Luke 19,41-48. 10. Trinity

✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠

The Word of the Lord Endures Forever 

se cwide þæs béaggiefan ábireþ ferhþ

Luke 19,41-48        4519

10. Sn. n. Trinitatis 055 

Louis, King of France, ✠ 1270 

25. August 2019 

1. O Christ Jesus, The Very Word of God made flesh; send to us the Holy Spirit, so that we hang on Your words that call us to repentance and gives us absolution.  Amen. (Luke 19,48)  

2. »And Jesus entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold, saying to them: „It is written: My house shall be a house of prayer, [Isaiah 56,7; Jeremiah 7,11] but you have made it a den of insurrectionists.“ And He was teaching daily in the temple. The chief priests, the scribes and the principal men of the people were seeking to destroy Him, but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were hanging on His words.«

3. The Lord’s house is to be a house of prayer, worship and preaching where His people gathered to hear His Word and sing His praises. The Jewish synagogues in Jesus’ day were houses of prayer and preaching. The chief house of prayer was the temple in Jerusalem where rabbis would gather with their disciples in the outer courtyard to teach and preach to the crowds going up to pray or offer a sacrifice. 2000 years later, the Jewish people still gather at the temple wall to offer their prayers.  

4. In Jesus’ day, those who sold animals for the sacrifices had overrun the temple courtyard, and the result was those going up to offer prayer or hear a rabbi were often hindered from doing so as a result of the commotion and the unrelenting noise from the animals. Practicality had intruded upon prayer, and Jesus was not pleased by this. He called these interlopers „insurrectionists“. It is a harsh word, and Jesus chose it to deliberately offend the Jews who thought they were doing something God-pleasing. They intended to offer a needed service for those going up to sacrifice but did so at the expense of others going up to pray, thus they were no better than those taking part in an armed rebellion against the constituted authority. 

5. Those who rebel against God do not fare well in the Holy Scriptures. Israel was dispersed from the land and lost to mankind. Judah suffered 2 captivities, temple destructions and razings of Jerusalem. 21st-century Israelis still experience the devastation of God’s wrath: they have the land, but do not control the temple mount, the temple has never been rebuilt and the sacrifices have not been done since AD 70 – 1949 years! All they have is a crumbling wall near the location of the temple to offer prayers. 

6. The physical temple in Jerusalem is no more, but God still has His temple, a better and more faithful Temple – His Only Son Jesus Christ. Jesus told the Jews that He would destroy this Temple and raise It up in 3 days. He was talking about Himself: His body was crucified and killed, but 3 days later He raised It up again from the grave. 

7. The Apostle Paul, in his Epistle to the Romans, writes about the temple, its rebuilding and connects it to Holy Baptism. He declares: »What shall we say then? Shall we keep on sinning so that grace may increase? Absolutely not! We died to sin. How can we go on living in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We were therefore buried with Him by this Baptism into His death, so that just as He was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too would also walk in a new life. For if we have been united with Him in the likeness of His death, then we will certainly also be united with Him in the likeness of His resurrection. We know that our old self was crucified with Him, to make our sinful body powerless, so that we would not continue to serve sin. For the person who has died has been declared free from sin. And since we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him. We know that since Christ has been raised from the dead, He will never die again. Death no longer has control over Him. For the death He died, He died to sin once and for all, but the life He lives, He lives to God. In the same way also consider yourselves dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus (Romans 6,1-11). 

8. God’s house is also a place where His Sacraments are administered: Holy Baptism, the Lord’s Supper and Absolution of sin. Today we again see God’s mercy and grace manifested physically before our eyes through the waters of Baptism. And just to drive His loving kindness home to us, God will be working His grace before us again in 2 weeks with another Baptism. Thus we hang on His holy words. 

9. A number of things happen at a Baptism. It’s a death, a resurrection, an adoption and an action of forgiveness, among other things. God has been in the business of finding the lost, turning rebels into righteous people, for a very long time – beginning with Adam and Eve, adopting Abraham to be the forefather of Israel and all the faithful in God, like us gathered here this morning. Today, little John, is baptized into Christ Jesus. He is baptized into Christ’s death, buried with Him and raised from the dead with Him through the Glory of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. John joins us as those adopted into the family of God. He is one whom Christ has chosen, blessed and falls under the protection of Jesus’ angelic heavenly host. John’s sin is washed away in the waters of Holy Baptism, more specifically, his sins have been drowned in the Baptismal waters just like Pharaoh and his army were drowned in the Reed Sea. His Baptism saves him, just like Noah and his family were saved by the ark from the Flood. His Baptism leads him to a life of service and prayer, just like all the saints of God live out their Baptismal faith through their good works. 

10. The Lord’s house shall be a house of prayer, and so it is by the merit of Christ and the working of the Holy Spirit. His Church and this congregation is a house of prayer where people gathered to receive from our Lord His gifts of Word and Sacraments; we worship Him with praise and service. The Apostle Paul reminds us that: »Our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is within us« (1. Corinthian 6,19). As temples of the Spirit, we are individual houses of prayer. As the Holy Spirit indwells in us, may we lift up our neighbors in prayer, petitioning the Lord that they believe in Jesus, remain steadfast in their Baptismal faith and serve the Lord with gladness.  Amen. 

11. Let us pray. O Lord Jesus Christ, God of our salvation; watch over us and protect us, both physically and spiritually, so that we remain safe and secure as the people of Your pasture and the sheep of Your hand.  Amen. 

To God alone be the Glory 

Gode ealdore sy se cyneþrymm

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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 28. Revised Edition © 2012 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. 

Giertz, Bo. Preaching from the Whole Bible. Copyright © 1967 Lutheran Legacy Publishing. 

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