Creation Is Perfected in the Body of Christ the Crucified

On the sixth day, God created Man in His own Image and Likeness. And what God began on that first Friday, He finishes and fulfills on this Good Friday. For here, in truth, is the Image and Likeness of God, in which man is created:

“Behold the Man,” the King of Creation, reigning from the Tree of His Cross

It is not uncommon, of course, that you may attempt a good work, only to have it go badly wrong and blow up in your face. But that is most certainly not what has happened here. God’s original intention has not been thwarted by the sin of man. What He has done, He has in fact purposed from the very beginning, indeed, from before the foundation of the world.

For the sake of His divine and holy love, God freely chose to create the heavens and the earth. Not for His own benefit, but for the sake of loving His creatures and benefitting them. He creates all things in order to love the man and the woman, the king and the queen of His first creation, made in His Image to live and reign with Him in Paradise eternally.

Already then, the Lord not only knows how things are going to go, but He willingly and graciously commits Himself to that very suffering and death which we here remember on this sacred day.

No one takes His life from Him, but He lays it down willingly for us poor sinners, His fallen and rebellious creatures, in order to raise us up with Himself by His Cross and in His Resurrection.

Thus, Adam was created in the Image and Likeness of this Man, the incarnate Son, the Seed of the Woman, who is more specifically the Crucified One, sacrificed for us men and our salvation.

Yet, even though God has created you to be and to live in the Image and Likeness of Christ, your sinful proclivity is to “create” gods of your own likeness, in your own image — false gods of selfish, self-serving, self-centered self-love. Those false gods and idols of yours are gods of power and greed and competition, gods of envy and revenge. And in your worship of such gods, your self-love is matched only by your hatred of anything that would hurt you, by your fear of anything that would threaten your freedom, and by your animosity toward anyone who might insult you.

The one true God is utterly unlike those false gods and idols that you worship and serve in your sinful unbelief. And so it is that, when He reveals Himself as He truly is in the Man of sorrows, you do not even recognize Him as a Man, far less as God in the Flesh. But so indeed He is. His almighty power is thus made known chiefly in showing mercy and pity toward those who deserve nothing but punishment. And the height of His divine glory is not selfishness, but Self-sacrificing love for poor, miserable sinners like yourself, who hate Him, and hurt Him, and betray Him for money, who deny Him and flee from Him, and who put Him to death, even death on the Cross.

He turns the other cheek to those who hit and punch and slap Him, and He does not retaliate. He loves His enemies, and He prays for those who persecute Him. He likewise prays for you, as well, that His Father would not hold your sins against you.

It is therefore in the frailty and weakness of His flesh and blood upon the Cross — in His Body made mortal by your sins — in His bitter suffering and innocent death, and in the shedding of His holy, precious Blood — it is there that the Image and Likeness of God are most clearly and fully revealed, and are now accomplished and perfected in this one true Man, the new and better Adam.

It is in this Image, in the Likeness of Christ, the Crucified One, that you are recreated to live with Him in His Kingdom forever. To live as He has lived in the fear and faith of His God and Father. To love as He loves you. To forgive others as He forgives you. And to sacrifice yourself for the sake of your neighbor, within your own calling, as Jesus Christ has sacrificed Himself for you.

So it is that, as the woman, Eve, was taken from the side of the man, Adam, and then brought to the man and given to him as his bride, now the Bride of Christ, His Holy Church, the Mother of all the living, is taken from the riven side of this Man, Jesus Christ, and made alive in the river of living water and life-giving blood that He pours out from His Body in the sacred sleep of death.

If you would be His disciple, His man or His woman, you are entrusted to this Holy Mother, His Church on earth as it is in heaven. You are born again by the water, Word, and Spirit of Christ. And as often as your sin has robbed you of His Breath of Life, you are resuscitated by His Word of Peace, His Word of Holy Absolution, the forgiveness of all your sins in His Name and stead. There is nothing that is held against you, since He has made Atonement for all of your iniquities.

Thus are you nourished at the Church’s festal board, fed with the Body and Blood of the firstborn Son who has been given in the place of lambs and sheep who love to wander, and who has been slain upon the Cross for you and for all of the children of men.

By the same token, the Woman herself, the Bride of Christ, His Holy Church, the Mother of all the sons and daughters of God, she is entrusted to the one who testifies. She is committed in body and soul to the Apostolic witness of the Cross and Crucifixion of the New Adam, Jesus Christ. And she is cared for by the preaching and confession of this same Lord Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, whose Blood cleanses the Woman and all of her children. It is His Blood that also covers you and shields you from the death and damnation you deserve.

In Him who is the very Image and Likeness of God, crucified for your transgressions and raised for your justification — though you are a child of dust, subject to death and the grave for your sins — yet, in Him, you are resurrected from the dust of the earth and returned to the Garden of God, to Paradise the blest, where you are fed forevermore with the Fruits of this Tree of Life. “Behold the life-giving Cross, on which was hung the salvation of the world!” Take and eat. Drink of it, all of you. Taste and see that the Lord is very good, and that His loving-kindness endures forever.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Enter into the Holy City with Your Priestly King

It is truly an amazing and remarkable thing, that your King, the Lord Himself, the Son of God in His own human Flesh, comes to you and makes His dwelling here with you.

But what does this mean for you?  It’s a bit frightening, really.  I mean, does He come to provide for you or punish you?  To promote you, or to pull rank on you?  After all, a visit from the powers that be and the governing authorities often means discipline or consequences for wrongdoing.

There is a certain ambiguity and tension to the coming of your King.  Is He coming to put you in your place, or to remove you from your place and your position?  Wondering and worrying about when and where and how the axe is going to fall is nerve-wracking and scary.  And if, on the other hand, you get your hopes up that your King is coming to set things right and make everything better in your life on earth, you’re likely going to be surprised and disappointed by what He does.

It’s true enough, as the Holy Scriptures testify, that things are pretty messed up, not only in your own personal life, but on a national and global scale.  And even if you’re not a ruler or a boss — perhaps you’re one of the little guys, or you’re still making your way to wherever it is that you’re going — you’ve done your part to mess things up in your own little corner of the world.

There is no one who is righteous; no, not one — no one but Christ Jesus, the King who comes to His own people in righteousness and peace.  But then, consider how this one Lord Jesus Christ is regarded and received.  He’s hailed on Palm Sunday, yes, but mocked and ridiculed, condemned and crucified by the end of the week.  Falsely accused, brutally beaten, and spit upon.  His closest companions betray Him, deny Him, and abandon Him. How should a King respond to all of that?

Even now, as He enters the Holy City on the cusp of His Passion, it is primarily due to His miracles that the crowds throng to see Him and welcome Him.  His own disciples don’t yet understand what’s going on.  Everyone is eager for a “Bread King,” a great big “Sugar Daddy,” a Miracle Worker who will build a glorious Kingdom on earth and take on all the nations of the world.

To be sure, the raising of Lazarus from the dead has been an impressive Sign, as even the skeptics must admit and the enemies of Jesus grudgingly concede.  But, as a Sign, it points beyond itself to something else, that is, to the dying and rising of the Lord Jesus Himself.  The way that He approached that situation, as you heard last week, has indicated that the Glory of God in Christ is to be found, first of all, in His suffering and death, and only then in His Resurrection and His Life.

That is the pattern, too, of Christian faith and life, as your Baptism signifies and testifies, if you think about the dying and rising of that Holy Sacrament.  It is also your experience of life in the world, with all its ups and downs, with all its hopes and disappointments, frustrations and fears.

It is frankly confusing and difficult to navigate.  Just when you think you’ve finally got it figured out, and gotten your bearings, and found your footing in the world, then everything suddenly shifts and changes, and you’re left not knowing what’s up and what’s down, or which way to turn.

Think of how it must have been for the disciples in the course of that first Holy Week, from Palm Sunday, through Maundy Thursday, to Good Friday and Easter.  The Passion of Christ Jesus is a profound and powerful story, even to consider it.  But it is also the life into which you are baptized, by which the Lord recreates you from the dust of death and conforms you to His own Image.

It is impossible to understand any of this superficially, nor at all apart from the accomplished fact of the Cross and Passion — manifested in the Resurrection of Christ Jesus from the dead, and now realized for you in His Sacrament of the Altar.  The Lord’s Supper is the interpretive key to the Lord’s Passion, both beforehand and afterwards.  It not only explains what happens to Him, and why, but it now delivers and bestows the Fruits and Benefits of His Cross and Resurrection.

Only in the Body and Blood of Christ Jesus — crucified and risen from the dead, given and poured out for you and for the many — only there do you see and know and believe what is the Truth of God in Christ, your King: That He has indeed come to “take your place,” and to “put you in your place,” but in such a way that you could never have guessed or imagined or invented for yourself.

Do not be afraid, dear child of God!  For the Lord has made you a beloved son or daughter of His Church on earth, and therefore a son or daughter of the Father in Christ Jesus, the incarnate Son.  Rejoice in His mercy, and give all thanks and praise to this one Lord Jesus Christ, your King, who comes to you in Love, not to punish you for your sins, but to bear your punishment and grant you His Peace.  He comes to save you from your enemies; to give you rest from your weariness, relief from your fears, and safety in place of uncertainty; and to reign over you in love with His Word.

He has not come to “lord it over you” in the way of earthly monarchs, but, as your Lord, as your Savior and your King, He calls you by His Cross and Resurrection to become and be like Him.

To that end, He has first of all become like you in every way, save only without sin.  He has been tempted in every way that you are; He has suffered every burden of your mortal flesh and every dire consequence of your sin.  He truly has taken your place, your sin and death and every ill, and He has made it all His own, in order to bring you into His place with God the Father in Paradise.

By His Self-Sacrifice He opens up the Way through suffering and death into the Resurrection of the Body and the Life everlasting; for He is a priestly King, a royal High Priest, who enters the Most Holy Place by His own Blood and brings you into the presence of God in His own Body.

He humbles Himself, even unto His death upon the Cross, in order to be exalted and glorified on your behalf by His God and Father.  He becomes a disciple, Himself, in order to make a disciple of you by the catechesis of His Word and by your Holy Baptism in His Name.

So it is that your salvation is accomplished, established, and secure in the Person of Christ Jesus, in His own crucified and risen Body of flesh and blood.

Now, then, He testifies to the Sign of His own Cross and Resurrection by preaching repentance for the forgiveness of sins in His Name.  His dying and rising are the fulfillment of all things, and they are also then the Sign of your own dying and rising with Him, by which you are saved from sin and death unto Life and Salvation forever.  All that He has suffered and received in your place, in order to rescue and redeem you, to justify and save you, He preaches and gives to you by His Word.

His preaching to you is not simply information to be processed and stored; it actually calls you to follow after Him.  Accordingly, as you hear the testimony of His Cross and Passion, come out to meet Him as He comes in Peace to meet you here at His Altar within His Church on earth.

His preaching of repentance does put you to death, it crucifies and buries you with Him.  So, you do lose “your place,” the place that you have made for yourself, the place of sin and death which Christ has taken from you and made His own.  But so does He also then bring you to Life and put you in His place.  He gives to you His Sonship, His Spirit, and His Glory in and with the Father.

In calling you to follow after Him, His preaching calls you and brings you into the New Covenant of His Flesh and Blood, the Promise of His eternal Inheritance which He has established forever.

Beloved of the Lord, as He entered the Holy City on Palm Sunday for His Cross and Passion, so do you enter the heavenly City, New Jerusalem, by the way and means of His Cross and Passion.

And as He entered the Most Holy Place once for all with His own Blood, by His innocent suffering and death and in His bodily Resurrection and Ascension, so do you now enter with Him into that same Holy of Holies, eternal in the heavens, by His Flesh and Blood in the Sacrament of the Altar. 

That is why the Liturgy has taught you to cry out in prayer and praise, to rejoice, give thanks, and sing, as the Lord comes to His Altar: Hosanna! Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord!  Hosanna in the highest, and the Peace of the Lord on earth.  For here, indeed, He comes to save you now in this Divine Service, to sustain you with His Word and Holy Spirit, and to sanctify you for the Life everlasting in body and soul with His own holy Body and His holy and precious Blood.

As He thus remembers you in mercy, forgives you all your sins, and gives you His own Life and Salvation in body and soul, so remember Him by faith, repent of all your sins, and rejoice in His Resurrection and His Righteousness.  As surely as He comes to be with you here and now, so shall you surely follow after Him, to be with Him where He is forever and ever.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Behold the Image of God in Man, Given and Poured Out for You

It is amazing how visual the Gospel of the Passion is.  “Look!” you are told, again and again.  “Behold the Lamb of God.”  “Behold the Man.”  “Behold your King.”  “Like this,” St. John will describe, as though you could actually see some gesture he is making while he preaches.

No one has ever seen God at any time, but now the Incarnate Son, who resides in the bosom of the Father, He reveals God to us.  For the Word of God, who is God, by whom all things are made — He has become Flesh.  In Him God tabernacles among us.  In Him you behold the one true God.

In the beginning was this Word — the Word was with God, and the Word was God — and as God spoke this Word of His, who is in fact the Father’s only-begotten Son from all eternity, so did creation come into being out of nothing.  “Let there be Light,” He said, and there was Light.  For this Word is the Light in the darkness, which is the Life and Love of God.

And on the Sixth Day, on that first Friday of creation, God said, “Let Us make Man in Our Image.”  Then He crafted the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his body the Breath of Life, which is the Spirit of the Lord.  So did man become a living being.  And that he should be and live in the Image and Likeness of the Holy Trinity — an eternal relationship of mutual Love between the Father and His Son in the Holy Spirit — the Lord God caused the man to sleep, and opened up his side, and from his body crafted the woman, his beautiful bride, to be a helpmate comparable to him.  The Lord then brought her to the man to be his wife; and behold, it was very good.

But the Image of God is not a static or stationary work of art, which simply stays put and looks pretty on the wall, on a mantle or a shelf.  In order to see God in man, the man is given to live in mutual love with God and with his neighbor, receiving and requiting the Love of God, and loving the Household and Family of God in His Name.  Such Love, by its very nature, cannot be forced, demanded, or manipulated.  It is given and received in freedom, in the peace of friendship.

In that freedom, though they were the friends of God, the man and the woman doubted and denied His Word, and so betrayed Him with their disobedience.  Though they were His own creation and His beloved children, to whom He had already given a cornucopia of good things, they chose to flee in faithless fear from His Image, and they sought instead the knowledge of self-righteousness, which is not the Truth at all but the likeness of death.  They ran from God and returned to the dust.

The first man and his wife were blinded by their sin.  They could no longer perceive or understand the Lord their God in His good creation with the clarity of faith and love.  Instead, they were afraid and ashamed.  They were lost and confused.  They were no longer free to live and love in peace, but trapped in a pit of desperation.  They were no longer fully alive, but subject to death and decay.

Nevertheless, God still beheld them in His mercy, and the gracious freedom of His Love for them was not defeated by their disobedience.  He did not destroy them or turn Himself against them.  He did not look with contempt upon their nakedness, but covered and clothed them with animal skins.  Thus did the Lord offer the first sacrifice, in order to remove the shame of fallen man.

And the Promise was first given, that God would remedy the problem, rectify what was broken, and make all things new.  The Seed of the Woman would crush the adversary’s head and reconcile the world to God.  In Him the Image and Likeness of God would be seen in perfect clarity.

Behold, this is the New Creation that God has accomplished in Christ Jesus, His beloved Son, conceived and born of the Woman.  He does not scrap the first creation and start over, but He redeems and restores it, raises it up, and perfects it in this Man.  He is the completion of Creation.

So it was that, on the Sixth Day, on the Good Friday of His Cross, God the Father said to His dear Son, “Let Us make Man in Our Image and after Our Likeness.”  And that is what He has done.

Indeed, this is what the one true God looks like in His Creation.  Here is the fullness of the Deity embodied and enfleshed.  Which means, also, that here is the true Man.  For Christ the Crucified is the very Model and Pattern — the Image and Likeness of God — in which the first man, Adam, was fashioned and formed.  From the beginning, yes, even from before the foundation of the world, it was this Man, Christ Jesus, the Blessed Virgin Mary’s Son, whom God the Father beheld in Love, and for whose sake He created the heavens and the earth, Adam & Eve, and everything else.

It is specifically His Sacrifice for the salvation of sinners that reveals the grace and glory of God most clearly.  So, if you want to know what God and Man are like, look at Him upon the Cross.

He lives and dies, not for Himself — He does what He does, not for His own sake or benefit — but in love for His Father and in love for you and all His creatures.  It is such divine Love that you behold in Him, and perfect faith in His God and Father; for He is the faithful and obedient Son.

Thus He becomes your merciful and great High Priest in all things pertaining to God; not only for a little while, but forever and always.  As the true Man He has fully taken your place; and in His own human Flesh and Blood He has established His place as the Son of God for you.

He has taken your place, not only by His Incarnation, by His conception and birth of the Woman, but also by coming in the likeness of fallen flesh.  That is, although He has no sins of His own, He takes the sins of the whole world upon Himself and bears the entire brunt of their burden, the full extent of their curse and consequence.  Though He is Life Itself, He is made mortal and subject to death.  He suffers all your pain and grief and sorrow from the cradle to the grave.  He is tempted in all the ways that you are tempted.  He sympathizes with all of your frailties and weaknesses.

He takes your place — the place of Adam and of all the children of men — the place of the skull.

You know that no one takes His life from Him; He lays it down willingly in love, and so shall He take it up again by the Spirit of His Father.  And He takes that place of yours on purpose, that place of death and the grave, so that He might take you up from there to His own place with the Father.

As your great High Priest He offers Himself up to God — the Son offers Himself up to the Father — in the faith and love for which you have been created.  He does so, not under ideal conditions, not in the bliss of Paradise, but from within the curse of death and damnation, under the terrible weight of your sin.  Burdened by all the hate and hurt and heartache of this fallen world, still He perseveres in the fear, love, and trust of His Father.  He has no other gods but Him.

It’s not as though it were easy for Him, but He does it all because He is faithful and true, because He is the true Man, and because He loves you.  So He calls upon the Name of the Lord, even with tears, with loud cries and deep groans of anguish, and He entrusts Himself entirely to His God and Father.  He takes the Cup and drinks it, confident in the One who is able to save Him out of death.

And He is heard because of His piety!  Not only that but, consequently, His matchless piety now and forever avails for you before the Father in heaven!  For the Body of Christ Jesus, who has been crucified for your iniquities, is your Mercy Seat in the Holy of Holies.  Therein He ever stands for you as your merciful and great High Priest, and there He ever lives to make intercession for you.  His priestly garment, His unrent seamless tunic, covers your naked guilt and shame.  Do not run away and hide, therefore, but draw near in peace, since you are reconciled to God in Christ Jesus.

As surely as He is your great High Priest, so is He also the Christ, the Lord’s Anointed, that is, the King of the Lord’s Creation.  He truly is the King of the Jews, for salvation is from the Jews.  He is the King of Israel, indeed, of all who are the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob by faith in the Promise.  But He is also the King of the world, even though His Kingdom is not from here — just as Pilate decrees by the authority that was given to him from above, that Jesus of Nazareth is “the King of the Jews.”  Thus it is written in the languages of the whole world, and so shall it be wherever in the world the Gospel is preached concerning this crucified King and His Cross.

As the New Adam He has become the Head of a new humanity.  But see how His headship is so different from the rulers of this world.  They lord it over their subjects and use their power to serve themselves, to promote their own advantage and agendas.  The Lord Jesus is not like that at all.  He reigns in love, He rules in peace.  He lays down His own life in order to give life to His people.  His Kingdom and His Power and His Glory are the Gospel of His Cross.

And so it is that His own Bride, His Queen, His Holy Church is taken from His opened side as He sleeps the deep sleep of death upon His Cross.  By the Water and the Blood that pour forth out of His innermost being, the New Woman is fashioned and formed after the Image of this New Man, to be a helpmate comparable to Him.  Even His own blessed Mother is given this new identity, as she who once gave birth to Him is given new life by Him.  She, too, is redeemed and sanctified by His atoning death, by His holy and precious Blood, which she beholds at the foot of His Cross.

She stands there, beneath His Tree, as a member and an icon of His Holy Church, the Mother of all the living.  And so does the beloved disciple stand there with her, as an icon of each and every Christian, each and all of whom are the children of God by grace, by His gracious adoption of sons.  Behold, in this Mother and this Son, the Household and Family of God in Christ Jesus.

She is entrusted to the care of the apostolic witness and preaching of Christ the Crucified.  And by the Word and Spirit of God the Church conceives and gives birth to His children, in much the same way that Mother Mary conceived and gave birth to the Christ Child Himself.  Born from the waters of the font, they are nourished by His Blood and Flesh at the Altar of His Holy Church.

These are the Fruits of His Tree, the Water, Blood, and Spirit which He hands over and gives out from the Cross; His gracious Word of forgiveness; and His Body given for you and for the many.

As He enters upon His Holy Passion from the garden, and as His sacred Body is temporarily laid to rest in the garden, so is the Cross of Christ the true Tree of Life in the midst of Paradise.  Its good and holy Fruits are no evil, no poison or hurt, but the very Medicine of Immortality, the true Ambrosia, by which you have life and health and strength in body and soul, forever and ever.

You don’t have to get yourself back to the garden.  Nor could you ever have done so.  On your own you can only return to the dust from which you were taken.  But here the Garden of God has come to you, as it is found wherever Christ the Crucified is lifted up in the preaching of His Cross, and wherever He is given and poured out in the Fruits of His Cross, His Body and His Blood.

You now, beloved of the Lord, who are born from His Body in the Water and the Blood, and who are fed from His Tree of Life with His own Flesh — you are now like Him, who made Himself to be like you.  You are made brand new in Him.  You are what you eat and drink: the Image of God.

Do not doubt that it is true.  Despite the outward appearance of the Cross, which the world despises in Christ Jesus and so now also in you, and notwithstanding the fact and experience of sin, which remains in your fallen flesh — where you feel it, and the Law reveals it daily — nevertheless, the Truth of Christ Jesus stands fast and remains forever and ever for you.

He is the Man, and He is the Image of God in Man.  As He has taken your place, even unto death upon the Cross, so has He given you His place as the Son of God, even unto Life everlasting.

That is what His God and Father graciously beholds in you.  Not your nakedness and shame, your suffering, sin, and death, which Christ Jesus bears on your behalf, but the perfect piety, steadfast faith, and holy love with which He has gone to the Cross for you and for all people, and which He now lavishly bestows upon you by His Holy Gospel.  Amen, amen, it is and ever shall be so.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Christ Jesus is the Passover Lamb of God

The sons of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were not spared from death because of any merit or worthiness or innocence of their own, but for the sake of the Lamb that was sacrificed in their stead.  The blood of that Lamb covered them from death, it shielded them from the Angel of Death.  And the flesh of that Lamb fed them for the journey out of bondage into freedom.

All of this on account of divine and holy Love, the grace and mercy of the Lord their God.  And that is already to speak of Christ Jesus.  It’s all about Jesus.  And it is all fulfilled for you in Him, the one Lord Jesus Christ.  He is the firstborn Son of God, who is not spared from death, though He committed no sin, nor was there any deceit found in His mouth.  He is the firstborn Son of God from all eternity, who was in time conceived and born as the promised Seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  He is the true Israel.  And He has become the Lamb of God, who takes upon Himself and takes away the sins of the world.  He is sacrificed for you and all as the true Passover Lamb.

His Sacrifice has been completed once-for-all in His death upon the Cross, and there is no other sacrifice for sin, nor is any other needed.  His Victory is sure and certain.  It is finished and perfect.

And yet, the Passover requires, not only the sacrifice of the Lamb, but also that His holy and precious Blood be applied to you, that it should cover you; and likewise, that His Flesh should be given to you, and that you should eat His Flesh in repentant faith and with thanksgiving.

It is true, as you have heard from the lips of Jesus, that you are already clean by the Word that He has spoken to you; for He has called you by His Gospel, and He has enlightened you with His gifts of grace and peace.  In Holy Baptism He has washed you with water and His Word; He has there forgiven you all of your sins, and He has poured out His Holy Spirit generously upon you.

But consider your day-to-day life and your circumstances in this world.  You do not love and serve your neighbor as Christ Jesus loves and serves you.  Perhaps your neighbor does not need you to wash his dirty feet — or perhaps he does — but your neighbor does have needs, in any case; and he is set before you as an object of divine Love, so that you also might love and serve him or her, as the Lord Jesus Christ has humbled Himself and served you, even unto death upon the Cross.

But the truth is that you do not love your neighbor as Jesus loves you, certainly not consistently and all the time.  You do, however, sin every day in the way that you think, in the way that you speak, and in the way that you act.  Indeed, you are surrounded on all sides, within and without, by sin and death — by your own sins and weaknesses, and by the sins of others against you — and by all the assaults and temptations of the devil and the whole fallen world around you, all seeking to destroy you by grabbing you away from God and plunging you into bitter death and judgment.

Your own covetous lust (whether for money, for sex, for food and drink, or for entertainment) can so easily lead you astray into sin and finally death, as happened in the tragic case of Judas Iscariot.  How often do you compromise yourself for wealth or pleasure?  And how often do you excuse your selfishness and sin, supposing that you are in a position to call your own shots?  But to pursue that path is to open your heart and mind, your body, and your life to Satan and his wicked ways.

All of which is also to say that, if the Lord Jesus does not continue to wash you by His Word and Spirit, to cleanse you with His Blood and feed you with His Flesh in divine mercy, then you shall have no part in Him.  If He does not continue to catechize you with His Wisdom, you shall perish.  You shall be consumed and destroyed by the Angel of Death on account of your unbelief and sin.

So, then, do not be like Simon Peter in this case, questioning and resisting the Word of the Lord and His Means of the Gospel.  Rather, hear and heed the Word of Christ Jesus, and trust Him to serve you, to love you with the ways and means He has provided for you in divine and holy Love.  Remain in the House of His God and Father, and so keep the Feast at His Table.  Live and love as a child of God, and give no place to the devil in your heart, mind, or behavior.  But where you have fallen into temptation and sin, return to the Lord your God by fleeing to His mercy in Christ Jesus.

Now, it is certainly true that your life as a Christian disciple of Jesus is one of joyful peace, of faith and hope and confidence.  And how shall we not give thanks and praise to our dear Lord on such a night as this one, in particular?  But with that, so are you also called to live in the fear of the Lord, and to exercise sober judgment and repentance by His Word and Spirit in this sinful world.

“Repent.”  That is the preaching of Jesus.  “Examine yourself.”  That is the teaching of His Holy Apostle, St. Paul.  “Consider your place in life according to the Ten Commandments,” and so learn to confess to your pastor those sins that you discover in yourself, in your thoughts, words, and actions.  That is the teaching of the Lord’s faithful servant, Dr. Luther.  Judge yourself rightly in the light of God’s Word.  Acknowledge your sins, your weaknesses, and your mortality.

And knowing your many and great needs, confess your sins and receive the forgiveness of Christ Jesus, your Savior.  Be returned to the cleansing and Life-giving waters of your Holy Baptism by the right use of His Word in Confession and Holy Absolution.  And as He remembers you in love and speaks to you in peace here in His Supper, so eat the Flesh with which He feeds you, and drink the Blood with which He removes your sins, shelters you from death, and brings you into Paradise.

Here at the Table of the Lord is where and how you learn to love and serve your neighbor, and so to live as a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ; because here at this Table is where and how the Lord Jesus loves and serves you as His own beloved.  So is He faithful and gracious even to the end.

Here is the Hour of His Glory, where He is glorified in His grace and mercy toward you as your beloved Lord and Savior; because here is where the Glory of His Cross, His Victory over sin, death, and the devil, is given to you and poured out for you, unto Life and Salvation in Him.

Here the devil cannot have you or tyrannize you anymore; not while the Word of Christ rings in your ears, in your heart, in your body and your mind.  Nor can your sin accuse you or harm you; not while you cling by faith to the forgiveness of the Gospel of Christ Jesus.  And not even death can touch you forever; not while you rest and remain in the Body and Blood of the Lamb.

Though the world may shed your blood and slay you, yet the Lord Himself prevails for you and saves you from sin, death, and hell.  For you are baptized into Christ Jesus, and here in His Supper you abide in Him — and He abides in you — unto the Resurrection and the Life everlasting.

It is the Lord’s Passover, and you are His Israel indeed, whom He sets free from bondage and brings through the wilderness into the good Land that He has promised; that you may live with Him in His Kingdom, and worship Him and serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness all your days, even to the close of the age, when you shall see Him face to face and live forever.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Follow the Man with the Water to the Feast of the Lamb

Have this attitude in yourself, which was in Christ Jesus.  Have the mind of Christ, His heart and Spirit.  That is more than just a mind set or a world view; it is to lay down your life in love for those who hate you, to serve those who persecute you, and to pray for those who speak ill of you.

That is what the life of God in the Flesh is like.  So, then, if you would be like Him, if you would bear His Name and live as His child, think and speak and act like that, as Christ Jesus does.

Are you ready, willing, and able to do so?  As Simon Peter boasted, are you ready to go with Jesus, even to prison and to death?  To follow Him to the Cross, to be mocked and ridiculed, beaten up and spit upon?  Or do you fear even the questions, accusations, and opinions of others?

How easily are you swayed in your resolve by what other people might think or say or do?  How quickly do their loud voices drown out your reason, your faith, and your confession of Christ Jesus, so that you give Him up and hand Him over?  For what?  For money, friends, safety, or freedom?

Pray, as the Lord Jesus prays for you, and as He has taught you to pray, that you would not enter into temptation, and that your faith in Him would not fail.

That is what happened to Judas Iscariot.  His lust for money opened his heart to the temptations of the devil, and he sold out his Friend, the Lord Jesus, for cash.  Pray that you don’t go there.

Consider what Christ Jesus is like, and how different He is from the kings and rulers, presidents and princes of this world, who lord it over their subjects even by giving out their “favors.”  They like to be called “benefactors,” because it makes them feel like gods, as though all things were at their disposal.  So they distribute their favors to those who tickle their fancy and stroke their ego.

But the true King, Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, is not like this at all.  He does not count His equality with God as something to be clung to and hoarded to His own advantage.  He knows who He is, and He knows and loves and trusts His Father — and in such confidence, with a heart of compassion, He empties Himself and makes Himself nothing.  He is true God in the Flesh, but He takes into His Flesh the sins of the world, the curse and consequences of death and damnation.

In holy faith and holy love He humbles Himself entirely in obedience to the Father who sent Him, in order to save you and all the fallen sons and daughters of Adam from sin, death, the devil, and hell.  It is in this way that He is your Lord; not by bossing you about or pushing you around, but by giving Himself into death for your Life and Salvation, and so also by seating you at His Table and serving you with His forgiveness of sins and the gift of His own Body and Blood, that you might live with Him in His Kingdom, by His grace, in righteousness, innocence, and blessedness.

This is the true Glory of God in the Flesh of Jesus Christ.  For divine Glory is not found in what the world calls great and powerful.  It is rather found in what the world considers to be weak and foolish and impotent.  In particular, the Glory of God is manifested and revealed in Christ Jesus, the Crucified One, who willingly lays down His Body and Life, sheds His own Blood, and suffers and dies upon the Cross, in order to save you and all people by and with His forgiveness of sins.

The world does sometimes speak of “forgiveness,” but it usually does not know what it’s talking about.  Indeed, there is no real forgiveness apart from Christ Jesus, who does not make excuses, who does not rationalize or wink at sin, who does not merely offer second chances, or whatever else the world offers in the way of barter and bargain.  He does not excuse sin, He forgives it.  And that is not a cheap or easy transaction, but one that He accomplishes at the greatest personal cost.

He does it in the Passion of His Love for you, even to the point of His death on the Cross.  And so, too, it is in His Love for you that He calls you to repentance, bids you take up the Cross and follow after Him, and disciplines you in the Way of Life by His Word and Holy Spirit.  He is not out to destroy you or make your life miserable!  He wounds you and puts you to death with His Law, in order to heal you and raise you up to newness of life with the forgiveness of His Gospel.

And all of this that He now works in you by the preaching of repentance and forgiveness of sins, He has first of all accomplished for you (and for all people) in His own Body of Flesh and Blood, by His sacrificial death upon the Cross and in His Resurrection from the dead unto Life eternal.

So does He also come to you now, in the same Body of Flesh and Blood, crucified and risen from the dead, in order to “save you now.”  By and with His Body — from the Altar of His Cross and in His Resurrection from the dead — He reigns over you in Love with the Fruits of His Passion.

In His going up to Jerusalem and in His being lifted up on the Cross, He reconciles you to God and raises you up to the Father in heaven.  He has descended from the heights of the Mountain and has taken up your sin as His burden, bearing all that weight in His own Body to the Cross; and He has taken you up, as well, and gone back up the Mountain to God, bearing you to the Father.

So it is that He is wounded, in order to heal you.  And He is put to death, in order to give you Life.  For He numbers Himself with transgressors — beginning already with His Baptism in the Jordan River (now completed in His death).  Do you recall?  When all the people were baptized — when the sinners were coming, repenting, confessing their sins, and being baptized by John — Jesus also was baptized.  He stood there in the midst of the waters of the Jordan, as Joshua once stood in the midst of the waters, so that Israel could pass through; and so do you now pass through with Him.

He takes His stand with sinners.  He numbers Himself with transgressors.  He is in the water with you, so that His suffering and death, His Sacrifice, His humbleness, His obedience, His faith — all of these are for you.  He does all that He does on your behalf, for your Life and your Salvation.

He humbles Himself in this way, even to His death upon the Cross, in order to cover your shame with His honor.  He takes your shame upon Himself, so that His honor becomes yours.  You were naked, so He strips Himself and dresses you; He is naked on the Cross, that you might be clothed in His righteousness.  You were hungry, so He goes without to feed you.  You were a stranger and an alien, a nobody with no name, and you had no people, you had no home.  So He made Himself a stranger, with no place of His own to lay His head.  He made Himself an outcast, in order to give you His own room in the Father’s House — so that you may call His Father’s House your Home; that you should have a place and a Family, and that you should know Love and not be forgotten.

He covers your sin and shame with His holiness and righteousness, and He glorifies you with His own Glory; for His faithfulness is reckoned to you as righteousness.  All that Jesus has done right, by the Father’s Word you have now done right.  I don’t mean that you try harder and do better.  And I don’t mean that you have done better, or that you mean well, or that you think about things differently now.  I mean that everything Christ has done is now yours.  His Righteousness is yours, because it is reckoned to you, it is credited to you.  This is the “grade” that God gives you: A+

There is nothing lacking in your standing before the Lord your God; for the very One who died for you, bearing all your sins, is risen from the dead and highly exalted by God, and in Him you also are raised from the dead and highly exalted by God.  And you are named with His Name — yes, that very Name which is above every other name, that is the Name with which God has named you, and that is the Name which you now bear as a Christian, as one who is baptized into Christ Jesus.

As God the Father vindicated His righteous and faithful Servant, Christ Jesus, so has He vindicated you in Him.  All the accusations of your enemies are silenced.  All the accusations of Satan against you are silenced.  All the accusations of God’s own Law are silenced.  God Himself has vindicated you.  Who, then, will contend with you?  Let them make their case — it is thrown out of court.

Through the waters of your Holy Baptism you follow Jesus up to Jerusalem, and you pass through His death into Life with Him — into the Most Holy Place, the Inner Sanctum, the Holy of Holies, the very Bosom of the Father.  The Holy of Holies not made with hands but eternal in the heavens, that is where you go and enter in with Jesus — unto the Passover Feast of God.  How the Lord has longed to eat this Feast with you!  And He has made it so.

That is why He is among you, even now, as One who serves, who bids you to recline at His Table.  Though He is the Greatest, He demonstrates His greatness by girding Himself to serve you, by stretching out His hand to feed you, and by pouring out His Cup to give you drink.

You know the Way.  You know how to find that Feast.  You know how to enter in.  Your Savior, Christ Jesus, is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and you come to the Father by and with Him. And as it is, the same instructions that He gave to His disciples then, are also good instructions for you:  Find the man with the pitcher of water, and follow him to where he leads — to the Upper Room — that is the place for the Great Supper, the true Passover of the Lamb of God.

You know what that pitcher of water is for.  It has already cleansed you by the Word and Spirit of God in Holy Baptism.  There the Spirit Himself was poured out upon you generously through Jesus Christ your Savior.  There God the Father named you, and there you were marked with the sign of the Cross as one redeemed by Christ the Crucified.  So it is that you are already clean, because you are baptized into Him.  But that same pitcher of water is now poured out, as it were, so that Christ Jesus might wash your feet with Holy Absolution; that all the dirt and dust and grime that accumulates in your body and soul, heart, mind, and spirit, as you go about your days in the world, should likewise be washed away, freely cleansed by waters that flow with the very Blood of Christ.

That man whom Christ has sent with the pitcher of water leads you here to the Upper Room.  And here is the Table at which the Lord invites you to recline.  Here is where He serves you with His Body and His Blood.  Here, then, bend your knees and confess His holy Name.  Or, if your knees won’t bend in this life, know that in the Resurrection they will.  And whether you can bend the knee or not, bow your heart, bow your mind, and bow your spirit before Him who is your Savior.

Do not be afraid to confess His Name; not only here among your friends and fellow Christians, but in that place where God has put you in the world, wherever He has stationed you in this life.

Bow before the Lord Jesus and confess His Name, not as though you must appease Him.  There is no wrath in Him, but only mercy for you.  The Son of Man has not come to condemn the world, but that you might be saved through Him.  So, too, bend the knee and confess His Name, not as though you must curry His favor by stroking His “ego,” but because He freely and fully forgives you all your sins by the Ministry of His Gospel.  So does He justify you by His grace and save you from death and the grave.  In Him is your Life and your Salvation.  That is why you worship Him.

Offer Him the sacrifice of thanksgiving because He gives you all good things.  There is nothing else for you to give to Him except thanks.  He does not require you to pay for your sins with your body and life.  But here is the Fat Portion of His Sacrifice, His holy Body, given for you.  And here is the choice Wine of His Drink Offering, His own holy and precious Blood, poured out for you.  For He, the true God in the Flesh, has made the Sacrifice, and now He gives Himself to you.

Here at His Table He serves you with His Word of the Gospel, His forgiveness of all your sins.  And here at His Table He gives you His Spirit by feeding you with Spiritual Food, which is your Meat and Drink indeed.  And here at His Table, in His Supper, is where and how He remembers you in His Kingdom.  That is what it means to do this in “remembrance” of Him.  It is not so much that you gird up your mind and your memory to think about Jesus, but that He remembers you by feeding you and forgiving you.  So does He make His Paradise right here with you, by His grace.

Come on up to His Feast, therefore, here at His Altar in His House, and find your hiding place and your Sabbath Rest in the Flesh and Blood of the Lamb of God, both now and forever.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Behold the One True Man of God

Dear Christians, one and all, your God and Father loves you.  He is not mad at you; He is at peace with you in Christ Jesus, His beloved Son.  And He is not mean.  You have known meanness, and you have been mean yourself, but your God and Father is not mean.  He is not cruel, as the devil would have you believe, but gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, and abounding in Love.

Everything He does proceeds in Love.  And in His great Love for you, He desires to give you only good things — because He desires that you should live with Him forever in faith and love.

So does your Father give you good gifts.  And not only that, but He also gives you the freedom to receive them and to enjoy them.  Indeed, He gives you the freedom to love Him, or to leave Him.  He takes that risk, because He desires to have a real relationship with you.  He would have you be His dear child, His friend, a member of His Bride, and not His slave.  So He gives you freedom.

But His earnest desire is that you would love Him — that you would love and trust in Him above all others and all other things — not because He is insecure, prideful, or selfish, but that you should have true and lasting Life in Him who is your greatest good.  It is true that He is jealous, as the Scriptures testify.  He is a jealous God.  But understand that He is jealous for you — not as though He were petty, the way that you are sometimes petty — but He is jealous for you because He loves you, the way a husband is jealous for his wife and a mother for her child.  He will not permit any other gods to take you from Him, nor to rob you of His Life and Light and Love.

In much the same way, and for the very same reason, He is angry with your sin, and He punishes your sin, because your sin cuts you off from Him; your sin causes you harm and is killing you.

Therefore, your God and Father in heaven disciplines you in His great love for you, as any loving father must disciplines his sons and daughters.  He thereby calls you to repentance and to faith.

You parents, if your child were running out into the road, into the path of a car, you would holler at him or her, you would reach out to stop him or her, and you would be angry — not because you desire your child’s hurt, but precisely because you desire that your child not be hurt.  And when your Father disciplines you, that is likewise what He is about.  But His Love is more pure and more perfect than that of any father or mother here on earth.  His desire is always that you would live.

It is by repentance and faith that you live in and with Him, and that is a high and holy calling.  And it is for such Life that He has created you in love.  To live in that way, by faith in God, is to live as true Man in the Image of God.  To live by such faith is to be truly human, to be a man or a woman as the Lord your God intends.  And to live by such faith is to trust and rely upon the Word of your God and Father in all circumstances, even if everything else is screaming contradiction.

To live by faith in God is to wait on Him in steady hope and quiet confidence.  It is to give thanks in both prosperity and poverty.  It is to be patient in affliction.  It is to be patient with your family, as your God and Father in heaven is patient and long-suffering with you.  It is to be patient with your neighbor, gladly forgiving and continuing to do good to those who trespass against you.  It is to suffer all manner of wrongs and hurts and sorrows in the certain promise of the Resurrection, not striking back or seeking revenge, but calling on the Lord to vindicate and save you in love.  To live by faith in God is to have your heart so fixed on Him that even in death you fear no evil.

It is for such life that you have been created in the Image of God, and to such a life you are called.  What is more, the One who calls you is faithful and true.  He’s not playing games with you.  He’s not teasing you or tricking you.  The Life to which He calls you is a blessed and beautiful Life, notwithstanding the fact that it is obtained for you and given to you by the way of the Cross.

The One who calls you is faithful and true — not only because He is God, and so of course He keeps His Word and promises — but because He truly loves you from His great heart of Love.  With the very depths of His Being He loves you; and everything He does proceeds in that Love.

His Love for you is unmatched and unsurpassed.  But it is not uncontested.  Indeed, the Love of God is resisted and rejected on all sides, within and without.  Your own sinful heart is covetous; you desire what God has not given you, and you desire what is not God.  The whole world, too, is idolatrous.  It worships things.  It loves the creature while hating the Creator.  It is not content with what God has given, but strives to get for itself.  Meanwhile, the devil is furious and rages against you; he is hateful and murderous, and he does whatever it takes to deceive you, mislead you, and destroy you.  Thus do the devil, the world, and your own fallen flesh conspire against you — and against the Life and Love of God, which He desires to give you freely in Christ Jesus.

“Skin for skin,” the devil says, as he did when he went after righteous Job.  “Skin for skin.”  And all too easily, all too often, you fall into that trap.  When God commands you to love Him, you regard that as too burdensome.  And when He commands you to love your neighbor, you regard that as unfair and unrealistic.  When God punishes your sin, you do not perceive His love for you, but only wrath and anger, as though He were out to get you and destroy you.  So, too, when He disciplines you in love and calls you to repentance and faith, you run away from Him and flee to the false “freedom” of idolatry.  You make a god of yourself and try to make a life for yourself.

Although the Lord your God is so desirous to give you real Life with Himself, you prefer to go your own way, futilely supposing that you’ll do better on your own.  The fact is that, while your sinful heart is dreadfully afraid of death, it actually knows nothing other than the pursuit of death.  You don’t fear God as you should, and yet you are afraid of Him.  You worry that He’s out to get you, and so you run away and try to hide — running yourself headlong into death and destruction.

Do fear the Lord your God — not in the terror of death, but in faith and love — because there is forgiveness, salvation, and Life with Him in the Flesh and Blood of the incarnate Son, Christ Jesus.

It is your sin that brings you to sorrow, grief, and death.  But in His Love for you, in order to save you, the Son of God has taken all of that upon Himself, all your sin, your sorrow, grief, and death.

Behold the Lamb of God, the one true Man of God, who takes away your sins and the sins of the whole world.  In Him, in His Body on the Cross, you behold the Lord your God as He is, perfect in Love.  And in Him you also behold true Man, as Man was meant to be, perfect in faith and love.

In this Man, all that has been broken, including your relationship with God, is repaired and healed and made new.  In His Body of Flesh and Blood, God completes and fulfills His good Creation.

It is in Christ Jesus that Man lives with God by faith and lives in love for God and man.  It is in Him that Man is rescued from sin and death, vindicated in righteousness, and prevails in peace.  For He trusted in His God and Father, He humbled Himself and became obedient, even unto death upon the Cross; and His God and Father saved Him from out of death and the grave, and granted Him the Victory of Life in His bodily Resurrection from the dead and His Ascension into heaven.  That Victory is not yet seen, except by the eyes of faith in His Word, but it is already true in Him.

In His Passion and on the Cross, Christ Jesus has nothing but His God and Father.  And when even His God and Father turns away from Him in righteous judgment against the sins of the world that He bears vicariously in His Body, the Lord Jesus still calls upon God as His God and His Father.  He does not curse, but He believes.  He perseveres in faith.  And He is heard because of His piety.

So it is that sin and death and all that separate you from God is undone.  The brokenness is broken, and death is put to death, because this one true Man, Christ Jesus, remains faithful even unto death.  He lives and dies in perfect faith and holy love.  And all of this He does for you, in your skin, in your own flesh, so that sin and the curse of death and all their hold on Man are utterly defeated.

Everything is achieved and accomplished in Christ Jesus, and established for you in Christ Jesus, in His Body of Flesh and Blood, crucified and risen from the dead.  He is your merciful and great High Priest in all things pertaining to God, so your relationship with God is safe and sound in Him.

God and Man, faith and love, righteousness and peace, all are in perfect harmony in Christ Jesus.  And all His faithfulness, His Faith and Love, His Cross and Resurrection, and His Life with God, all of these are yours by the grace of His Gospel.  That is what He gives to you, into your body, from His Cross and from His Altar in His Church, that you should live with Him in body and soul.

Here is not only God’s pledge and promise to you, but the one true God and Man given to you.  And in the Body and Blood of God the Son, God the Father’s heart is fully open to you in Love, for He thus delights to give you every good and perfect gift in Christ Jesus.  Whatever else may happen to you in this poor life of labor, the Life and Love of God are yours in Him forevermore.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Given and Poured Out for You and for the Many

It is a common but misleading error to think of the Lord’s Supper as simply a “means to an end,” as one of many other means of forgiveness.  To be sure, it is a gracious means of forgiveness, and so also of Life and Salvation with God in Christ Jesus.  But this Chief Part of the Christian faith and life — the Sacrament of the Altar — is really the crescendo and fulfillment of everything else.

In the First Chief Part, the Ten Commandments reveal your sin and demonstrate your desperate need for a Savior from sin, death, and hell; and they provide you with the Word of God that you need to examine yourself honestly and rightly, so that you are able to confess your sins and receive the Lord’s Holy Absolution by way of the Fifth Chief Part, the Office of the Keys & Confession.

In the Second Chief Part, the Apostles’ Creed confesses and declares the Church’s holy faith in the Word and promises of the Holy Triune God, who grants Life, Life, and more Life to His people in the incarnate Son, Christ Jesus.  And all this Life that you receive from the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is given to you, personally, in the Fourth Chief Part, the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, whereby you are God’s own child, united with the Lord Jesus Christ in His Cross & Resurrection.

In the Third Chief Part, the Our Father teaches and gives to you the very Words with which to pray as a baptized child of God in Christ Jesus, calling on His Name with bold confidence for all that you need in both body and soul.  And all of these things that you believe, teach, confess, and pray for, the Lord graciously places into your hands, upon your lips, and into your mouth and body in the Sacrament of the true Body and Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, given and poured out for you.

Far from being a means to some other end, the Lord’s Supper is the very Foretaste of the End — a very present and real participation in the divine, eternal Life and Salvation of the Holy Triune God.  It is, indeed, Paradise itself here on earth, in the face of Satan, sin, and death, and in the midst of this fallen and perishing world with all its sickness and sorrow.  What more could you ask or hope for than the Body and Blood of your crucified and risen Lord Jesus, your Savior and God?  In truth, nowhere are you closer or more intimately united to Him in this body and life on earth.

Of course, much time has been spent in the course of Christian history arguing over the presence of Christ Jesus in His Holy Supper.  Such arguments are a shame, but the Body and Blood of Christ in His Sacrament are not incidental, inconsequential, or irrelevant, but central and fundamental.  To put it bluntly, it is worth fighting about; the Truth is that important.

You cannot know or embrace the true significance of the Holy Communion without knowing what the Sacrament of the Altar is: “The true Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, under the bread and wine, instituted by Christ Himself for us Christians to eat and to drink.”  Anything else or less than the Body and Blood of Christ Jesus, which He gives to you here, would leave you without the forgiveness and grace, life and salvation with which He feeds your body and soul in His Supper.

Along with this confession, that the Sacrament of the Altar is the true Body and Blood of Jesus, given and poured out for you and for the many, there is also the larger significance of this Blessed Sacrament for your faith and life in Christ.  We could hardly begin to exhaust that significance, even if we spoke of nothing else from now until eternity.  But I have often found that three Old Testament precursors are especially helpful in grasping the meaning and purpose of this Supper.

Probably the most obvious Old Testament precursor to the Lord’s Supper — indeed, the context in which it was first given and poured out for you and for the many — is the Passover, which was so central and instrumental to the Lord’s deliverance of His Israel from Pharaoh’s bitter yoke.

You’ve heard the beginning of that story again this evening.  When the Lord was about to bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt by His mighty arm and outstretched hand — when He would send His Angel of Death throughout the land to slay the firstborn son in each and every household — He prescribed the Passover as a means of grace to be eaten by those who trusted in Him.

Instead of the firstborn sons of Israel, each household would sacrifice a male lamb without spot or blemish.  On the night of the Exodus from Egypt, the blood of that lamb would be applied to the doorposts and lintel of each home — in the shape of a cross! — to protect the family from the Angel of Death; and within that house the flesh of the lamb would be eaten as a meal of salvation.

All of this was a marvelous exercise of the Lord’s mercy upon Israel.  But as with everything in the Old Testament, the Passover also pointed forward to the coming of the Christ and His Cross.

Indeed, the true Passover Lamb is our dear Lord Jesus, the Christ.  He is the firstborn Son of God, who willingly offered His Life as a sacrificial Lamb in the stead of the entire world.  And now, in His Holy Supper, His Blood covers you from death, His Flesh is given as your Meal of Salvation.

Following the Exodus from Egypt — after all the people had been “baptized into Moses in the Cloud and in the Sea,” as St. Paul writes  — the Lord established His Covenant with the sons of Israel at Mt. Sinai.  He declared Himself to be their God, and He blessed them to be His people.

At the foot of that sacred Mountain of God, sacrifices of oxen were made on behalf of the people.  Then Moses took half of the blood from those sacrifices and sprinkled it on the Altar as an offering to the Lord.  And the other half of the same blood he sprinkled on the people to seal the Covenant between them and the Lord their God.  “This is the blood of the Covenant,” he said as he did so.

Our Lord Jesus Christ, on the night when He was handed over to His voluntary suffering and death upon the Cross, took up those same Words of Moses and made them uniquely His own in the pouring out of His Blood of the New Covenant for His disciples to drink in the Sacrament.  So does He now give you to drink from His Cup, the New Covenant or Testament in His Blood, here at His Altar.  The same Blood that He offered to the Father on the Cross, He now pours out for His people to drink as the Seal, Pledge, and Guarantee of His free forgiveness, eternal Life, and Salvation.

We typically think and speak of the “Old” and “New Testaments” as collections of Books in the Bible.  But in actual fact, the Old Testament was really that Blood of the Covenant at Mt. Sinai; and the New Testament, likewise, according to the Words of our Lord Jesus Himself, is the Cup of His own Blood which He pours out for you and for the many, for the forgiveness of sins.

That is the “New Covenant” that God promised through the Prophet Jeremiah, in which He gives Himself to each and all of His dear children.  For He comes to you and feeds you with His own Body and Blood, intimately uniting Himself to you, and giving you His Life in body and soul.

If you pray that He would be your God, if you would be and live as His child, then learn from Him to seek and to find the answer to that prayer in His Sacrament of the Altar, His New Testament.

As the sons of Israel then wandered in the wilderness on their journey from Egypt to the Promised Land of Canaan, you know how the Lord provided them with Manna from Heaven.  In fact, we  recently heard reference to that daily bread with which He fed them so faithfully all those years.

Well, the Lord Jesus reveals in one of His sermons, recorded by St. John, that the Manna was really pointing forward to the true and living Bread from Heaven — that is, to Christ Jesus Himself, the  Word of God who became Flesh and tabernacles with us; who has come down from the bosom of the Father in heaven, conceived and born of St. Mary, in order to save us all from sin and death.

The Bread that He gives for the life of the world is His own Flesh.  He says so, Himself.  So does He also promise that whoever eats His Flesh and drinks His Blood will never die — as those who ate the Manna did — but they will live forever in and with Him, sharing His divine eternal Life.

It is, of course, this true Bread from Heaven, this Flesh and Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, that He spreads before you in this Feast of His Holy Supper, here at His Table in His House.  And it is of the greatest significance and benefit — for you — because of the Words with which He gives to you His Body to eat and pours out His Blood for you to drink, for the forgiveness of your sins.

His Words of Institution — the Verba Testamenti with which He gives this Holy Supper — and His Body and Blood thus given — indicate, first of all, the meaning and purpose of His Sacrifice; that no one takes His life from Him, but He lays it down willingly in faith and love, handed over by His God and Father to His Cross and Passion for the reconciliation of the world.  Thus did He sacrifice Himself in obedience to His Father and with divine compassion for you and all people.

And just as He offered up His Body and His Blood in sacrificial death for you and all upon the Cross, so does He now hand over His Body and Blood to you and to the many, to eat and to drink, in order to give to His disciples all the fruits and benefits of His Sacrifice.  Apart from His Words — that these most Holy Things are here given for you — you would hardly dare to take the Body and Blood of the almighty and eternal Son of God upon your lips; nor could you ever do so.  But the fact is that He has spoken — and His words, for you, invite you to believe and trust in Him.

Take these precious and priceless Words to heart, and so also take the Body and Blood of Christ Jesus into your mouth with peace and joy and hope and confidence in Him.  There is no greater treasure in heaven or on earth than these sacred Gifts.  And your own dear Savior desires nothing more than this, that you should receive them as your very own, as your participation in His Life.

When you are tempted by the devil, by the world, and by your own flesh to avoid the Sacrament — whether it be out of a misguided sense of humility or a false sense of unworthiness, as though you could ever be worthy of yourself to eat and drink the Body and Blood of Christ — or whether it be out of laziness or pride — consider the good advice that Dr. Luther gives in the Catechism:

“What should encourage a Christian to receive the Sacrament frequently?”

In respect to God, both the command and the promise of Christ the Lord should move him, and in respect to himself, the trouble that lies heavy on him, on account of which such command, encouragement, and promise are given.

“But what shall a person do if he be not sensible of such trouble and feel no hunger and thirst for the Sacrament?”

To such a person no better advice can be given than this:

First, that he put his hand into his bosom, and feel whether he still have flesh and blood, and that he by all means believe what the Scriptures say of it (in Galatians and Romans).

Second, that he look around to see whether he is still in the world, and keep in mind that there will be no lack of sin and trouble, as the Scriptures say (in John’s Gospel and 1st Epistle).

Third, he will certainly have the devil also about him, who with his lying and murdering, day and night, will let him have no peace within or without, as the Scriptures picture him (in John’s Gospel, as well as First Peter, Ephesians, and Second Timothy).

In all things, at all times and in all places, it is the Word of the Lord that catechizes you in the true Christian faith and life.  And Christ be praised that, by His Word and promise, you have such a sure and certain refuge in His Body and His Blood — given into death upon the Cross for your Atonement and Redemption — and now given and poured out for you here in His Supper for the free and full forgiveness of all your sins, and for Life and Salvation with Him in body and soul.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Sanity of the “New Normal” in the Self-Sacrifice of Christ Jesus

The fallen world is dumbfounded by the Self-Sacrifice of Christ Jesus on the Cross.  The world recognizes and admires the self-sacrifice of duty on the part of those who put themselves in harm’s way to save others; and by the same token, the world is critical of those who shirk their duties and run away from danger when it comes, including those who end their own lives to avoid difficulties.  But the fallen world is not able to comprehend the true glory of the Cross.

The world does not perceive the bullet that Christ Jesus takes on our behalf, the deadly bomb that He smothers and absorbs with His own Body to save us.  Nor does the world realize the ransom that Christ Jesus pays to redeem us all from the destruction we deserve.  The Cross appears to be, not the faithfulness of duty, but simply foolishness; not the glory of heroic rescue from danger, but a futile waste, a misguided effort, a failed mission, and a dismal loss.  Or, at best, the world might think of our crucified Lord Jesus as a martyr for some tragic ideological cause. 

Confronted with the Cross of Christ, the world slips easily into cynical unbelief and proud idolatry.  If that’s what God is like, well then, no thanks!  Cold reason kicks into gear and begins to calculate survival.  Hardness of heart sets in, not only against God, but also against the neighbor.  Sacrifice may be fine, to a certain extent, if there’s some return on the investment, some marketable glory to be gained.  Every move is governed by the twin goals of self-preservation and self-promotion.

Your own fallen flesh is no different.  But, ironically, by that way of thinking — by resisting and fleeing from the Cross — you run headlong into the spiritual self-destruction of apostasy.  In trying to protect yourself and preserve your life by rejecting the Cross and the Crucified One, you make a show of strength and competence, but you cut yourself off from the only true and lasting Life.

Alternatively, the fallen world and your fallen flesh sometimes simply fall apart when confronted by the Cross; that is to say, instead of cold logic and calculated strategy, there is a kind of craziness or madness that emerges and erupts in your thinking, speaking, and acting.  Not hardness of heart, but insanity, lawlessness, and perversity of every kind.  The nervous system comes unglued, the mind becomes unhinged, and open foolishness begins to reign.  Faced with the consequences of sin, the certainty of death, and the condemnation of the Law — which is precisely what you see in Christ Jesus on the Cross — there is the panic, the chaos and confusion of a waking nightmare.

So, what are you to make of all this, when the so-called “real world” seems so solid, so objective, and so certain, and yet so often explodes in ways that expose just how unstable and unreliable it really is.  If the whole past year has not made it obvious that this old world and your own flesh are perishing and passing away, you don’t have to wait long or go looking for many more examples to prove the point.  Just consider the ten people gunned down at the grocery store this past week.

At the same time, the true reality — that of the Holy Triune God and His Word, His Kingdom and His Righteousness — and His dwelling Place, the Holy of Holies made without hands, eternal in the heavens — that all sounds so imaginary and fantastic, so make-believe and fairy-tale foolish.

It all sound too good to be true, to begin with.  But then it turns out to be manifested and bestowed by way of the Cross and suffering — which seems and feels like exactly the opposite of good.

Your instinct says that sanity ought to be rather savvy, reasonable, and strong, the way the world likes it and wants it to be.  But here the “sanity” of God enters in with this strange foolishness, in humility and weakness, seated on a donkey’s back.  The Lord God empties Himself and makes Himself nothing.  He submits Himself, in utter poverty and human shame, to death upon the Cross.

This divine wisdom appears to be absolutely crazy, as though God were actually out of His mind.  And yet, you also are called to have this mind of God in yourself, to share this bizarre “sanity” of Christ Jesus, which is the mysterious divine wisdom of His Cross and Passion.  And that is yours only by faith in the Word of God.  It is not by sight or sense, nor by emotion and experience.

The fact is that outward appearances are utterly deceiving.  So, what is really going on here?

The “triumphal entry” of Jesus into Jerusalem is the Lord’s selection and identification of the true Passover Lamb.  That’s what’s going on in the Holy City on this day: God the Father chooses His own beloved Son, without spot or blemish, and hands Him over to be sacrificed for the Feast.

Hence, Christ Jesus comes and enters in; and then He becomes the King of the Jews — He saves His people now — by entering upon His Holy Passion and ascending the throne of His Cross.

He goes up to Jerusalem in order to enter the Most Holy Place once for all by His Self-sacrifice upon the Cross, by the voluntary shedding of His own Blood.  He thereby atones for the sins of the world and redeems mankind at the cost of His own Life, freely given in faith and love.

It is in this way that Christ Jesus establishes the New Covenant in Himself — in His own Body, with His own Blood.  That is to say, He reconciles the world to God in Himself.  Consequently, heaven and earth, God and Man are perfectly and permanently united and at Peace in Him.

The evidence and testimony of that reconciliation are given by God the Father in the Resurrection and Ascension of Christ Jesus.  For the very One who died for you, bearing your sins, has been raised up and seated at the right hand of the Father in heaven.  What is more, His reconciliation is also given here and now — to you — in the New Covenant of His Body and His Blood.

The Lord’s Supper is the Meat and Drink of that Passover Meal — of that Lamb who was chosen by God and sacrificed for the salvation of the world.  His Flesh feeds you.  His Blood cleanses you from sin and covers you from death.  And this is the Redemption that Christ has obtained for you.

This is the true wisdom of His Cross, the true sanity and stability of His salvation, the true victory of Christ which prevails for you against all of your enemies, against sin, death, the devil, and hell.

Therefore, wherever you have given up or despaired of any hope, return to this Stronghold, to this New Covenant of Christ the Crucified.  For this very day, He declares, He restores double to you.

The Lord is faithful, who calls you to Himself and promises to save you, and He will surely do it.

The world does have its own victories of self-sacrificing love, its own heroes, its own martyrs for good causes: Soldiers who put their lives on the line in defense of others.  Firefighters and police officers who brave real dangers every day for the safety of their neighbors.  Regular citizens who step into the breach.  Mothers and fathers who sacrifice in countless ways to care for their children.

For a good cause, for a good person, for a good friend, for their families, there are indeed many people willing to risk their lives, and even to die.  And man has no greater love to give than that.

The world, in its own way, honors those sacrifices, though it does so with sadness, with memories of the past and monuments to that which has been lost and won’t ever be gotten back again.

For all that, the Love of God in Christ Jesus and His Self-sacrifice upon the Cross are far greater.  For while we were yet sinners — not good people, but bad — not friends of God, but enemies at odds with Him — even then, the Father gave His Son, and the Son laid down His Life for us all.

And consider what His love has done: He has reconciled you and all the world to Himself.  He has befriended His enemies.  He has brought an end to the war that would not end, and now He speaks peace to all the nations.  In place of chaos, He bestows calm.  Instead of insanity and instability, He has become your solid Foundation, the wise Master Builder of a House that shall not fall.

In the Resurrection of Christ Jesus from the dead, He has given you a future and a hope.  Indeed, He is your Future and your Hope, your Life and your Salvation, your Strength and your Song, because He is not dead and gone but victorious and alive forevermore.  His dominion is from sea to shining sea; from the Tigris and Euphrates, and from the Jordan River, to the ends of the earth.

And here is the real irony of the Cross: The world is a better place because of His death; because, by His atoning Self-sacrifice, He has established a peaceful connection and profound communion between God and Man.  He has removed the great divide, brought down the wall of hostility, and replaced the stone cold loneliness of sin and death with His divine friendship and camaraderie.

That is the “new normal,” which is eternal and permanent in the crucified and risen Body of Christ Jesus; and which is also true and real, sure and certain for you, as well.  The world is now a better place for you and for your neighbor, because of who you are in Christ Jesus — God’s own dear child, buried with Christ by your Baptism into His death, and raised with Him to newness of life.

So it is that your life in the flesh — even now in the midst of this fallen and perishing world — even now under the Cross — your life in the flesh and all your labors of love on behalf of all your neighbors, be they friends or foes — none of this is pointless but meaningful and significant.  Your faith in Christ and His Cross is not foolish but true divine wisdom, which is forever and ever.

For God has highly exalted the Crucified One, and has given Him the Name which is above every name.  Therefore, at the Name of Jesus every knee shall bow — in heaven and on earth, and under the earth — and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

What, then, shall we offer to the Lord for all His benefits to us?

Let us offer the sacrifice of thanksgiving.  Indeed, let us take up the Cup of Salvation, which He pours out for you and for the many, and let us call on the Name of the Lord in peace.  For everyone who calls on His Name shall be saved.  This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

One for All, and All for Love

Everything that Jesus does, He does in love for you, in order to give you Life with God the Father in Himself.  So, too, the love that He commands you to have for one another is this same Love that He has and exercises for each and all of you.

He has come from the Father into the Flesh, and He tabernacles with His Church in the Flesh, in order to reveal the Father to you and to all in His own Body of flesh and blood.  And as He has come from the Father, so does He also return to the Father — in His Flesh, through His Blood, by His Cross and Passion — in order to bring you to the bosom of the Father in and with Himself.

He is your merciful and great High Priest, and so it is that by His sacrificial death He enters into the Most Holy Place on your behalf.  That is to say, He enters the presence of His God and Father, in order to establish a permanent place for you there.  This He has done!  In His crucified and risen flesh, He is your steadfast Anchor behind the veil.  And where He is, there you shall be also.

This is the New Covenant that He has established between God and man, which is the bond and union — the Holy Communion — between God and man.  In Christ man is in harmony with God forevermore, because He has reconciled the world to God the Father in Himself, in His own flesh and blood, crucified for your transgressions and raised from the dead for your justification.  In this New Covenant of Christ, you are bound to God in peace, as He has bound Himself to you in love.

Now the same Lord Jesus Christ calls you to receive and enter into that New Covenant of His, not by any works of your own, but by the promise of His Gospel.  He calls you by the Gospel, and you both receive the promise and enter into His Covenant by the way and the means of the Gospel.

That is what He is doing, and what happens, in the preaching of His Holy Gospel.  That is what He has done for you and given to you in Holy Baptism.  And that is what He continues to do and give in Holy Absolution.  By the bath of your Baptism, you are already clean.  And daily, by the Gospel of forgiveness, the Lord Jesus washes your feet, that you may have your place with Him.

In each and all of these ways, the Holy Gospel bestows the very thing that it promises, although it is hidden in the Mystery of the Cross, which seems to have taken Christ Jesus away from you.  What the Gospel promises, and what it gives — not in spite of the Cross, but from the Cross — is the forgiveness of all your sins, and rescue from all of your enemies, and redemption from death.

The Blood of the Lamb has atoned for your sins and reconciled you to God.  Therefore, the devil has no rightful claim on you; he has no right to accuse you, nor is he permitted to tyrannize you.  And death is not permitted to have you anymore, either, or to hold you forever.  For where there is forgiveness of sins, as there is for you in the Gospel, there is resurrection, life, and salvation.

Thus, by the Gospel of the Cross of Christ, the Lord has executed judgment against all the gods of Egypt, against all the principalities and powers of this present age, and against the devil, the world, and the fallen flesh of old Adam, which seek to thwart His will and to destroy His people.

He has executed judgment against all of those false gods and mortal enemies of man.  So it is that He spares you from their demise, He delivers and redeems you from their grasp, and He brings you out of Egypt by His mighty arms and outstretched hands.

Therefore, do not turn to those false gods and enemies for life and help, for comfort or blessing.  They attempt to deceive you with false and alluring promises, but they cannot help or save you.  They cannot give you life.  They cannot do anything but enslave you again with sin and bring you back into death and the grave.   Therefore, do not forsake the Lord your God, nor forget His Holy Covenant, but daily repent of your sins, return to the sure promise of the Gospel, and cling to it.

It is for this reason, and to this end, that the Lord also disciplines you in love, so that you are not condemned with the idolatrous and unbelieving Egyptians, but rescued and redeemed for life.

He disciplines you with His Word of the Law, and with the sufferings of your mortal flesh in this fallen world.  But He calls you to repentant faith, He raises you up and restores you to Himself, by the preaching of His promise.  It never is by your own reason and strength, but by the preaching of the promise itself, that you receive and believe the promise of His Gospel.  It is His preaching that opens your ears to hear, His giving that opens your hand and your mouth to receive, and His kneeling to wash your feet that cleanses you of all unrighteousness and so enables you to stand.

Do not boast and brag of yourself, as Simon Peter did — and then he fell down hard and fast, as you will, too, on that path of self-reliance.  But hear and heed the Word of Christ who saves you.  By His Word and promises, by His actions and His gifts, He sanctifies you in body and soul, inside and out, with His forgiveness of all your sins.  It is by His Gospel that you are completely clean.

That is what the Divine Service of His Word and Sacrament is all about.  Indeed, that is what the Divine Service actually is: The Lord Jesus coming and doing, speaking and giving, all by grace.  By the preaching of repentance for the forgiveness of sins He returns you to the cleansing waters of your Baptism.  And then He brings you to His Table to feed you with His Body and His Blood, so that, in Him, in His flesh, you live and abide in the Holy Communion of the Holy Triune God.

It certainly doesn’t look that way for now.  You do not discern the Lord’s Body by your eyesight or your intellect.  Indeed, you cannot.  All your wisdom, reason, and senses will utterly fail you in that regard.  But you discern the Lord’s Body here and now, hidden under the Cross in humble bread and wine, by the Word that He speaks, and by the proclamation and catechesis of His Word.

It is His Word that not only reveals His Body and His Blood, but actually makes the bread to be His Body, the wine to be His Blood.  He uses that strong and simple word, “is,” at the heart of the Consecration, and He invites you to eat and to drink because of that identification: He speaks, and it is so.  “This Is My Body.”  Therefore, “Eat.”  Likewise, also, “This Is My Blood,” and, with that, “This Chalice is the New Covenant in My Blood.”  Therefore, “Drink of it, all of you.”

There simply is no Lord’s Supper without the Lord’s Word, which makes the Supper what it is, and which gives the Supper to you, His Christian, to eat and to drink in faith and with thanksgiving.

But this Word of the Lord, by which He consecrates His Sacrament of the Altar, is not spoken or heard in a vacuum.  As often as the Church is gathered to eat this Bread and drink this Cup, this Holy Supper of Christ Jesus is given and received along with the preaching and teaching of His death — until He shall come in glory as the risen and exalted One, and all His angels with Him.

It is by the proclamation of Christ Jesus, crucified and risen, that you discern the Lord’s Body in the Holy Communion, and that you receive and believe the promise of His Gospel.  That is to say, you believe, not only that the bread and wine are His Body and Blood at His Word, but also that this Most Holy Food and Drink are given and poured out for you, for the forgiveness of your sins.

He gives you His sacred Body to eat, and He pours out His holy and precious Blood for you to drink, for the forgiveness of all your fears and failings, for your betrayals and denials, for your arrogance and envy, for your faithless despair, and for all of your other shameful sins and vices.

Thus, by His Word and promise of the Gospel, which is to say, by His free and full forgiveness of your sins, you remember Him in this Holy Sacrament.  Not only in your heart and mind, with your intellect and emotions, but also with your ears, and with your hand and mouth, and in your body as well as your soul.  For His Body and His Blood are surely given for both your body and soul.

You remember Him by His Word of the Gospel, as He remembers you in love by giving you His Body to eat and pouring out His Blood for you to drink.  For He is not a passive or distant observer of this Holy Supper, but He truly is the Host, the Waiter, and the Meal, as surely as He is the Sacrifice Itself, the Meat and the Drink of which are here received and shared in the fellowship of the Church with her dear Lord Jesus Christ, and with God the Father and the Holy Spirit in Him.

You remember Him, as He remembers you in Love, not only in the Sacrament, but also in loving one another as He has loved you.  It is the New Covenant of Christ that undergirds and informs the New Commandment.  Not that “Love” is something altogether new, for the entire Law of God is summarized in that one word.  But Christ has fulfilled the Law, and He has made all things new. So then, “Love” itself is redefined — or, better, it is realized for what it is — in the Cross of Christ, in the Sacrifice of His flesh and blood for the atonement of the world, and in His Holy Sacrament.

As a Christian, a disciple of Christ Jesus, you are given to love your neighbors without prejudice or partiality, as the Lord Jesus loves and serves all people and lays down His life for the salvation of the world.  But all the more so are you given to love one another, as you are bathed and washed and cleansed by one Lord Jesus Christ in one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins, and you are fed by the same Lord Jesus Christ, with His Body and His Blood, as fellow members of one Body in Him.  It is His Love for you in these means of grace which fills you with His Love for each other.

His Love for you is not relegated to the past, but it is constant and continuous.  Consider that He loves you and serves you unto the “end” with His forgiveness and life and salvation.  That is how you remember Him and follow Him to and from His Holy Altar, even unto the Life everlasting.

For what He receives from and has with His Father, He also hands over to you by the Ministry of the Gospel.  This is the Holy Tradition of which St. Paul the Apostle writes.  That is, what he has received, he also hands over to the Church.  And that holy “handing over” of Christ Jesus really begins, not with Judas the betrayer, but with God the Father handing over His beloved Son in the flesh, unto His death upon the Cross.  The incarnate Son goes just as it is written of Him.

And the Tradition continues with the Son handing Himself over to “His own” beloved disciples, even as He hands Himself over to the Father by His willing Self-sacrifice as the Lamb of God.

“Do this,” Jesus says, “in remembrance of Me.”  Which is not only to love one another, as He has loved you, but what He has done for His disciples, they are to do for His Church: To take bread and wine, to bless and give thanks to His God and Father, to consecrate with His Word, and in His Name and stead to distribute His Body and His Blood to His baptized and catechized disciples.

By this Holy Ministry, the “handing over” of the Son by the Father reaches now to you, to your ears, to your hands, and to your mouth and body.  So it is that everything Christ Jesus has received from His Father, He now gives to you in turn.  And as the Father remembers Him, and raises Him from the dead, and receives Him back to Himself in peace, so does the Father remember you in Christ Jesus, His Son.  That is what He does for you and gives to you in this Holy Sacrament.

Such is the meaning and purpose of this New Covenant, which Christ has established in Himself.  In His own flesh and blood you have Life with God in both your body and soul — already here and now, by grace, in the Holy Communion (on earth as it is in heaven) — and in the resurrection of your body, at the last, to the Life everlasting in Paradise.  That is the promise and pledge which is bequeathed to you in the Lord’s Supper, even the eternal inheritance of the Father for His Son.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

The Lord Jesus Loves You to the End

Beloved, you also are among those whom Jesus has chosen, as your Holy Baptism testifies and His Word of Holy Absolution reaffirms and upholds, whereby He washes your feet and cleanses you.

You are a disciple of the Lord Jesus, and He loves and serves you faithfully, even unto death.

Indeed, He welcomes you to recline at His Table with Him, to lean on Him and rest yourself in Him.  Here He feeds you, from His own hand, that bread which is His own Body; and He gives you to drink from that Cup of Salvation which is the New Testament in His holy and precious Blood.

Now also consider and take to heart that He did the same thing for Judas Iscariot and Simon Peter, and that you are no greater, no better, and no stronger than either of those two men, who were both among the chosen twelve disciples and Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Do not suppose that, by any power, strength, intelligence, or savvy of your own, you will be able to guard and keep yourself from harm and danger, from the assaults and accusations of the devil, or from the temptations and deceptions of Satan, who hates you and seeks to destroy you.  For that old evil foe would easily sift you like wheat, and with craft and spite he would lead you astray — away from Jesus Christ into false belief, despair, and other great shame and vice.

By yourself, you are prone to both pride and despair, and because of your fallen, mortal flesh you are a sitting duck and easy prey for the enemy.  Left to yourself, you could not stand or survive.

Therefore, do not presume to take your life or any other matters into your own hands.  Do not betray your Lord and sell Him out, neither for cash nor any other advantage.  And do not boast or presume that you are man enough (or woman enough) to do what Christ Jesus alone is able to do.

Do not attempt to save yourself, to go it alone, or to be your own savior.  Do not neglect or decline the means of grace and salvation whereby Christ Jesus serves you and sustains you in His mercy.

Rather, repent of your presumptuous pride and sinful self-righteousness.

Repent.  But do not despair of Christ and His Love — for despair is simply the flipside of pride, and it is every bit as sinful and self-righteous in its refusal to believe and trust in the Lord Jesus.

Repent of your betrayals and denials.  And so also repent of your cynical despair.

Repent.  And be lifted up by Christ Jesus in His free and full forgiveness of all your sins.

It is true that you cannot follow Him at the first, to go where He goes or do what He does.  It is His prerogative alone — it is His divine glory — to go and do these things for you and your salvation.

But you shall follow Him hereafter — by way of His Cross and Resurrection — by grace through faith in Him, as a disciple whom He loves — by the Word of His Gospel, and by His Holy Spirit.

So does He call you to love your neighbor, as He has loved you, and as He continues to love you and serve you.  But you love, only and ever because He first loves you: faithfully, freely, and fully.

He loves you with divine Love — with which He washes the feet and feeds both the body and soul of those who betray Him and deny Him, and who run away from Him in fear in the time of trial.

It is for the purpose of this washing and cleansing that He has called and sent His slaves and the servants of His Word to speak and act as He does, on His behalf, in His Name and stead.  All of these slaves and servants and sent ones are sinful, mortal men, no better and no stronger than yourself — and of themselves no better and no stronger than Judas or Peter.  But it is Christ Jesus who sends them to you, and so He is the One you hear and receive in the Ministry of His Gospel.

He knows you, He knows your weaknesses and sins.  Likewise, your betrayals and denials have not caught Him by surprise, nor have they trapped Him in circumstances beyond His control.

He goes to the Cross as the Father has sent Him, and He lays down His life willingly for you and for all people.  He loves you to the end — and so it is that He loves you precisely in this way.

And not only that, but in His great love for you, even now He welcomes you to recline upon His bosom here at His Table on earth.  Here He feeds you with His Body and His Blood — yes, even you! — for the forgiveness of all your sins, for Life and Salvation, for now and forever.

In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.