Grace Evangelical-Lutheran: Hebrews 10,35-39. 16th Sunday after Trinity

Monday, October 6, 2014

Hebrews 10,35-39. 16th Sunday after Trinity

✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠

The Word of the Lord Endures Forever

Verbum Domini Manet in Aeternum

Hebrews 10,35-36 (37-38) 39 5014

16. Sonntag nach Trinitatis 061

Placidus of Subiaco, Italy. Abbot at Monte Cassino, Martyr 546 ✠

05. Oktober 2014

1. O God, Thou Source of our life, we worship You and we praise You; we thank You and acknowledge: everything we are and everything we have is a gift from You. We thank You most of all for the Gift of Your Son, Jesus Christ, our Brother and Lord (VELKD, Prayer for 16. Sunday after Trinity § 7). Amen.

2. »Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. For: »Yet a little while, and the advent one will arrive and will not delay; but My righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, My soul has no pleasure in him.« [Habakkuk 2,3-4] But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their lives.

3. This morning’s Gospel pericope tells us that Jesus had received a message that His dear friend Lazarus was sick and dying. Jesus then remained two more days where He was until He and His disciples departed for Bethany in Judea. Once they had arrived in the town, they were told that Lazarus had died four days ago and was now buried in his grave. The confidence of Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha, had been shaken. Had Jesus arrived immediately after receiving their message, He may have gotten to Bethany in time to heal Lazarus from his deadly illness. Alas, Jesus had not shown up in time, Lazarus was now dead and all Bethany mourned this beloved man.

4. Jesus had planned something more wonderful for Lazarus than healing him of his illness. Our difficulty, like Mary, Martha and the other disciples of Jesus, is that we tend to put Jesus in a box. We construct this box with low expectations or predictable responses from God. We limit our perception of what God can do. We do not expect Him to do something outside the boundaries of the box we have put Him in. Mary, Martha and the others did not conceive that Jesus could or would raise Lazarus from the dead. They had become accustomed to Him healing people before their illness had killed them. When Jesus does finally arrive, they lament that had He been here days earlier then Lazarus would be alive and well.

5. The Apostle John records that wonderful discussion between Martha and Jesus. »Martha said to Jesus: „Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever You ask from God, God will give You.“ Jesus said to her: „Your brother will rise again.“« Here we see a glimpse of someone willing to think outside the box. Martha knows that God the Father will give Jesus whatever He asks from Him, even if that request is for Lazarus to be raised to new life on the last day. But, alas, Martha is still confining Jesus to her box: My dear brother has died, but I take comfort in the reality that on the last day Jesus will raise him up again for she said to Jesus: „I know that Lazarus will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.“

6. At this point Jesus deconstructs Martha’ box. »Jesus said to her: „I am the Resurrection and the Life. Whoever believes in Me, though he die, yet he will live, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?“ She said to Him: „Yes, Lord; I believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God, who is arriving into the world.“« This is a confession of faith on par with the Apostle Peter who had earlier said on behalf of all the apostles: »You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.« (Matthew 16,16). Judaism in Jesus’ day confessed the same thing we confess as Christians today: God will raise all the dead on the last day. This is a true confession, but when we are standing in a funeral home paying last respects to someone we care about who is lying in a coffin, that last day and its resurrection seems an eternity away and a dull anesthesia for the pain and grief we have at that moment when we look death squarely in the eyes. Yes, we believe in the resurrection of the dead, and confess it every week in our Creeds, but that last day is not this day, and this day shows us the reality of death.

7. With Lazarus, Jesus does something out of the box. Jesus raises Lazarus up not on the last day but on a particular day 2000 years ago 4 days after Lazarus had died. The man had been wrapped in the white burial linen cloth, the spices applied to him, he was lovingly placed on a shelf carved into the wall of his tomb and the cloth had been placed over his face. Lazarus was dead as dead could be, and He was enjoying the rest of paradise at Abraham’s side awaiting his resurrection on the last day (Luke 16,23). To this dead body, Jesus commands: »Lazarus, walk out!« By the power of His words, Jesus raised Lazarus’ body to new life, commanded his soul to leave paradise and re-enter his resurrected body. On that day, Lazarus was raised and left his tomb in foretaste of the greater resurrection that we ourselves will experience on the last day when Jesus’ voice likewise calls us forth from our grave.

8. The last day, however, is not ultimately what we look forward to. We do not wait for an anonymous Last Day, but for the Last One, Jesus Christ, whom we know by faith already (Bayer 333). The anticipation of the beloved Last Day is thus identical with the anticipation of the „beloved Lord.“ (Bayer 334). This is what Jesus did when He raised Lazarus. Jesus shifted the focus off of some future day of resurrection by a distant God and put the focus on a specific day where Jesus Himself is the one who raises the dead. This resurrection is ours now, by promise, because Jesus has called us forth to life through His gospel words. Jesus speaks the promise, and we believe His promise. Thus, the apostle declares: »Yet a little while, and the advent one will arrive and will not delay; but My righteous one shall live by faith. [Habakkuk 2,3-4] But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their lives«.

9. The resurrection of Lazarus was not merely to bring joy to a grieving community and family. St. John the Apostle and Evangelist proclaims: »Many of the Jews, therefore, who had arrived with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in Him.« The resurrection of Lazarus was done to create faith in Jesus. Only the one who can raise the dead and bring them back to life can save fallen mankind from sin and the curse of death. Jesus declares: »I am the Resurrection and the Life. Whoever believes in Me, though he die, yet he will live.« It was true with Lazarus. It is true for all who have died and await the resurrection on the last day. It is true for us who live now. Jesus is our Resurrection and our Life. He is the Son of God, we believe in Him and we have the promise of resurrection and eternal life. Jesus has promised it, He has done it and He will fulfill His promise to us. Amen.

10. Let us pray. O God the Father, the Redeemer of Your people, You have sent Your testament unto us, manifested in Your Very Son so that we may hear and believe that through Him we have the Resurrection and the Life, now and always. Amen.

To God alone be the Glory

Soli Deo Gloria

✠

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.

Grace Evangelical-Lutheran

Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church

Monday, October 6, 2014

Hebrews 10,35-39. 16th Sunday after Trinity

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