✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠
The Word of the Lord Endures Forever
se cwide þæs béaggiefan ábireþ ferhþ
Mt 24,[1-2].15-28; Mk 13,14-23; Lk 21,20-24.17,23-24.37 5315
Drittlezter Sn. d. Kirchenjahres (25. Trinitatis) 070
The Four Crowned Martyrs, at Rome 304
Johannes von Staupitz, Luther’s Father Confessor. ✠ 1524
8. November 2015
1. O Merciful God, look upon us and Your creation, for we pray in the Lord’s Prayer: Thy kingdom come, and so it has and so it will in the advent of Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord. Amen. (VELKD, Prayer for den Sn. im Kirchenjahr § 1 2015)
2. Jesus left the temple and was going away, when His disciples came to point out to Him the buildings of the temple. But He answered them: „You see all these, do you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down. So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the Prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let the one who is on the housetop not go down to take what is in his house, and let the one who is in the field not turn back to take his cloak. And alas for women who are pregnant and for those who are nursing infants in those days! Pray that your flight may not be in winter or on a Sabbath. For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be. And if those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short. Then if anyone says to you: ‘Behold, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand. So, if they say to you: ‘Behold, he is in the wilderness,’ do not go out. If they say: ‘Behold, he is in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For as the lightning arrives from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the advent of the Son of Man. Wherever the corpse is, there the vultures will gather.“
3. In Matthew 24, the end of Jesus’ ministry was drawing to a close. He was in Jerusalem and Holy Week was in full swing. The cross and the empty tomb were nigh; Jesus would soon inaugurate the last days. The apostles, however, were admiring the wonders of the city and its crowning jewel: the temple. They were pining for the good old days of Israel’s power and influence in Palestine. They were hoping that Jesus would restore those long lost days with a renewed Jewish kingdom, but Jesus dashed their hopes for glory: these buildings and this marvelous temple will be demolished so that only individual stones remain in a pile of rubble. This is nothing short of saying that the Mosaic covenant will be coming to an end. No temple means no sacrifices, and no sacrifices means no forgiveness being given out. It is the end.
4. Jesus used the historical example of Antiochus Epiphanes IV who in 168 bc had entered Jerusalem and offered up a desolating sacrifice on the altar of burnt offering (1. Maccabees 1,54). Antiochus had also placed a statue of Zeus in the most holy place of the temple, thereby turning Yahweh ’s temple into a temple of idolatry. Jesus explained to His apostles that just as Antiochus desecrated the temple, when the apostles see another abomination which causes desolation standing in the temple then they should flee from the area. Jesus’ warning came to pass a few decades later when the Jews revolted in ad 66. By ad 70 General Titus lead his legions into Jerusalem, crushed the Jewish rebellion against Emperor Vespatian, planted the Imperial eagle standard on holy ground and destroyed the city and the temple. Three years later he captured the last few Jewish holdouts in Masada. By ad 73 Rome had brought peace to the region again, but it cost 1 million lives to do so.
4. Well-meaning, but false, messengers cried out: God will save us! Behold, the Christ is on His way to drive the Roman pagans out of holy Jerusalem! The Christians, however, heeded Jesus’ warning from Matthew 24. When the Jews revolted, the Christians fled Judea and Jerusalem because they knew Jesus was not returning to save the city. Most of the war’s 1 million casualties were civilians who were in Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. They succumbed to violence and famine after the Romans laid siege to the city. Failure to heed Jesus’ words led to destruction, but faithfulness to Jesus’ words led to salvation.
5. This action by the Romans brought the Mosaic covenant to an end. It was now the old testament and it has been replaced by the new testament. The old covenant was tied to the animal sacrifices and located at the temple in Jerusalem. With the temple gone and the city razed, the old testament and its sacrifices for sin were brought to an end. The temple has never been rebuilt and the animal sacrifices have ceased. The old testament has come to an end, the new testament is now in effect and this was God’s will. The wine is now given in new wineskins. Jesus is the new wine of the new testament. His vicarious sacrifice on the cross is the one sacrifice that redeemed all the world back unto God the Father. The effects of this one sacrifice are given out though the means of grace. Where the Word is preached and the Sacraments administered, there the grace and forgiveness of God though Jesus Christ are given and received.
6. Too often we are tempted to exchange the certain promise of Christ given in the means of grace with nebulous predictions of His return. We live in world that is enthralled with the future. Some Christians and even entire denominations stake their claim on predicting when Jesus will return. Since Jesus ascended to heaven, over 240 predictions of when He will return have been prognosticated. (That’s an average of one new prediction every 8.2625 years!) In 2008, Mark Biltz began teaching that Christ’s return would correspond with the 28. September 2015 lunar eclipse. His teaching became known as the Blood Moon Prophecy, and it eventually became a constant theme that John Hagee pounded from his pulpit (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictions_and_claims_for_the_Second_Coming_of_Christ). Another small fringe Christian group known as eBible Fellowship also picked up on this teaching and tied it with Harold Campings failed prediction of the end of the world in October 2011. Chris McCann, leader of the fellowship, boldly proclaimed: „According to what the Bible is presenting it does appear that 7. October will be the day that God has spoken of: in which, the world will pass away. It’ll be gone forever. Annihilated“ (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/06/end-of-world-7-october-ebible-fellowship).
7. Christians often look for and desire for Jesus to return at an event of great tragedy. There have been numerous world-changing events that seemed like the end of the world as we knew it, but Jesus has not returned during any of those tragic historical events. Jesus Himself tells us: »Then if anyone says to you: ‘Behold, here is the Christ!’ or ‘There He is!’ do not believe it.« Even St. Paul wrote to the Thessalonian Christians these encouraging words regarding the second advent of Christ Jesus: »But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who are asleep, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the advent of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words. For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with Him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing« (1. Thessalonians 4,13-18. 1. Thessalonians 5,9-11).
8. Notice how St. Paul grounds the discussion on the promise of Christ’s providence and protection rather than attempting to set a definitive date for His return. This is the universal approach of the apostles in their New Testament epistles when they deal with the topic of Jesus’ second advent.
9. We long for the return of Christ Jesus, for we are wearied and burdened by false christs who promise salvation, by false prophets who offer false hope and law burdens disguised as gospel, by those who wear us down with their incessant dating of Christ’s return, by those who persecute our Christian brothers and sisters around the world, by those who ridicule and defame Christians in our society and by the cares and duties of this fallen world that weigh us down as if a millstone were hung around our necks. The pure gospel of the crucified and risen Christ soothes burdened consciences. Every generation sees its share of tribulations that threaten to overwhelm the Church. The gospel brings us this blessed assurance (seligste Versicherung): Fear not, dear Christians, fear not, for we are saved by Christ alone (solus Christus) and no one and nothing can snatch us out of Christ’s redeeming hands: not our sins, not false teachers, not the tribulations of the world and not even the devil himself. We are free; we are forgiven; we belong to Jesus. His vicarious and substitutionary death solves our real, deadly problem: (which is our) sin. There is now full and complete peace between God the Father and us. We are righteous and justified on account of Christ’s merits which have now been credited to us. This is the doctrine of justification that Christ Jesus established for you and your salvation. Let the world and the devil press against us with tribulations, doubts and despair! We have Christ, and He has rescued us from the fallen world and the hordes of devils that surround us. Christ is our Victor and Deliverer.
10. The way of Christ is often that of a victory disguised as a defeat. His suffering and death on the cross seemed like a victory for His Jewish adversaries. His dead corpse buried in a tomb looked like a victory that not even God can overcome death, even His death. The complete destruction of Jerusalem and the temple looked like a complete victory of God promises. On Palm Sunday Jesus taught: »The hour has arrived for the Son of Man to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves Me, he must follow Me; and where I am, there will My servant be also. If anyone serves Me, then the Father will honor him« (John 12,23-26). Jesus’ crucifixion was the fulfilling of the law to make payment for the world’s sin. The serpent used the cross to bruise Christ’s heel, and Jesus used that same cross to smash the serpent’s head. Jesus’ resurrection shows that not even death and hades can defeat God. Jesus is the first fruits of the resurrection, and we will be the resurrection harvest when He returns on the last day. The razing of the temple proclaims once and for all that the old testament has been fulfilled by Jesus and that He has now given us an even better new testament grounded upon Himself as the Word of God made flesh who is the Lamb of God who has taken away the sin of the world. The Muslims can have the temple mount in Jerusalem and their Mosque built on the Mount Zion. We don’t need the Temple Mount and a new temple dedicated to old testament sacrifices because we have the new temple who is Jesus Christ in the flesh who is our Lord and Savior. The Jews can have their Wailing Wall, for we have a Mighty Fortress who is our God and the gates of hades dash themselves to pieces against Him. We do not weep and cry but sing and rejoice because for us fights the Valiant One whom God Himself elected.
11. Consider what John Donne said of this risen Christ in his 1630 Easter sermon: „I was crucified with Christ upon Friday, says Chrysologus, Et hodie resurgo, Today I rose with Him again; Et gloria reeurrectionis sepelivit injuriam morientis, The ingloriousness of having been buried in the dust, is recompensed in the glory I rise too, Liber inter mortuos; that which David says, and, (by St. Augustine’s application) of Christ, is true of me too; Christ was, and I am Liber inter mortuos, Free amongst the dead, undetainable in the state of death. For, says St. Peter: »It was not possible Christ should be holden of death.« Not possible for Christ, because of the prediction of so many prophets, whose words had an infallibility in them; not possible especially, because of the union of the Divine nature: not possible for me neither, because God hath afforded me the marks of His election, and thereby made me partaker of the Divine nature too. But yet these things might, perchance, not fall into the consideration of these women; they did not; but they might, they should have done; for, as the angel tells them here, Christ had told them of this before; sicut dixit, He is risen, as He said“ (http://www.biblestudytools.com/classics/the-works-of-john-donne-vol-1/sermon-xxiii.html).
12. Furthermore, the comforting words of Luther in time of tribulation and doubt: „If we truly believe that Christ is our Savior, then we have a God of love, and to see God in faith is to look upon His friendly heart. So when the devil throws your sins in your face and declares that you deserve death and hell, tell him this: I admit that I deserve death and hell. What of it? For I know One who suffered and made satisfaction in my behalf. His name is Jesus Christ, Son of God. Where He is, there I shall be also“ (Luther movie). And so it is. Amen and Amen.
10. Let us pray. O to Son of God, we give thanks to You, for Your Name is near in Your Word and the Sacraments, grant us peace in these days of ever-increasing tribulation for Your Church so that we may stand firm in faith that You are our Shield and Defender. Amen.
To God alone be the Glory
Gode ealdore sy se cyneþrymm
✠
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.
ELKB. Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. www.bayern-evangelisch.de/www/index.php. Copyright © 2013 Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern.
VELKD. Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands. www.velkd.de. Copyright © 2013 Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands.
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