In the Name of Jesus
John 12,44-50 613
1. Sonntag nach dem Christfest 09
David, King of Israel, 1050 B.C.
30. December 2012
1. O Almighty God, who has given us Your Only-begotten Son to take our nature upon Him, and as at this time to be born of a pure Virgin: Grant that we being regenerate, and made Your children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed by Your Holy Spirit. Amen.
2. And Jesus cried out and said: „Whoever believes in Me, believes not in Me but in Him who sent Me. And whoever sees Me sees Him who sent Me. I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in Me may not remain in darkness. If anyone hears My words and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save the world. The one who rejects Me and does not receive My words has a judge; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day. For I have not spoken on My own authority, but the Father who sent Me has Himself given Me a commandment of what to say and what to speak. And I know that His commandment is eternal life. What I say, therefore, I say as the Father has told Me.“
3. There is perfect unity between God the Father and His Only-begotten Son. Jesus’ words are the Father’s words. Jesus’ works are the Father’s works. If you have Jesus, then you have the Father; if you have the Father, then you have Jesus. In John 14 Jesus expounds on these truths: »Philip said to Him: „Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.“ Jesus said to him: „Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know Me, Philip? Whoever has seen Me has seen the Father. How can you say: „Show us the Father“? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own authority, but the Father who dwells in Me does His works. Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me, or else believe on account of the works themselves“« (John 14,8-11).
4. Some hear these words from Jesus in John 12 and 14 and wrongly reason that God is one Person (Monarchianism). This was an early heresy in the Church that erred in one of two ways. Dynamic monarchianism (adoptionism): holds that God is one being, above all else, wholly indivisible, and of one nature. It reconciles the Trinity (or at least Jesus) by holding that the Son was not co-eternal with the Father, and that Jesus Christ was essentially granted godhood (adopted) for the plans of God and for his own perfect life and works. Modalistic monarchianism (modalism): considers God to be one person appearing and working in the different modes of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
5. In our Creeds we confess the Triune God by which we mean that we worship One God comprised of Three separate and distinct Persons. Jesus Himself teaches that there is One God. Both the Father and Jesus are separate Persons in this Godhead, and since they are both Persons of the One God there is perfect unity of will, word and work between the Father and the Son. To furthermore make this 3-in-1 nature of God more complicated, Jesus, the Son of God, has taken up into His Divinity human flesh, body, soul and spirit. Now and forevermore, Jesus has two natures: the Divine and the human. We celebrated this union of two natures six days ago with Christmas.
6. As we heard the readings from the Gospel of Luke, perhaps you pictured Jesus quietly sleeping in the manger as Mary and Joseph proudly look upon Him. There in the manger is the very God who created the universe who is now as dependent upon His parents as any other infant boy or girl is. Mary fed Jesus and changed His dirty diapers. Joseph taught Jesus how to read the Bible and showed Him all the tools of the carpenter trade. For more than half of His earthly life Jesus worked with wood. The very hands that formed Adam from the ground and made Eve from his rib now built tables, chairs and buildings for men and women.
7. The real shock of it all was that God did not consider such human activities to be menial, degrading or of little importance. God delighted in being born of the virgin Mary, and He took great pride in working as a carpenter. This was the unified will of the Father and His Son.
8. If you desire to know the Father and discern His will, then you must look unto His Son, Jesus Christ, for Jesus is the humanly physical embodiment of God the Father. The cornerstone of the Divine will is the salvation of His fallen creation. Jesus tells us that He is the Light to shine upon the darkened heart and soul of mankind. To look upon Jesus and to believe in Him is to gaze upon the very glory of the Heavenly Father and to believe that it is His sincerest desire to redeem sinners from death, hell and the grave. Jesus Himself tells us that He did not enter this world to judge it but to save it.
9. In this fallen, wicked world we often look for God’s wrath and judgment under each rock and behind every tree. A storm damages our property, and we think God is angry at us. Little children are gunned down, and we question God’s omnipotence. We have no basis for such interpretations. We rightly make the logical deduction that evil actions merit Divine retribution. We feel safe with this interpretation because it seems fair and just. The problem is: the more closely we scrutinize the world around us we see the wicked safe, secure and prospering while the righteous are suffering. We then begin to question God’s justice.
10. It goes no better for us if we take the opposite view (which is the now popular Western view). Sure this world is fallen, but it is not all so bad. We still have a good spark within us; all we need is God to breath on it and fan it into a flame. We ease our conscience with thoughts of God’s love. He is merciful and compassionate to us, we say. Such generic love will not take us very far in this world. If God is so loving, then why does He allow homes to be swept away, children to starve and bloody warfare to continue? We then begin to doubt how loving God really is.
11. This is exactly why The Father sent His Son to this world and why the Son was in full and complete agreement with this decision. God knows that our corrupted human reason will question His justice and doubt His love for His creation. God’s will is not our will and His ways are not our ways. We cannot fathom His reasoning or will because He is the Almighty God and we are fallible human beings. Sometimes we just cannot comprehend what we perceive as God’s inaction in this world.
12. Jesus, however, came into this world to bring us clarity to God’s justice and love. Jesus says, here is God’s justice: the Son of God humbled Himself, took up human flesh and soul, lived among us as a man and is the Righteous One who bore all of His Father’s fierce wrath that sinners and their sin rightly deserve. Here is God’s justice: you deserved to suffer His judgment, but you did not, and you will not, because Jesus suffered that judgment in your place. Jesus says, here is God’s love: the Father gave you His very own Son as a great Christmas gift. Here is true unconditional love and value (αγαπη): the Son of God left the glories of heaven, humbled Himself, took up our human nature and dwelt among the unloveable as the Loving One who laid down His life for all the world. There is no greater love than this (John 15,13).
13. If you want to see God’s justice, if you want to see His love, then look nowhere else but to Jesus and look no further than Him. Jesus is the Righteousness of God who justifies the unrighteous. Jesus is the Love of God who loves and values the unloveable. Jesus is His Father’s justice and love made flesh, made real and physical, made accessible to you and all the world. Cast your eyes upon Jesus and believe that by Him you are justified and through Him you are loved, for Jesus is your salvation. Amen.
14. Let us pray. O God the Father, You remembered Your steadfast love and faithfulness to the house of Israel by sending to earth Your Only Son, help us to behold this gift that all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God so that we receive this salvation as our very own. Amen.
To God alone be the Glory
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All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4th Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27th Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart.
ELKB. Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. www.bayern-evangelisch.de/www/index.php. Copyright © Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern.
Book of Common Prayer, The. Copyright © 1771 Oxford University Press.
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