July 8, 2012
There is a progression in today’s Gospel reading and it’s the same
progression begun in the Garden when God promised to Adam and Eve that He would
send them a Savior. The irony is not lost on God, that at the moment of man’s
fall into sin, God begins a progression in order to restore man to his previous
good and blessed state. While the world seems to be in a constant regression,
with natural disasters and individuals and groups of people causing disasters
of their own on other people, there is a distinct progression God has been
bringing about throughout history. This has absolutely nothing to do with the
notion many people have that the human race continues to get better and will
continue to accomplish greater and great achievements. This notion really is at
the heart of God’s command to have no other gods. The first and foremost god in
mind here is not gods of any other religion but of man himself. There’s no
doubt we as a human race have achieved remarkable feats and there are many to
come. It seems even more clear, though, that mankind continues not to progress,
but to regress, going back again and again to that first sin Adam and Eve
committed of wanting to be their own god; of feeding the sinful flesh and all
its evil desires.
Whether things are getting worse or getting better or staying the same,
there is a distinct progress in the midst of it all. God never stops in His
relentless carrying out of His salvation work first promised there in the
Garden and first begun. The very speaking of the promise was the very first act
and work of God in this accomplishing of salvation. His Word has power and that
is why even though Adam and Eve were told that in the day they would eat of the
fruit of the tree they would surely die, God’s salvation was already in effect.
They were not dead but rather given salvation.
Much of the Old Testament is history and in that history we see this
progression. How many times must Adam and Eve have told the story to their sons
and daughters of that fateful day in the Garden? How often must they have
reminded their children of the amazing salvation God promised to them on that
day and that in fact had already come into play as they were given mercy by
their God whom they had thrown under the bus? Some of the descendents of Adam
and Eve and their children were some of the well-known people we know from our
being in the Scriptures. Abraham and Noah and David come to mind. There are
many others. How often did these people marvel at the grace of God even as they
often continued to question God and go their own way over God’s way, going back
again and again to the same sin Adam and Eve had committed? Much of the history
of the Old Testament reads like a lesson in, Did you learn anything from your
ancestors?
Through it all was this progression. God at work in His people, calling
them to repentance. Giving them His grace and mercy. Pointing them forward to
the Savior He would send. A striking example of this is in today’s Old Testament
reading. God sends Ezekiel to the Israelites, God’s very own people, and God
calls them nations of rebels, people who have rebelled against Him. His message
to them is judgment. He is calling them to repentance. That’s what God does for
His people. He loves them and is unwilling to sit by while His people go their
own way. That’s why God didn’t abandon Adam and Eve in the Garden when they had
abandoned Him. He reached out to them, calling them to repentance, embracing
them with His love and forgiveness.
God says to Ezekiel that if he will speak God’s Word to the people,
whether or not they will take it to heart they will know that a prophet has been
among them. God has continued all along to make known His Word to His people
through people who are sinful as they are. When they speak it’s not their own
words they speak. It’s not their own opinion. It’s not something new or
progressive. It’s the same word of God that was first spoken in the Garden when
Adam and Eve desperately needed to hear that God was still for them, would
never give up on them, would always love them, would give them a Savior and
salvation.
In our day and age we think we’re so far beyond all those in the past.
We know more, we’ve achieved more, we’re on the cusp of spectacular things
never dreamed of in former times. But who are we kidding? We’re no different
than anyone else throughout history. We think we know better than God. Sounds a
little bit like all those people who went before us, doesn’t it? We think we’re
so advanced. Sounds a little bit like Adam and Eve thought they could be. We
never learn. We continue to regress even as God continues His progression of
coming to us in His Word and with His salvation.
Paul knew something of being advanced and beyond all others. In many
ways he was. But when Jesus came to him to bring him to his senses, Paul
realized—well, I’ll just let him do the describing of himself—he realized he was
the chief of sinners. He came to see that he was no better than anyone who had
gone before him, that he needed salvation as every other person, that his heart
and soul were rotten to the core. And in his new life given him by Jesus he
realized something else. That in this life on earth there are problems, and
hardships, and trials, and that he was very, very weak. His realization of this
as a new creation in Christ was that he could, and even should, boast in these
weaknesses. As he says in the Epistle reading, a thorn was given him in the
flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass him, to keep him from being too elated. “Three
times” he says, “I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me.
But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made
perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my
weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of
Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions,
and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
This is always the challenge our sinful flesh faces. It is the moment
we face every day, and many times throughout each day, where we are met with
the Word of God which says we should fear, love, and trust in Him above all
things and our sinful flesh says that it’s got way better ideas than that. When
God says to us that we should love Him with all our heart, soul, strength, and
mind, our sinful flesh says that we should do what we think is best, what we
feel like doing, what will not impinge on our own desires.
So the world, the devil, and our own sinful flesh will appeal to us: we
don’t have to step out of our comfort zone and share the Gospel with our
neighbor because the relationship there is nice and comfortable just in being
good neighbors. We know we’re forgiven and don’t need to spend time each day in
reading and pondering the Word of God. Since we have to take care of ourselves,
our health, our peace of mind, we shouldn’t place extra burdens on our
ourselves when others are in need.
Sound familiar? It should. You know these things to be true in your
life. If for some reason none of these actually apply to you, never fear,
because the Ten Commandments have you covered. God in His Law pins you to the
wall in every corner of your life. You have no better chance of hiding from God
than Adam and Eve did.
And it should sound familiar to you in another way as well. You are
just like the people Jesus went to in the Gospel reading. God’s description of
His people to Ezekiel sound a lot like them, don’t they? And if you are wise
enough to hear it, you will see that it’s an apt description of you. It all
boils down to this. Who you are, what you have done, how you have continued in
the downward spiral as your ancestors in the faith have, means something. It
means you need to repent. And it means that Jesus will keep coming to you. Just
as He did with those people in our Scripture readings this morning. He
continues His progression.
It’s remarkable how Jesus came to those He knew would reject them. God
had said to Ezekiel that you need to go to them. Whether they listen to you or
not, they’ll know a prophet has been among them. When Jesus came to those who
had known Him as the guy who grew up down the street, they refused Him as their
Lord. But they knew a prophet had been among them. And there’s another thing.
Even though He marveled at their unbelief, even though He went on to the next
towns, and continued His Gospel message to others, He nevertheless, and even
was the reason, He went to the cross for those very people who rejected Him. He
paid for their sins. He died for them, He took in His place what was rightfully
theirs—their sin, their guilt, their shame of rejecting Hm.
While we should never think that it’s okay for us to do the same, we
should marvel at the fact that we are just like them. And marvel at the fact
that Jesus, just as He did for them, went to the cross for us. And knowing
this, you can also know that He continues to come to you, calling you to
repentance, and forgiving you of your sins. His progression never ceases, He
continues on in His progression, always loving you and forgiving you. And when
you hear Him as He is proclaimed to you and as He comes to you in His body and
blood in His Supper, you will know that He has been among you. Amen.
SDG
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