Grace Evangelical-Lutheran: Acts 16,23-34. Cantate

✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠

The Word of the Lord Endures Forever

se cwide þæs béaggiefan ábireþ ferhþ

Acts 16,23-34 2618

Kantate 039

Tychicus and Asia, disciples of St. Paul. Acts 20,4

29. April 2018

1. О Christ Jesus, Your resurrection brings us comfort, focus our attention on Your all sufficient ransom and perfect redemption, so that we take heart that death cannot harm us for You have conquered death (Starck 89). Amen.

2. »And when they had inflicted many blows upon them, they threw them into prison, ordering the jailer to keep them safely. Having received this order, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks. About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them, and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone’s bonds were unfastened. When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. But Paul cried with a loud voice: „Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.“ And the jailer called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas. Then he brought them out and said: „Sirs, what must I do to be saved?“ And they said: „Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.“ And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds; and he was baptized at once, he and all his family. Then he brought them up into his house and set food before them. And he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God.«

3. The Apostle Paul had been preaching in Philippi, Macedonia, a prominent Roman colony. All was going well until Paul exorcised a girl with the spirit of divination. With the spirit gone, the girl lost her fortune-telling ability and her owners were now losing the revenue she had made for them. These men convince the magistrates to throw Paul and Silas into prison. That night an earthquake struck and the doors of the prison and their shackles are opened. The distraught Philippian jailer thought all the prisoners under his watch had escaped and he was about to kill himself for his dereliction of duty as a Roman soldier.

4. Jesus proclaims in today’s Gospel pericope: »Draw unto Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest« (Matthew 11,28). This is precisely the sort of gospel the Roman jailer needed to hear, and Paul proclaimed it to him. In that very moment, a dying jailer is snatched from death into life. The power of the preached Word saved him and his household. The Apostle Paul preached this gospel; a man and his family heard it, believed it and they were saved.

5. What is this gospel, these powerful words (like runes), that create faith in Jesus? The gospel begins with: »Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved.« Then Paul and Silas speak the word of the Lord to the jailer and his family. Luke is vague in Chapter 16 as to exactly what Paul preaches about who Jesus is. At other places, Luke is more specific as to the gospel Paul preaches. In Acts 17, Luke tells us that »Paul reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and rise from the dead. This Jesus is the Christ« (Acts 17,2-3). In his epistles, Paul tells us with his own words the gospel he preaches: »We have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not justified by works of the law« (Galatians 2,16). »I proclaimed to you Christ crucified, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures and that He appeared to His apostles and disciples« (1. Corinthians 2,2; 15,3-6). It is this Jesus that Paul preached to the jailer and his family; they heard and believed, for faith comes from hearing the word of Christ (Romans 10,9.17).

6. Paul and Silas gave this Roman family certainty (Gewißheit) and certainty is exactly what the gospel of Christ crucified is all about. People need certainty in their lives; we live much easier knowing there is a set of certainties we can count upon in a chaotic world that has numerous uncertainties and is renown for throwing us unexpected curveballs. To make matters worse, God Himself may seem uncertain and hidden. When we ponder God, we often envision Him in His revealed glory. We want the God in the Burning Bush, the Voice from Sinai or the Pillar of fire and smoke guiding us with undeniable visibility and clarity. Yet, God does not always reveal His Glory. The Prophet Isaiah affirms this: »Truly, you are a God who hides Himself« (Isaiah 45,15). The Prophet Elijah found God revealed not in a mighty wind, an earthquake or a fire, but rather hidden in a low whisper (1. Kings 19,11-13). „God hides in order not to be found where God wills to be found. But God also hides in order to be found where God wills to be found“ (Paulson 366).

7. The hidden vs. the revealed God finds its juxtaposition and culmination in Christ’s Passion. His apostles couldn’t comprehend how or why the Christ must suffer, be killed and on the third day be raised (Matthew 16,21-22). The Jewish leaders and the Roman soldiers mocked Him: »If you are the son of God, then come down from the cross« (Matthew 27,40); »If you are the king of the Jews, then save yourself!« (Luke 23,37«. How could God suffer and die for men and women? Why would He? While some Roman gods die in their myths, they certainly don’t die while attempting to save mankind. The Jews likewise held the belief that God does not and cannot die. When Jesus tells them that He was going to be crucified, the Jews exclaim: »We have heard from the Torah that the Christ remains for ever! How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up and crucified« (John 12,32-34).

8. The Scriptures do state that the Christ will suffer and die in order to redeem men and women. The Serpent will bite the heel of Christ (Genesis 3,15). A viper’s bite is poisonous and deadly. The Christ would be a Suffering Servant who would be lifted up and His appearance would be marred beyond human semblance (Isaiah 52,13-14). Jesus then explains why God must die: »When I am crucified, then I will draw all people to Myself« (John 12,32). This proclamation is the theme for the 3. verse of the well known hymn Lift High the Cross with it energetic conclusion: „So shall our song of triumph ever be: Praise to the Crucified for victory! Lift high the cross, the love of Christ proclaim Till all the world adore His sacred Name“ (LSB 837,6).

9. Paul and Silas lifted high the crucified Christ and a Roman family was saved. That family then lifted high the crucified Christ, they were baptized and they rejoice in fellowship with a meal. This morning we have lifted high the crucified Christ with our worship and prayers; we have heard His gospel in Scripture and hymn. This gospel assures us of our salvation. We hear it, we’ve been baptized, we have received it, believe it and rejoice in it. Only Jesus forgives and saves. Amen.

10. Let us pray. O Risen Christ, all the earth sings the glory of Your Name; we also praise You and we ask that You shoulder our heavy burdens alongside us or, if You will, bear them entirely for us, so that we receive Your light burden which is manifested in the reality of Your resurrection, that we are comforted and at peace of Christian discipleship that teaches us to trust You in all things. 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.

Paulson, Steven D. „Luther on the Hidden God.“ Word & World, Vol. XIX, No. 4 Fall 1999. https://wordandworld.luthersem.edu/content/pdfs/19-4_God_and_Evil/19-4_Paulson.pdf

Grace Evangelical-Lutheran

Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church

Monday, April 30, 2018

Acts 16,23-34. Cantate

No comments:

Post a Comment