Isaiah 58,1-9a. Quinquagesima (Estomihi)

✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠

The Word of the Lord Endures Forever

Verbum Domini Manet in Aeternum

Isaiah 58,1-9a  

Estomihi 022 Quinquagesima 1514

Simplicius, Bishop of Rome, † 483 

2. März 2014

1. O Lord, who hast taught us that all our doings without charity are nothing worth: Send thy Holy Ghost, and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of charity, the very bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whosoever liveth is counted dead before thee: Grant this for thine only Son Jesus Christ’s sake (The Book of Common Prayer 164-65).  Amen.

2. »Cry aloud; do not hold back; lift up your voice like a trumpet; declare to My people their transgression, to the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek Me daily and delight to know My ways, as if they were a nation that did righteousness and did not forsake the judgment of their God; they ask of Me righteous judgments; they delight to draw near to God. ‘Why have we fasted, and You see it not? Why have we humbled ourselves, and You take no knowledge of it?’ Behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure, and oppress all your workers. Behold, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to hit with a wicked fist. Fasting like yours this day will not make your voice to be heard on high. Is such the fast that I choose, a day for a person to humble himself? Is it to bow down his head like a reed, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to Yahweh? Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh? Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of Yahweh shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and Yahweh will answer; you shall cry, and He will say: ‘Here I am.’« 

3. Grace is not easily understood, and we see this where Mark the Evangelist records that Jesus told His disciples that He must be crucified, die and rise on the third day (Mark 8,31). The disciples did not understand this as grace, and the Apostle Peter even took Jesus aside and privately rebuked Him (Mark 8,32). Imagine that! A disciple privately rebuking his teacher, and the Christ and Son of God at that! Surely we would not speak to Jesus like brash Peter does in Mark 8. But don’t we? Every time we use God’s Name in vain, we are rebuking Him. Every time we curse, swear, lie or deceive by His Name, we are misusing God’s Name for we have set our minds on the things of man rather than the things of God. 

4. Jesus has plainly told His disciples in Mark 8 what »the things of God« are (Mark 8,33). Jesus is the Word of God made flesh, and the things of God that He was about during His ministry was to »suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and after three days rise again« (Mark 8,31). This is the first declaration of Jesus that He will be crucified and rise again. He tells His disciples this because they have come to believe that Jesus is the Christ (Mark 8,29). Jesus will speak of His death and resurrection two more time in Mark’s Gospel (9,31; 10,33-34). 

5. The Prophet Isaiah heard these words of Yahweh spoken against idolatrous, immoral Israel: »Cry aloud; do not hold back; lift up your voice like a trumpet; declare to My people their transgression, to the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek Me daily and delight to know My ways, as if they were a nation that did righteousness and did not forsake the judgment of their God.« Israel’s idolatry had immoral consequences. They ignored their neighbors’ plight. They did not offer help in time of their need. They dismissed them and passed by them. And yet, when they themselves needed Yahweh’s help, they asked: „Where is Yahweh in my time of need?“ So it is with us. We put on our piety, say our prayers, and pledge allegiance to Jesus, but how often do we misuse His Name, ignore our neighbor’s plight and only call upon Jesus for selfish petitions? So also the disciples and apostles of Jesus. Yes, they now understood by Mark 8 that Jesus is the Christ, but they had their own preconceived ideals of what that meant. The average Jewish person in the 1. century A.D. thought the ministry of the Christ was to restore land unto the people, and that meant running out the Roman occupiers and the emperor’s puppet kings who ruled Judea. The disciples and apostles expected Jesus to renew the old, Sinai covenant because, after all, they were keeping up their end of the covenant to remain in the land: they were attentive to the sacrifices at the temple, teaching their children the way of Yahweh, and forsaking all other idols. 

6. What the disciples and apostles had failed to consider is that Yahweh had already fulfilled His covenant promise to them. When Joshua lead Israel into the promised land forty years after they left Egypt, at that time and in that activity, Jesus had fulfilled the promise made to Abraham in Genesis 15: »To your offspring I give this land« (15,18). God freely gave Israel the land under the leadership of Joshua. But Joshua instituted another covenant with Israel on behalf of Yahweh. The provision was: God has given you this land as a gift, but if you want to remain in this land, then you must obey Him (Joshua 24,19-20). Israel did not remain faithful to this covenant, and therefore after generations of idolatry, God exiled them from the land that He had given them. The covenant, again, had been fulfilled. When the people returned from Divine exile seventy years later, God restored to them the land, but it was not like the good old glory days under Joshua or David. God had fulfilled His covenant with Israel, and He now let Israel re-dwell in the land, but He also let other nations rule and occupy the land as overseers of Israel. Cyrus let the people return to Judea and rebuild the temple and live in the land, but he still ruled over them as the King of Persia. Alexander the Great defeated the Persians and Judea fell under his rule and the Seleucid Empire. Finally the Romans marched in after defeating the Seleucids and flew their imperial standard, chose kings to rule the region and even elevated and deposed the high priests for the Jewish temple. 

7. Jesus had not arrived to renew or restore the old covenant that He had made with Moses, Joshua or Ezra. That old covenant was temporary and preparatory. Jesus arrived to fulfill the old covenant and institute a new one. The apostle tells us in his Epistle to the Hebrews: »Therefore Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant…. For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf…. And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of all, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for Him« (Hebrews9,15.24.27-28). The Apostle Paul writes in his Epistle to the Romans that Jesus is the promised offspring of Abraham (Genesis 15; Romans 4,18); »this Jesus was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification« (Romans 4,25). Again, St. Paul writes in his Epistle to the Galatians: »Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying: „In you shall all the nations be blessed.“ (Genesis 22,18) So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith« (Galatians 3,7-9). 

8. The Prophet Isaiah says that only when fasting, prayer and helping our neighbor is done selflessly and out of love, then God the Father will send forth His righteousness. Unfortunately, as Isaiah well-knows, Israel cannot fulfill that requirement. Neither can we, and that is the point Yahweh makes through Isaiah: we sinners cannot ever do enough to merit God’s good graces upon us. Therefore, God Himself promises to fulfill the very law He has imposed upon us. Jesus arrived and healed the sick, cleansed the lepers, dined with rogues and sinners. Jesus showed love for His neighbor, and He did so purely out of love for them. His ultimate act of love for His neighbor was to allow Himself to be crucified, die and rise from the grave. Because Christ Jesus has done this, now »shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of  Yahweh shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and Yahweh will answer; you shall cry, and He will say: ‘Here I am.’« In His suffering, death and resurrection Jesus said: Here I am to be the new testament that redeems all My neighbors, yes, the entire world of sinful men and women who have ever lived and who will live. In all this God the Father was well-pleased with His Only-begotten Son, and now when we cry out unto our Lord, His response is quick and decisive: Jesus replies: Here I am. 

9. Jesus walked this gospel path of forgiveness and salvation. It was a path that was undertaken in the shadow of the cross and crucifixion. His disciples and apostles cannot comprehend this and think it is a path imposed upon Jesus by those who would hinder His work as the Christ. Jesus, however, tells the apostles that the cross is not a departure or a ploy of Satan to distract Him, but the cross is the very will of the Triune God that He has come to fulfill as the Christ. 

10. Jesus called His disciples and apostles to follow Him along this path, and today He likewise calls us to follow Him: »If anyone would walk after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save his life« (Mark 8,34-35). Our Christian life of faith is besieged with trials, tests and tribulations. Jesus calls us to bear them and their heartache as we keep our eyes focused on Him and where He went. He went to the cross to die for the sins of the world. He went to die and be buried in a tomb. He went to hell to take the keys of Death and Hades as His own possession. He rose on the third day, and ascended back to heaven to be in the presence of His Father. Jesus has already done these things, and because He has done these things He is with us and brings us through each one as well. Jesus’ journey ended at the right hand of God the Father in glory, and that is where our journey will end as well, for that is why Jesus arrived, was crucified and rose from the dead so that on the last day He will return and raise us up to be in His glorious presence for all eternity.  Amen. 

12. O Christ Jesus, who accomplished everything written about You by the Prophets, help us to follow You to the cross and the empty tomb so that one day we will also ascend up to heaven and behold the everlasting salvation You have prepared for us.  Amen. 

To God alone be the Glory 

Soli Deo Gloria

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All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4. Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27. Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart.  

Book of Common Prayer, The. Copyright © 1990 Oxford University Press.

ELKB. Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. www.bayern-evangelisch.de/www/index.php. Copyright © 2013 Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern.

Löhe, Wilhelm. Seed-Grains of Prayer: A Manual for Evangelical Christians. Wartburg Publishing House, Chicago circa 1912. Concordia Publishing House; Concordia on Demand. 

VELKD. Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands. www.velkd.de. Copyright © 2013 Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands.