Grace Evangelical-Lutheran: Isaiah 42,1-4 (5-9). 1. Sunday after Epiphany

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The Word of the Lord Endures Forever

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Isaiah 42,1-4 (5-9) 0814

1. Sonntag nach Epiphanias 014

Arcadius, Martyr at Caesarea in Mauretania, 3rd c.

12. Januar 2014

1. O God, Father of all grace and mercy, we praise You for revealing the Redeemer of the world unto us Gentiles, who once lived in darkness; You show us that Jesus is the Light of the Nations who shines salvation unto the ends of the earth (Löhe 455-56). Amen.

2. And behold a Voice from the heavens saying: »This is My Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased« (Matthew 3,17).

3. Our Gospel Lection recounts the event of Jesus’ baptism (an event recorded in all Four Gospels: Matthew 3,13-17; Mark 1,9-11; Luke 3,21-22 and John 1,32-34). St. Matthew, who is both an apostle and an evangelist, tells us that the Triune God was manifested at this glorious event, writing: Jesus being baptized, the Holy Spirit descending as a Dove upon Jesus and the Father speaking from the heavens with His Voice. We don’t normally see the full Godhead revealed together in the Holy Scriptures, so this baptism of Jesus should be marked as an important event of Divine significance.

4. The Prophet Isaiah foresaw this event when Yahweh Himself spoke to him: »Behold My Servant, whom I uphold; Mine Elect, in whom My Soul delights; I have put My Spirit upon Him: He will bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. He will not cry, nor lift up, nor cause His voice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed He will not break, and the smoking wick He will not quench: He will bring forth judgment unto truth. He will not fail nor be discouraged, till He has set judgment in the earth: and the islands shall wait for His law. Thus says God the Lord, He who created the heavens, and stretched them out; He who spread forth the earth, and that which comes out of it; He who gives breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them who walk therein: „I Yahweh have called You in righteousness, and will hold Your hand, and will keep You and give You for a Covenant of the people, for a Light of the Gentiles; To open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the prison, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison house. I Am Yahweh: that is My Name: and I will not give My Glory to another, neither My praise to graven images. Behold, the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them“ (Isaiah 42,1-9).

5. When John was baptizing the people in a baptism of repentance, the people were in expectation, and all were contemplating in their hearts whether John himself might be the Christ (Luke 3,15). John the Baptizer, preaching like the Prophet Isaiah, answered them: „I baptize you with water, but He who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in His hand, to clear His threshing floor and to gather the wheat into His barn, but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire“ (Luke 3,16-17). So with many other exhortations he preached the gospel to the people (Luke 3,18).

6. John taught that the arrival of the Christ was an arrival of judgment and fire. John therefore urged people to repent of their sins, be baptized as a sign of that repentance and thus be ready for the Christ’s arrival. Those who remained adamantly unrepentant were not ready for the Christ to arrive, and thus they could expect the Christ’s fiery gaze and swift judgment. They will be bound up like chaff to be burned for all eternity.

7. The Church takes repentance seriously, and so should you as a Christian. We thus prepare ourselves for the Christ’s arrival each time we confess our sins and are absolved before the start of the Divine Service. Liturgically, the Divine Service begins with the Introit (LSB 186) and ends with the Benediction (LSB 202). Therefore, the repentant who expect the arrival of the Christ and repent of their sin could expect the Christ’s merciful gaze and gracious righteousness. They will be cut and gathered as precious wheat into His barn.

8. John prepared the people with preaching and baptism. John’ baptism was a baptism of repentance, and Jesus submitted Himself to that baptism. We are sinners. We know that, and we confess it. We do not love God with all our hearts, and we love our neighbors even less. Jesus should not be associated with our sinful company. Weeks later, Simon Peter would actually say this when Jesus called him to be His disciple: »Falling down at Jesus’ knees, Simon said: „Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord“« (Luke 5,8). Jesus certainly does not need a sinner’s baptism of repentance for He is, after all, the Righteous Son of God. John has the right attitude: Jesus should be baptizing him, not the other way around.

8. Don’t you just love Jesus’ reply to John? »Permit it that you baptize Me, for thus it is proper that we complete all righteousness« (Matthew 3,15). Jesus gently persuades John to baptize Him. Jesus respects John and his ministry. John is the voice of one crying out in the wilderness preparing the people for the arrival of Jesus. John’s ministry is not yet finished. He has one more person to baptize: the very Christ Himself. John hears His Lord’s words, and he baptizes his Lord. Jesus afforded John a great honor, and it was an honor granted to Him by God Himself. John baptized Jesus, and then he proclaimed: „This Jesus is the Christ!“ The appearance of the Holy Spirit as a Dove upon Him and the Father’s Voice from the heavens proclaim that Jesus is the Elect Servant of His Heavenly Father.

9. Together, John and Jesus complete all righteousness as Jesus steps into the Jordan River, bows His head and receives from John the water pored upon His head. By this baptism, Jesus declares solidarity with us poor, miserable sinners. Jesus is called Immanuel, and that means „God is with us.“ Jesus is most certainly with us. He was conceived and born with human flesh and blood like men and women. He grew up from infancy, to childhood, to adolescence and to adulthood like us. Jesus studied academics, learned a trade and worked a job like us. Now Jesus steps into the waters for baptism like us. In His baptism, Jesus completes the words of the Holy Spirit spoken to the Prophet Isaiah: »I Yahweh have called You in righteousness, and will hold Your hand, and will keep You and give You for a Covenant of the people, for a Light of the Gentiles.«

10. Jesus is the Covenant for His people Israel. The covenant given to Moses at Sinai was to prepare Israel for the arrival of the Christ. With His arrival and His baptism, Jesus has completed the Mosaic covenant and has instituted a new covenant with Israel, a covenant that is Jesus Himself. Jesus is also the Light of the Nations. All those lost in darkness, those ignorant of God and His plan to save His fallen creation, now have the Light of salvation revealed to them. Jesus is righteous, and He Himself receives the baptism of repentance. Jesus is both God and man. He is bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh, yet He does not bear the taint of original sin within His body. But at the Jordan, Jesus steps into that river taking up the mantle of a sinner, and He receives this mantle in order to redeem us and make us righteous as He is righteous.

11. Before His Ascension, Jesus told His apostles: »All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in/into the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold I am with you always, to the end of the age« (Matthew 28,18-20). And so you have been baptized, and it is a Perfect Passive verb: you were baptized in the past, but your Baptism still influences the present.

12. In His baptism, Jesus took upon Himself our sinful lot and stood in the water as one of us: a sinner in need of repentance and the washing away of sin. Likewise in your Holy Baptism, you are connected to Jesus’ righteousness and were adopted as a son or daughter into the family of the Triune God. At His baptism, God the Father said of Jesus: »This is My Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased« (Matthew 3,17). This is to declare that Jesus is the Son of God just as surely as He is now the Son of Mary. „Jesus is the Son of God, that is: God is not very far away, He is not the Great Unknown and He is not someone whom we never ultimately know what He is about. But that Jesus is God’s Son, that means: God makes Himself clearly fixed and irrevocable. We know who God is and what He is to us. We can see that He has become man for us, and that He went to the cross for us“[1] (Martens § 12).

13. Behold, Immanuel – God is with us! He is with us, standing in the Jordan receiving a sinner’s baptism. He hung on the cross as a Sinner receiving a sinner’s just condemnation and in the process made us righteous before God the Father. He is with you in your Holy Baptism as one of the Persons into whose Name you were baptized. He is with you today, and every day, as your Savior and Friend. Amen.

14. Let us pray. O Good God, who leads us on level ground, teach us to live in our Holy Baptism and help us to know the Holy Scriptures, so that we are always ready to give an account of Your precious gospel to our neighbors. 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.

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

Martens, Gottfried. A sermon preached on 13. January 2013 | John 1,29-34 | Feast of the Baptism of Christ. Copyright © 2013 St. Mary Church in Berlin-Zehlendorf (SELK). All rights reserved. The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind, Tr. © 2013.

[1] Jesus ist Gottes Sohn – das heißt eben: Gott ist nicht unendlich weit entfernt, nicht der große Unbekannte, nicht einer, bei dem man nie weiß, wie er letztlich zu einem steht. Sondern dass Jesus Gottes Sohn ist, das heißt: Gott legt sich eindeutig, unwiderruflich fest. Ich kann wissen, wer Gott ist und wie er zu mir steht. Ich kann es an dem erkennen, der für mich Mensch geworden ist, der für mich ans Kreuz gegangen ist.

Grace Evangelical-Lutheran

Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church

Monday, January 20, 2014

Isaiah 42,1-4 (5-9). 1. Sunday after Epiphany

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