Like the Tabernacle before it, the Temple in Jerusalem was the way and the means by which God the Lord dwelt among His Old Testament people with grace and mercy and forgiveness. It’s not that God needed a place to stay; He was not homeless. Nor could all the heavens and the earth contain Him. But He established His House on earth to be a place of peace and rest for His people.
In fact, the Temple was the place where the Lord God caused His Name and His Glory to dwell. It was neither accidental nor arbitrary, but very deliberate and particular. As you have heard in Solomon’s prayer of dedication, wherever the people might be, in Israel or elsewhere, their prayer and worship were to be toward this place, this House in this City, according to the Lord’s promise.
The Temple was a means of grace for the people then, as surely as Holy Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are means of grace for you. For God is ever and always attaching His Word to particular places and things, to particular objects and actions. So, just as otherwise ordinary water, bread, and wine become Sacraments of Christ Jesus at His Word, so was the Temple an actual place where God was tangibly present with His people. And, as such, it was to be a House of Prayer.
At the heart and center of all prayer, as also in the Our Father, is the petition for the forgiveness of sins. As Dr. Luther explains, if God does not forgive our sins, first of all, then we’ll not receive anything else, either. And we hear that echoed in Solomon’s dedication prayer, as well. Over and over, the thing for which he prays, and the thing for which the people will pray when they come to the Temple or look to the Temple, is forgiveness: “Hear, O Lord, from heaven, and forgive.”
So the Temple was not only a House of Prayer but a House of Sacrifice. Every morning and every evening, sacrifices were offered — in order that the incense of prayer could also then be offered. As prayer depends on the forgiveness of sin, the sacrifices were offered every day for atonement, so that the prayers and intercessions of the people and the priests would be heard and answered.
Of course, all of these Old Testament things had their power and authority from the Christ who was to come, and from His coming Sacrifice upon the Cross. All the blood of all those bulls and goats, lambs and sheep, all those prayers, and all that incense, it was all pointing to Christ Jesus.
The Temple was the place where God’s Name and Glory dwelt in the Old Testament, the location of His grace, mercy, forgiveness, and peace. As such, it was also the place to which the people were called and returned in repentance and faith. Whenever they wandered away, wherever they ended up, whatever sort of mess they got themselves into, the Lord was always calling them back to His House in Jerusalem, to the place of His promise, to the grace and glory of His Name. And that is a picture, not only of Israel’s history, but of your life, also; for there is no one without sin.
Thus, God disciplines His children in love, because that is what a good father does. Which is to say that He calls them to repentance — back to Himself — to His House and Home and Family. In doing so, He teaches them how to live as those who bear His Name, and He keeps them safe and secure, close to Himself, at peace with Him and with each other in the forgiveness of His Gospel.
The Lord’s discipline always aims to bring His children out of harm and danger, away from sin and death, and closer to Him. His desire is never to cast them away from His presence, but to restore them to divine Life in faith and love within His household and family. That requires both Law and Gospel, the preaching of repentance and forgiveness of sins. And the Lord your God is the Master at doing this. No one knows how to apply the Law and the Gospel better than He does. So, that is what He’s all about when He disciplines you, both with His Word and by various other ways.
By way of example, Solomon mentions in his prayer that God will sometimes shut up the heavens and withhold the rain, or bring a famine or a plague upon the land, because the people have sinned and turned away from Him — that they should repent of their sin and call upon His Name in faith.
Dr. Luther similarly warned the people in his day that, if they persisted in despising the Word of the Lord and neglecting His good gifts of the Gospel, He would likewise send such a drought and famine of His Word upon them. Then they would long for His Word and the preaching of it, but there would be not a drop or a crumb to be found. It has seemed to me, over this past year, in particular, that our Lord in His mercy has exercised precisely such a discipline upon His people, in order to restore them to a genuine hunger and thirst for His Kingdom and His Righteousness.
God grant that we would learn not to despise or neglect His good gifts, but to call upon His Name at all times and seasons, to pray, praise, and give thanks, and to avail ourselves of His Gospel!
As you have heard, Solomon also prays concerning enemies, including those who defeat the people of God in battles. And you have had such enemies and battles, too. I’m not talking about your high school nemesis or workplace rival, but your real enemies of sin, death, and the devil, and the battles you wage with your addictions, the desires of your flesh, and countless other temptations that confront you in this mortal body and life. How often have you lost those battles? And then you are faced with the sting of defeat, with guilt and shame and doubts and fears, inside and out.
There are those enemies that carry you away and take you captive altogether — addictions that take over your life and become besetting sins, which may end up dogging you until the day you die. So did Babylon take the people of Judah into captivity because of their rebelliousness, idolatry, and rampant disobedience. But then, like the Prodigal Son, in that far country to which you have been taken, by the grace and mercies of God you begin to remember who you are and who your Father is; and by His Word and Spirit you turn back to Him with your whole heart and soul — you call upon His Name — and He hears and answers your prayer, forgives you all your sins, and restores you to faith and life in Him. He brings you back to the Temple of His Church on earth. That is, again, the point and purpose of His discipline, because He loves you and longs to save you.
In returning to the Lord in His Temple you confess that you have sinned against Him and deserve nothing but punishment, but that you also fear, love, and trust in Him and rely upon His mercy and forgiveness. Such confession on your lips flows from a heart of repentance, a broken and contrite heart, which the Lord does not despise. And though it is possible to confess hypocritically, that is, to say the right words while your heart remains cold and hard, it is hardly possible to repent with your heart without also confessing with your lips; for as you believe, so do you also speak.
You confess the faith and you confess the Creed because these things are true. And for that same reason, in much the same way, you confess your sins according to the Word that God has spoken. You do as both the Scriptures and the Catechism have taught you, which is to examine yourself in the light of the Ten Commandments, and then to confess the truth concerning your sins.
You have had other gods. You have misused God’s Name to curse and swear, but have not called upon His Name in prayer, praise, and thanksgiving. You have despised the preaching of His Word, and you have despised your parents and other authorities. You have hated your neighbor in your heart and injured him with your words and actions. You have been angry unrighteously and let the sun go down on your anger. Instead of helping your neighbor you have neglected his needs and added to his woes. You have lusted after your neighbor’s wife or husband. You have coveted and taken what God the Lord has not given, thereby making idols of those things that are not God.
God calls you to repent for each and all of these sins, and He is serious in doing so, for they are not only wrong, they are deadly. Your sins cut you off from God, because they contradict His Word and so destroy both faith and love. They rob you of the Life that He desires to give you.
So He calls you to repentance and faith, away from your sins and back to Himself in His Temple. He calls you and all the nations to find compassion, mercy, and forgiveness in His Name. That’s not some kind of “pie in the sky,” nor is it merely some idea in your head or a feeling in your heart. He calls you to the place and to the means wherein His Name and His Glory now abide for you. He calls you to the Temple of His Church on earth, to the Ministry of His Gospel in His Church.
This Temple of His Church is established, now and forever, in the Body of Christ Jesus, crucified and risen from the dead, given and poured out for you and for the many in the preaching of His Word and in His Holy Sacraments. Not only that, but you are a member of His Body, His Church — a living stone within His Temple — because you are baptized into Him, into His Cross and Resurrection, and because you eat His Body and drink His Blood in His Holy Supper.
It is in His Body of Flesh and Blood that Christ Jesus was crucified for your transgressions and made Atonement for all your sins, and not only for your sins, but for the sins of the whole world. So it is from His Body — in the water and the blood that flow from His wounded side — in and with the Spirit that He breathes upon His Apostles in sending them forth in His Name — it is from His Body that forgiveness is given to the ends of the earth. And it is in His crucified and risen Body that you are reconciled to His God and Father, justified and righteous in His presence.
As you have heard again from St. Paul this evening, “God has reconciled the world to Himself, not counting men’s trespasses against them; for He made Him who knew no sin to be Sin, so that we might become the Righteousness of God in Him.” The Lord your God has done this. He has reconciled you and the whole world to Himself in the Person of Christ Jesus, the incarnate Son. He is at Peace with you. He loves you and forgives you. And He calls you to Himself through the Ministry of Reconciliation, whereby His servants preach repentance and forgiveness in His Name.
You, then, be reconciled to God. Turn away from sin and death, and return to the Lord your God. Call upon His Name. Seek Him where He may be found. And know that He is found right here in His Church and Ministry of the Gospel, in the preaching of His Word and in His Sacraments.
The Ministry of Reconciliation surely includes all of the ways in which the Gospel is administered in the life of the Church: The preaching of the Word of Christ, the washing of the water with His Word in Holy Baptism, and His Body given, His Blood poured out for you in His Holy Supper, a real Feast instead of drought and famine. And along with all of these, there is also Individual Confession and Holy Absolution, resting on the sure and certain Word and promise of your dear Lord Jesus Christ, who says to His ministers, “Whosoever sins you forgive, they are forgiven.”
Is this a matter of the Law? Do you “have to” go to Confession? No, that is not the point. But there is a great benefit to this means of grace and forgiveness, which is the voice of God on earth. It is one-on-one pastoral care, whereby the Good Shepherd guards and keeps you safe and sound as a sheep within His green pastures, beside His streams of water, and at His Table in His House.
Here is a means of repentance and reconciliation, whenever you are brought to a recognition of your sins and failings, and as often as you find yourself out of sorts and at odds with God and with your neighbors. It is, as Dr. Luther often said, a return to the significance of your Holy Baptism, a way to reorient yourself, by God’s Word and Spirit, in faith toward Him and in love for others, that you might rest and reside at His Altar in peace, where His Name and His Glory dwell for you.
“By what authority?” That’s the question they put to Jesus, right? “By what authority do you do these things?” How on earth is it that any man should presume to forgive anyone else’s sins?
It’s certainly not by my own authority that I speak the Lord’s Word of Holy Absolution. But it is by the same authority with which St. John the Baptist came preaching and baptizing, and by the same authority with which Christ Jesus laid down His Life upon the Cross and took it up again in His Resurrection from the dead — the same authority by which He sent His holy Apostles to make disciples of all nations. It is, indeed, by the special authority which Christ has given to His Church on earth to forgive the sins of repentant sinners. It is the authority of His Word, whereby your old Adam is put to death and the New Man is raised up in you. It is the authority of His Gospel, by which He heals you, feeds and waters you, and gives you Life with God by the Tree of His Cross.
In the Name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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