the devil tries to take advantage of a hardship Jesus is facing.  Or, if there is no hardship, then the devil tries to create one by dangling a piece of forbidden fruit before Jesus’ eyes, by trying to convince him he needs something that God hasn’t provided.

In the first temptation, it says that Jesus was hungry after 40 days and 40 nights of fasting.  He wanted to eat.  But God had not yet wanted to give him anything to eat.  Remember, it was the Spirit of God who led Jesus out into the wilderness.  So, on the one hand, you have what Jesus wants, and on the other hand, you have what his Father wants.  And that’s not a sin.  The sin comes when it becomes a battle of wills between man and God, when man begins to resent God’s will, to covet the thing that God has not provided.  The sin comes when a man insists on getting what he wants.  The sin comes when a man, instead of saying to God, “Thy will be done,” says “My will be done.”

And the devil’s sneaky about it, too, he’s not obvious; he’s not crass.  He doesn’t say to Jesus, “Curse God!  You do what you want!”  He says, “If you’re the Son of God, turn these stones into bread!” In other words, God won’t mind.  You’re his Son, after all.  You deserve this.  You need it.  And your Father can hardly disapprove; he loves you.

The devil tries the same tricks on you, doesn’t he?  He jabs at you, over and over, little by little. He reminds you of that thing you want that God’s Word has not given you permission to have, at least not yet.  What is it?  A certain job?  A certain relationship?  A certain pleasure?  Something else?  If it’s something sinful you want, like, to commit adultery or to hurt someone, then you’ve already fallen into temptation, even if you don’t act on it.  If it’s not something sinful, it becomes sin when your will wins out over God’s will.

Now, God the Father made it hard for Jesus.  And in the midst of this temptation, God still didn’t yet provide his Son with food. He would later, after the temptations were over!, but not now.  He forces his Son to suffer the temptation and the hunger.  It’s as if he were saying, “Earn it, Son!  You have to earn it!  No one else can do it.  Earn the world back from the devil!”

And he did.  See what perfection looks like!  Jesus, the very Son of God, doesn’t presume to know what his Father approves of or disapproves of apart from the Word of God.  He had no command, nor did he have permission from his Father to perform a self-serving miracle like turning stones into bread.  All he had was the Word of God that says in Proverbs 10, The Lord does not let the righteous go hungry.  So, even though there hasn’t been food in sight for 40 days, Jesus clings to that Word and throws God’s Word back in the devil’s face, “It is written: Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”  

In the second temptation mentioned, the devil builds off the first one and tries to get Jesus interested in looking for a sign of God’s faithfulness.  “Throw yourself down from the temple and watch as God sends his angels to lift you up and save you.  Once you see with your eyes that God is faithful, then you’ll feel better.  Then your trust in him will be justified.”

Does the devil ever send you looking for a sign, for some proof of God’s faithfulness?  When it appears that God is against you, when God is closing all the doors around you and making it look like he’s cruel, like he’s your enemy, wouldn’t you like to see some proof that he cares?  And so the devil gets you to abandon faith in your quest for sight.  That’s called putting God to the test.

But again, God gives Jesus nothing – no vision of angels – at least, not yet.  There would be angels attending him after the temptation was over, but not now. Now he has to trust.  Now he has to believe that God is good, even though his eyes tell him differently.  “Earn it, Son!  You have to earn it! You have to earn the world back from the devil!”

And again, he does. See again what perfection looks like!  Jesus refuses to ask for a sign.  He refuses to be guided by the devil. He trusts his Father completely, without needing proof of it.  Because, what does he have?  He has his Father’s word.  And that’s enough, because he knows his Father will not lie.  “Again it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.”

In the third temptation, the devil dangles before Jesus’ eyes the ultimate forbidden fruit, the world itself, with all its glory, with all its inhabitants.  “You don’t have to earn it back from me, Jesus!  I won’t make it so hard on you, so difficult, so painful.  Your Father – he’s the one who wants to make it hard, who wants to make you suffer, who wants you to bear the cross, not me.  I’ll make it ever so easy.  Bow down to me – just this once.  And I’ll give the world back to you.”

“No, dear Christian, you don’t have to suffer,” says the devil.  “You don’t have to do anything that seems too hard for you.  God wants you to suffer.  He wants you to keep worshiping him and following his commandments, even though he knows it’s going to bring you trouble and heartache.  It’s going to cause all sorts of problems in your family, in your church, even in your employment and among your friends.  It doesn’t have to be so hard.  Just don’t speak up.  Just don’t rock the boat.  Don’t practice discipline in your home, or in your church.  Just let people do what they’re going to do.  Then they’ll love you.  Then you won’t drive them away with the Word of God.  Then your church will be popular and people will want to come.  All this I’ll give you.  And you don’t even have to ‘bow down’ to me.  Just don’t bow down quite so low before God.”

You see how lost you are, don’t you?, if your salvation depends on you.  If you have to earn God’s favor, or earn God’s forgiveness, or earn your way out of the devil’s kingdom and into God’s, then you’re lost.  You’re condemned.  You have no hope.  And so God calls you to repentance, to acknowledge that you have listened to the devil’s voice, to abandon all hope of earning your way into heaven, and to look in hope to the one who earned it for you.

Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “ ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’  Jesus said that, knowing full well what it meant, knowing full well that his worship of the Lord his God would lead him to the cross, that his service to God alone would mean giving his life as a ransom for many.

Jesus Christ, the Son of Man, the Offspring of Eve, came knowingly and willingly to this earth, to our human race, so that he, the Son of God and the Son of Man, could earn the world back from the devil and give his life as a sacrifice in order to accomplish it.  But don’t you for one moment think that it was easy for him to resist the devil’s temptations.  The Scriptures tell us that he suffered when he was tempted.  We see his agony in drops of bloody sweat as he prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night he was betrayed.  “Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me.  Yet not as I will, but as you will!”  Jesus did not “want” to suffer, but he was perfectly willing to suffer, to submit his will to his Father’s will, for love of him, and for love of you.  And by his perfect trust, his bloody sweat and his bloody death, he earned the world back to God from the devil.  There’s no reason for you to perish eternally.  The Son of God has bought you, has redeemed you by his victory over the devil’s temptations and with his blood, shed on the cross and given to you here to eat and to drink.  And as you eat and drink his body and blood, you eat and drink his victory over the devil.  You eat and drink his righteousness, his life, and the forgiveness of sins he has earned for you.

Today on Invocabit Sunday, the first Sunday in Lent, we witness the first bruises that Jesus, the Offspring of the woman, dealt to the serpent’s head. Forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness being tempted by the devil, earning our salvation.  Forty days we’ll spend in the season of Lent, one day for each day Jesus would appear to his disciples after he rose from the dead and crushed the serpent’s head for us forever. To you God the Father does not say, “Earn it!”  To you God the Father says, “Trust in Jesus Christ, my Son, who has earned all things for you. Amen.

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