Third Sunday in Lent – Series B

PDF file Download

I have a marvelous old book on one of my many bookshelves. It is from the late 1600’s, which was a time of much greater clarity but which might be criticized by the folks of today as lacking in charity; although, I will dispute that later. If you are familiar with the time, it is known as the age of Lutheran Orthodoxy. The book is small in terms of the size of every page, but it is thick. Designed to be slipped into the pocket of a greatcoat which was the fashion of the day, it allowed the reader to carry it with him wherever he went. Think of it as a primitive form of the smartphone.

The title of the book is what first fascinates me. It is actually two books bound together. The first and more substantial text is literally translated: the Fundamental Errors of the Roman Catholic Church. The second portion is only a little less problematic: The Better Ground of the Lutherans. Printed on the durable rag based paper of the time, encased in a leather binding, the book is extremely durable; it will likely outlast me unless something terribly untoward happens to it.

To the modern ear the book sounds like the bad old “pre-enlightenment” days before we discovered the blessings of “niceness.” Darmaid McCollough calls this the Reformation of Manners which would not finally be achieved until the Victorian Age. It is true, the polemical style of the text has fallen out style and generally my mother had a pretty good idea when she said I really ought to be nice to the other kids on the playground, even the one who made fun of my lunch box. It is a pretty good game plan, and in most circumstances the proverb holds true that a gentle word turns away wrath and is the wisest course. But I wonder if perhaps the writers of that text from three centuries ago did not have something more right than we do. There was something right and there was something wrong, and he had the courage to name it thus. We might wish that he had done it more charitably, but there is also a point where niceness is not actually charity or it is a charity which is misplaced. Error and evil simply have to be named and finally expunged.

This generation makes our excuses and justification to the point at which nothing is categorically wrong, except perhaps saying that something is wrong. My students’ favorite phrase is “It’s all good.” In some circles the only sin left is judgmentalism. We will tolerate anything but intolerance. Is that true among us as well? Has the vocabulary of sin, darkness, and death simply fallen out of our vocabulary, at least in a meaningful way? We can all grieve over the tragedy of death, but can we call it evil? We may empathize with our neighbor going through the messy divorce, (is a neat one actually better or simply horrible in another way?) but can we call it sin? God does. What is our problem with calling divorce a sin? Have we let therapy trump theology?

Today the readings confront us with the Ten Commandments, not suggestions. The Holy One of Israel, Creator of All, lays down Law. Can we hear it, can we bear it? The Jesus whom we encounter in the Gospel is not all that nice either today. He binds cords together and makes a whip so that he may drive out the money changers from the temple of God. He will tip over the tables of the money changers. My mother was decidedly against me overturning tables, I 2

recollect, and now that I am a parent, I can see why. It isn’t a nice thing to do at all. Jesus is attacking the livelihood of a lot of people. Paul Maier estimates that 20% of the population of Jerusalem made its money from the transactions and maintenance of the temple. Jesus’ actions in the Gospel lesson today threaten people where they feel it, their wallets. I wonder if this would be heard differently if we were preaching in Detroit or another economically depressed area. If it is not heard differently, does that mean we are disconnecting this text from our world? John locates this story at the beginning of his Gospel, but the synoptic Gospels locate it on Palm Sunday or the Monday of Holy Week. The implication is that it precipitated his own death. It won’t be hard to fill the square outside of Pontius Pilate’s palace with 500 or so angry Jews screaming for Jesus’ death on Friday of that week. Their ability to feed their children was at stake in this Galilean rebel who had pointed out the fact that their livelihood was theologically problematic. Being nice has a very attractive reward, people rarely get angry at you, at least not violently so.

But that reward comes at a terrible cost. Unless the cross of Christ can be applied to the sin, the sin, for all out ignoring it, doesn’t really go away. We might agree not to mention it, but it is still lurking out there, in there, in here. The marvel of the Gospel is that even the enemy is always a potential friend. Remember Paul and Sosthenes in Acts 18? The man who tried to kill him there became his friend in I Corinthians 1:1 – just a few verses before our reading today. There is no sin for which Jesus has not died, there is no guilt his blood cannot expunge, and no evil he has not conquered. That means we can own up to it, we can call it what it is. We are not terrified at the prospect. We have the solution; his name is Jesus.

About the same time as my little book was being written, a Lutheran hymn writer by the name of Johann Hermann stumbled on a poem. He liked it a great deal and gently reworked it. Today you can sing it as “Christ our Light, O Radiance True” The collect today echoes the line about “Shine forth on those estranged from you.” It is a favorite missional hymn of Lutherans and it beautifully portrays the Gospel reaching into the darkened minds of people straying in error’s “maze.” I am sure that most Lutherans are thinking of some benighted person, perhaps a Hindu bowing in a distant temple, or perhaps someone closer to home, a member of their own congregation who has stopped going to church. What makes this story really interesting is that Hermann did not know the provenance of this poem. It was written by an Austrian Jesuit. As it was originally conceived, the people walking in error’s maze and needing Christ’s light were the Lutherans themselves. There is a delicious and homiletically significant irony in that little factoid.

Collect of the Day

O God, whose glory it is always to have mercy, be gracious to all who have gone astray from Your ways and bring them again with penitent hearts and steadfast faith to embrace and hold fast the unchangeable truth of Your Word; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. 3

God’s glory is found in his mercy, not the power nor the glorious and unbearable light, it’s the mercy. Our humanity loves to gravitate toward that power, but the mercy is what we desperately need.

We pray for him to be gracious on all those who have gone astray. Is that us? Just who is that? They have left his ways. What ways? What does that mean? As we noted above, the Jesuit who penned the poem which is the basis for the hymn “O Christ our Light…” thought that you and I have wandered away and are in need of some divine light to shine within our hearts, and that simply because we are not in communion with the Bishop of Rome. Did he ever think that he needed that same light? If he was diligent in the spiritual exercises which the Jesuits swear to perform daily, he did, or at least he said he did.

What about us? I think before we can talk about the guys who are out there we need to think first about the folks who are in here, including this preacher. I don’t mean that we cannot speak about the evil we see in the world, but the credibility of our critique will seriously compromised if we do not begin this discussion within our own lives. I have always thought that our witness to the sin of the sexually promiscuous society in which we live was rendered pallid by our willingness to tolerate and even approve of the heterosexual sins of our own parish members. I know a parish which includes a number of couples who all got divorced and re-coupled with newly available Lutherans. These people sit on the council and the other boards of the parish. I don’t mean that divorcees are not forgiven or that they cannot serve, but I wonder if the fact that this was never really called a sin means that the congregation cannot really speak to the sins of broken marriages anymore.

We pray that God would bring them again with penitent hearts. There is this terrible turning that has to happen in our lives too. We are simultaneously sinner and saint, we cannot escape this brutal reality of who we are. After his anguished realization that he is at war with himself in Romans 7, Paul shouts out – “Wretched man that I am, who will rescue me from this body of death!?” He answers the question immediately “Praise be to God the Father through our Lord Jesus Christ!” Only God can work that great work. In this life, our life, we live in perpetual need of this penitence. Those who would resolve that tension simply err. I am a sinless child of God, but I am also am the wretched man. Those two poles define and torment me in a sense.

But penitence is an unpleasant experience. No one likes this, at least not sane people. Thus the cross is foolishness to some, but to others, it is the very power of God for the salvation of the world.

Exodus 20:1-17

And God spoke all these words, saying,

2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. 4

3 “You shall have no other gods before me.

4 “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

7 “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

12 “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.

13 “You shall not murder.

14 “You shall not commit adultery.

15 “You shall not steal.

16 “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.”

18 Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off 19 and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” 20 Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” 21 The people stood far off, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.

How do we preach these things and how do we hear them ourselves? The world around us chaffs at the idea of a moral absolute. There is no right or wrong in the current regime of tolerance. There is no moral position on which one can stand to offer up a moral absolute. There is only my interpretation and your interpretation. We would never want to impose our morality on another and suppress the expression of their individual needs. We have outgrown these ideas. This is the 21st century and we have progressed past this. Or at least we like to think that we have. Let someone’s behavior start to hurt or imping on my life, and things will likely change in a hurry. 5

Of course, such ideas also run headlong into the Word of God, the unchangeable truth which the Collect mentioned above. What does this say to us and to a world in which we live?

1. There are moral absolutes. The parishioner who is confronted with a culture which demands moral relativism needs to hear this.

2. Is this therapeutic? Certainly these commandments, if followed, will lead to a healthier and better life. This is a revelation of what God has in mind for us. Followed, this is keeping us from the landmines of life which will maim and harm us. But this is third use of the Law. It is not the primary uses of the Law. Every pagan also knows this and most cultures have a similar list. In a sense this is a form of natural law. We can come up with all sorts of rational reasons to do this, but do we preach that? Does that actually tap into the real message in these words?

3. They are commandments – they speak of the demands that God has. It might be a witness to the fact that we have a father who expects something of us. Silence would be the alternative, a deadly silence.

4. They are an enumeration of the covenantal expectations. This is the listing of the basic stipulations of God’s covenant with us. In this sense, this would be similar to the “New Perspective on Paul.” This is describing what we do now that we have God’s favor, now that the covenant is established. They describe us more than they prescribe behaviors for us. But this also has a weakness in that we will always have some part of us which is hearing this as prescription and the old man hates these impositions upon us.

5. As commandments they are not unique, but the starting point is unique. This starts by describing what God has done. Every culture has rules like these, not every culture starts with God rescuing enslaved Israelites. That is the real distinctive here.

6. This then might lead to the next point – These commandments perfectly describe Jesus. Last week we heard that suffering is redefined for us – suffering makes me look a little like Jesus. Here again, we find Christ in an unsuspected spot. Any proclamation which ends with us completing or not completing these commandments is missing the larger point of the Bible. The Law condemns us and describes Christ. Is the real law here that we imagine that this is all about me and my obedience. Have we displaced Christ from the center of this picture, quite naturally, but it is natural only because our nature is crooked? Is the law development here that we have thought we were just too important. That God’s joy was somehow hinging on whether we kept or broke these commandments.

7. The commandments need to be proclaimed and heard in the context of God’s great love for his creation. While it is true the Law serves to terrify the complacent conscience, the purpose of that terror is always the ensuing comfort.

Ten Commandments – what are these things? Actually the Hebrew is “Ten Words.” The Torah is pretty consistent in its labeling of this list: Ten Words. They are also repeated in Deuteronomy, which is why that is called the “second law.”

Of course, if you address this in a Bible study, you will probably encounter the reality that our brothers and sisters in the Reformed tradition have a different enumeration of the commandments. If you want a much more in depth study of this, there was quite a conversation about this in the Concordia Journal a number of years ago (1990’s).

The gist of it is this. A careful reading reveals that there are really only nine commandments in here. You have to split one to make it ten. And since we all have heard about the Ten Commandments, we can hardly only offer up nine of them. Traditionally, the split came in the last commandment about coveting. In the 16thf Century, when Zwingli threw out everything and decided to start over with a “fresh” reading of the Bible on which he would base a new Christianity, he elected to divide the first commandment into a proscription of other gods and a second proscription on graven images. This would work great evil in the Church as a new wave of iconoclasm swept over Europe, smashing beautiful works of art in the name of purging the idols. To this day most Baptist churches are very plain. They have no graven images and many of that tradition are deeply suspicious of art. It is gratifying to see that in recent years the reformed movement in North America has started to embrace art as “Word” again.

The dispute over the numbering seems to be intractable, at least if you are insistent on Ten Commandments. There are not actually ten commands. But there are Ten Words. The Hebrew “dabar” or word, is much more like Logos in Greek. It can mean concept, idea, or even a whole book. Most logically, I would think that that the first “Word” here is not a commandment at all, but the second verse of this chapter. “I am YHWH who brought out of slavery in Egypt.” Not a commandment for us to do, but a statement of who God is. That is the first “word” of the ten, God is our rescuer, he is our savior, and he is our deliverer from bondage. The other nine, which are expressed here as commandments, are actually the conclusions which one must draw from this fact. I will have no other Gods, I will use his name appropriately, I will listen to him, I will listen to his representatives, I will not murder, I will not disrupt my neighbors marriage, I will not take my neighbor’s property, lie about him, or even think the evil thought in my mind which is really coveting what he has and hating him for it.

As law, the commandments function terribly in our lives. They accuse us, they are a dreadful burden, a load we cannot carry. The preacher needs to be sensitive to the fact that his congregation who hears these may not be able to hear much after they hit the one which accuses them, at least not before the preacher actually deals with that fact.

In the rite of confession and absolution at the beginning of a communion service the rubric calls for a moment of silent reflection. I always observe that period of silence. My parishioners often asked how long that was. My answer was always the same. Long enough for the preacher to recite the Ten Commandments to himself slowly, deliberately, and carefully. To help them with that, I sometimes would print those commandments. Sometimes, in the season after the 7

Pentecost, I would print them in order with Luther’s explanations, one commandment per week, in the margin next to the words of the confession of sins in the bulletin.

I did all this because these commandments have power, real power, to accuse people and prepare them to hear the Gospel. Today we get the chance to see them all together.

But there is something else going on here. Remember how these are the ten words and the first word may in fact be the word of salvation, making all subsequent words derivative from that first word? Of course the Word of the Lord appeared to all those prophets who came after Moses. And of course, that Word of the Lord became flesh and dwelt among us.

Are the Ten Commandments burdens laid upon us or are they actually a perfect description of the Word made Flesh? Jesus kept them all perfectly, you see. He is the fulfillment of the whole law. Was Moses telling us what to do or was he telling us about Jesus? Of course, the answer is “Yes.” He was doing both. We have too often, however, stopped at the Law part and gotten on to the Gospel part in this, and that is a shame. We can learn a great deal about Jesus from these words.

Psalm 19

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. 2 Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge. 3 There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard. 4 Their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them he has set a tent for the sun, 5 which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy. 6 Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them, and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

7 The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; 8 the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes; 8

9 the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether. 10 More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb. 11 Moreover, by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward.

12 Who can discern his errors? Declare me innocent from hidden faults. 13 Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me! Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.

14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.

In case you were wondering about the interpretation of the Commandments which I offered up earlier, the interpretation in which I said that this was also a description of Jesus, just try and read verse 7 and 8 and not go there. If you insist that the commandments are only prescriptive, you will end up a Methodist. Now, please don’t get me wrong, Methodists are fine people. I am sure I am related to some, somewhere. But it is often in the discernment of the Law in this situation that we can tell the difference. The American Arminian bent has taken the third use of the law and turned into the primary use of the law. God’s Word has become the owner’s manual of life, the manufacturer’s instruction book for proper use of the product. It is that, surely, but that use of the text is like reading the Odyssey of Homer as a guide to ancient sailing practices. They are there, of a sort, but the book is an exploration of the character of Odysseus and to miss that point is to miss real point of the book. Likewise, to imagine that the Bible is given to us in order to tell us how to live is to miss the point – the Bible is a witness to Christ.

I Corinthians 1:18-31

18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 19 For it is written,

“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” 9

20 Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? 21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. 22 For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. 30 And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, 31 so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

What is Paul saying here? There is a great deal in this text. Perhaps an outline or a list of Paul’s points is helpful.

1. We need the cross. It is the very power and salvation of God for us who are otherwise dying/dead and helpless.

2. Logic and human wisdom are not the evaluation tool here.

3. We are nothing without Christ.

4. We are inept and impotent before our problems.

5. The mechanism of God’s kingdom among us is the cross – success in this kingdom will not be measured as the world measures, with glory, numbers, or success in the ways we think about success.

6. The power of God is shown through weakness, the very opposite of where we expect power. This is very hard for us to see, but Paul proclaims it and those who believe come to value and even rejoice in this strangely potent weakness.

7. We see that very same kingdom taking shape in our lives. We were not strong when God called us either, not noble, or wise. Yet we also see that god works mightily among us.

8. God’s kingdom does not look to the things we might expect. We often think that God should overlook us, for we are too small to do anything significant. God is the one at work in us and he can work mightily with simple and poor tools.

9. The very list of disciples suggests this. Who would look to a bunch of illiterates, fisherman, hated tax collectors and ne’er-do-wells to establish a kingdom which would soon overturn the very Roman Empire which had killed Jesus. The only requirement that

the fisherman really brought to the table was the fact that they heard that call and were willing to follow it.

First century Christians, who heard the apostles were not giants. They were just like us. Have we professionalized Christianity and especially the Christian witness? Do we imagine that the real evangelist has to have a master’s degree in theology? Do we paralyze our witness because we don’t think we can say it right?

This cross’s centrality in our faith, baptism unites us to Christ in baptism and resurrection. The Cross stands at the center of all the OT stories. Jesus on the road to Emmaus opens their minds to see that the Savior must die and rise again. He was unpacking the OT there. Our human nature, with Peter in the text from last week, rebels against this narrative. We have a completely different arc for God’s kingdom to come, but Luther called this human trajectory a theology of Glory. Real hope and salvation, the genuine rescue is to be found in the Theology of the Cross.

We could connect this with the OT lesson. He delivered them from slavery in Egypt. Like the Corinthians they were not much. They were numerous, but they were slaves. They were not exactly where you might look for competence. Slaves are often damaged humans, they have had freedom beaten out of them. Both text speak of Jesus as the success, not me.

Imagine sitting in a group of catechumens who are hearing this as the third in a series of sermons in preparation for baptism. Two weeks ago we heard of Jesus victory over Satan in the Temptation of Christ. Last week Jesus said he was going to suffer and die and rise.

This passage would bring those two elements together: The victory and the suffering death of Jesus are not different things, but the very same thing.

These words of Paul have long been favorites of Lutherans. I remember that the sign for Holy Cross Lutheran, situated in view of cars passing on the interstate near Emma, Mo, where my father was pastor, had the first words of verse 23 emblazoned on it. We preach Christ Crucified!

Paul was writing to a congregation that had profound problems in Corinth. He would eventually bring all those problems together in his treatment of the Resurrection in chapter 15, but in these opening verses of his arguments he is trying to contextualize the issues. They all grow much smaller in light of what Christ has done on the cross for us. The first problem Paul addresses is that of divisions within the congregation itself. They are in a very Roman sort of competition about their relative status. This was simply the way Romans of the time thought, and they evidenced this with a whole system of bowing, ring kissing, gift giving, etc. Attaining a certain rank came with certain obligations by others to recognize the rank. Paul sweeps all that away. We were all weaklings and idiots when you think about it. Christ does not pick us because we are something, but despite what we are he has chosen us. It is simply the way of the Gospel of the Crucified one. To be crucified was the worst sort of punishment, it was reserved for the lowest and worst of criminals. Roman citizens were guaranteed that no matter what crime they had committed, they could not be crucified. Jesus died as a common criminal. There simply is no room to boast about accomplishments in the kingdom of Christ. The only boast is in Christ. 11

For Paul’s first audience and for every subsequent audience, this has the effect of being a radical equalizing force. The people of Corinth can no longer play the socio-economic, education, class, and citizenship game of division which is the essence of Roman culture. The distinctions which were part and parcel of their lives simply must be part of the past and not the present. Christ’s kingdom does not operate under those principles. While all cultures are like this, perhaps the most stratified would be that of India today with its tenacious caste system. Tragically the Christian movement has only had limited success and proclaiming a new casteless kingdom which sees people only as the redeemed of Christ instead of through a brutal system which was designed to have a stable society by putting most people on the bottom of the heap.

Perhaps we should understand something about boasting here. In our day and age we tend to consider boasting to be a vice, a bad thing which our culture says is inappropriate. The Roman culture had a very different idea about boasting. Julius Caesar, Cicero, Cato, and other luminaries would write whole books which to our ears sound like arrogant boasting. But in truth, the Romans did not see it that way. They frowned on boasting which was not rooted in fact. Lying about what you did was not a good thing. But to sing your own praises when you had actually done something was considered not only acceptable but commendable in Roman culture. It was expected. It was a stratified community in which it was very important to know what the other guy had done and who he was so you could properly place him at the table when he came to dinner. If you did not know, you might place the great man at the low place and the humble man at the high place. Jesus even talks about this in the Gospels.

Paul here is saying that all the stuff that the culture would say I could boast about is in fact not important. The Christian boast is in Christ alone. We have a hard time encouraging our children to boast, but Paul could enjoin a certain kind of boasting in that culture. We would probably be better to suggest that our trust is in Christ alone. This is the thing which is most important to me and which I will tell you is my help and salvation. That is a form of boasting really, but when we say it that way it sounds more like praise of Christ, than a boast. Paul would simply call it a boast. This issue of boasting also arises in the letter to the Romans.

Paul wants them to remember that they were not much before Christ got hold of them, but now they are something, something real, something terribly important. The world might have a hard time seeing that, but God does not. He sees them as the people for whom Jesus died. The Jews stumble over this. They have a very difficult time accepting that God would come to earth, walk as a man, die on a cross, and in that way effect the salvation of the world. The Greeks look at this and they just think it is stupid. In the Greek mode of thought this world is simply not worth saving. The whole goal is escape this world, why would you want to save it?

But for those of us who believe this message, who are in the relationship of faith, this crucifixion is not only divine, it is the very power of God to save this broken and tired world. It is the creator and Lord of this world reclaiming his creation and establishing his claim on the whole planet once more. It is a terribly un-divine sort of thing to do, and when you think about God’s ability simply to make another world at substantively less cost than his own life blood, it might seem 12

foolish to us too. But this is the way that God did it. Now, through humble and simple people, through the slaves and women and illiterates of Corinth, through the old and the weak and the impoverished of our congregations, God continues to work.

We often make the mistake of hearing the command of God and then checking our bank book, calendar, and talent survey to see if we are going to respond to God’s call. God does not call us to be His people because we have the money, the time, or the ability to do what he says. In fact, our poverty and inability is often the very reason he does call us. If we were able to do it, then the credit would be ours. He calls us because we cannot, thus the glory in the deed done is not our glory but God’s glory. But at the same time, if we sit on our hands because we cannot see how this is going to work, then nothing gets done or God calls another to do this. I like to think of baptism in this regard. I cannot give this child eternal life, I cannot redeem them. But when the parents carry that child up, when I speak the word and apply the water, God makes my actions into the very actions which give that eternal life and bestow that holy name. I get to be part of that beautiful thing. If I say that I don’t have the ability to make a child of God, then I will do no baptisms. It is in faith that I pour that water and say those words which look to my senses like meaningless acts, but which faith sees as divine.

John 2:13-22(23-25)

13 The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. 15 And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.” 17 His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.”

18 So the Jews said to him, “What sign do you show us for doing these things?” 19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20 The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21 But he was speaking about the temple of his body. 22 When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

23 Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. 24 But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people 25 and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man.

“Remember” is a huge word in the Bible. In the Old Testament God remembers Noah in that ark and sends the wind to dry up the water. God remembers his promise to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and calls Moses to bring them out of slavery. This all takes place at the time of the Passover when the Jews “remember” the exodus. It is not an accident that the disciples “remember” this event after Jesus is raised. It is a very resurrection/exodus thing to do. 13

Take the word “remember” apart and you have “re” “member.” Does it literally have something to do with putting the “members” back into the body? We call our limbs and body parts our “members” to be remembered could mean to be reconnected. We use the same term for the fellow congregants, they are all “members.”

In the Lord’s Supper, the Christian Passover, Jesus says “Do this for the remembrance of me.” What does that mean? Who is remembering? The grammar actually can be read either way, either we are remembering him or he is remembering us. We hear the story and we remember – much as the Jews in the celebration of the Seder meal always tell the story with the words “When we were in Egypt.” It is not “when our fathers were in Egypt…” but always they become the first generation of people, the very people who walked out through the red sea.

Interestingly the word for “They believed” is exactly the same word as it uses for when Jesus “entrusts himself to them” What does that mean? Did he not give them faith? Or is it because they only believed because they saw the signs? In chapter 20 Thomas will be chided for requiring a sign before he will believe, Jesus says “blessed are those who believe without seeing.” That would be the hearers of John’s Gospel.

In verse 20, the things that disciples believe are Scripture and Jesus (the Word made flesh). Were the people of Jesus day attracted to power of what Jesus did and were blinded by it? They had the weakness of faith that Thomas had. It is our human nature that looks for the tangible/visible and often chaffs at the idea that we must take it on faith.

The Passover of the Jews was at hand. These little temporal markers in John are really important, and not for chronological reasons, but for theological reasons. I don’t have much sympathy for the older commentators who are determined to work John’s chronology into the chronology of the other gospels. John, I don’t believe, is telling us a history in the same sense that we might use that word. He is portraying Christ for the people of his generation, especially in light of the proto-gnostic developments that are plaguing his audience.

John wants you to know that this was at the time of the Passover, the great feast of the Torah which remembers God’s great deliverance event through Moses and the escape from Egypt, especially the final plague in which God passed over the Jewish children to afflict the first born of the Egyptians. Of course, Jesus is the Passover Lamb who will make Easter the Passover not only of the Jews but the Passover of the whole world. In fact, we call this the Paschal Season from that word Passover. In many European languages, especially those that derive more directly from Latin, the word for Easter is actually “Pascha.”

So, with Moses and the escape from Egypt ricocheting off the inside of your head, John tells us the story of Jesus cleansing the temple. At the time some estimate that fully 20% of the Jerusalem population made their money off the Temple. That would have included a lot of folks who cleaned and served, people with legitimate jobs which were necessary for the running of such a huge operation. But it also included some much less scrupulous people. The Jews would not allow any graven image within the temple boundaries and since Roman money all had an image 14

of Caesar on it, it could not be used. Since the emperor was not about to remove his image from the Roman coinage, a special zone was created in which only temple coins could be used. These coins did not include a picture of any human being, most often it was a depiction of the menorah. Of course, just as money changers do today, every time the pilgrim exchanged his Roman sesterces and denarii for Temple shekels, the money changer got a cut.

Even more odious was the practice of demanding that the sacrifice be an unblemished lamb. It appears that the priests who were making the decisions about whether it was a truly unblemished lamb may have been in some sort of a collusion with the folks just happened to be selling unblemished lambs within the temple courts. The money making potential was simply too great and apparently they made full use of the possibilities.

Jesus in casting out the money changers was making a statement which must have been cheered by the many pilgrims who had grumbled about being cheated by the Jerusalemites. And conversely, it must have made some folks in Jerusalem very nervous. Was he threatening their livelihood? More importantly was he exciting the throngs of pilgrims, especially those from Galilee, and forming an army of supporters who would foment a rebellion against the Romans? The local authorities did not like the Romans, but the Romans did give them enough space to fleece a few pilgrims and generally run the city as they wanted. In fact, Pontius Pilate had his provincial capital at Caesarea on the Sea, a beautiful coastal installation. He hated Jerusalem and would only come for Passover week. Not because he was religious but because he knew that this was the time in which the Jews were most likely to rebel. Indeed the fear was well founded. A few decades after Jesus death and resurrection the Jews did rebel in 68-70 AD and their rebellion was brutally suppressed and the temple destroyed, never to be rebuilt.

Paul Meier suggests that this cleansing of the temple was in fact the event which would trigger Jesus death. The Sanhedrin would not find it hard to fill the square outside of Pilate’s palace on Friday with angry people who were calling for Jesus to be crucified. Their jobs were at stake.

But what is John doing with this? He places this story at the beginning of his Gospel, right after the first miracle of Jesus, right at the beginning of his telling of the Jesus story? The changing of water into wine at Cana which immediately precedes this story we have already suggested in an earlier document is an Easter story. It begins with the provocative words, “And on the third day there was a wedding feast.” Here we get a little story which is laced with references to Jesus death. The temple torn down he will rebuild in three days. John wrote decades after the real temple was torn down and still not rebuilt. Of course the temple of which he is referring is His body, but it is more than the resurrected body of Christ. This is what Paul means in Ephesians 2 when he says that we are the temple of God built on the foundation of apostles and prophets or when Peter talks about the living stones, built into the house for the Holy Spirit. I believe John is talking about more than the resurrection here, I think this is also about the Church.

Notice how John makes sure that you hear that the disciples remember this word and believe. That is a church piece. See too the next paragraph in which John tells us that lots of folks were coming to Jesus side, but he would entrust himself to none of them. He knew the hearts of men 15

and he knew that it was not safe. But in the last decade of the first century, after sixty years of church and ministry, Jesus has been entrusting himself to people and it has gone rather well. John wants the reader to be able to see that what Jesus would not do in the days before his death and resurrection, in the Holy Spirit, he has done in the Church today. He has entrusted himself to us. We are his body, his hands and feet.

I believe that this passage is actually as much about the Church as it is about the tensions of Holy Week and the death of Christ and his resurrection. Of course the Church depends on those things. Without cross and empty tomb, there is no church, so the discussion has to reflect those things, but I believe John is pointing us to the disciples who believe today, the people to whom Jesus has entrusted himself.

How do we look like these money changers today? I suppose we could look at all the little bookstores and fundraisers we do inside our walls and find application, but I am wondering if it doesn’t come closer to home than that. As a pastor I am paid by these people. I think that is a good thing, but within it there is a latent potential to be a money changer. Do I see this institution, this body of people as simply my job? Am I punching a clock until I retire so that I can make a little cash? I know pastors who do that, perhaps all of us do that sometimes. Just who would Jesus accuse of fleecing the pilgrims today, who would feel the sting of his lash? Would it be me?

We look like the money changers when we put the Gospel and even Christ himself into our service instead of us serving Christ and his Father. The money changers were using religion and God for their own enrichment. They were the ones benefiting. This was not about God, it was about them. We can do exactly this when we come to Church and imagine that this is about me. The music needs to entertain, the sermon better be interesting, and the programs need to excite me and benefit me. We do not come to God with any holy awe, but we shop for churches today. We have roast pastor for Sunday dinner. If the church is growing, it must be right.

We imagine that we have God on our leash, but find it difficult to see that the god on our leash is a pretty puny little god. Meanwhile the real, awesome, and terrifying God of creation is scowling over our shoulders.

Law

1. God has commandments. I am supposed to do them. I fail at doing them. I don’t measure up to that standard.

2. My failure to measure up has created all sorts of results and problems in my life and the lives of the people around me, not the least of which is death, but also factionalism, anger, false pride, frustration, etc.

3. My human nature loathes the very idea that I am such a schmuck or that these things are my fault. I preen in front of the mirror of my self-image, and delude myself into thinking that there is something loveable there.

4. I can even mess up the Church, the moment of God’s kingdom breaking into this time and place. Whether I politicize a voters meeting or scorn the simpleton in the pew, or whether I simply see the Church as a paycheck for my pastoral services, all of them miss the point that this is Christ’s body we are talking about.

Gospel

1. Jesus has kept those commandments, in fact he is the fulfillment of the Law which accuses me. In him I can honestly say that I am perfect.

2. That perfection which is imputed to me in Christ is not only a statement God makes about me, but it is also a process which he has begun in me. It is not only forensic but it is also sanitizing. My sin has resulted in much grief to be sure, but the good work of Christ in me can also now result in blessing and growth in the people around me.

3. I do have reason to boast, but it is in Christ, a much more certain ground for boasting. I can own my sins in true penitential sorrow, but I also can own the grace of God shown to sinners. I can be wholly honest and honestly holy.

4. That truth lets me see the people of God in a very different light. Yes, voters meetings still happen, but sometimes they extend a divine call, the same call that I answered. The simpleton may surprise me with his ability to pray and the duty which seems so much like a job can be transformed into a delight, task I am eager to do when I see that Jesus is working in them and in me.

Sermon Ideas

1. He did not entrust himself to them, but we can boast in Christ. (Gospel and Epistle – That the hearer re-envision the congregation, self and people around him/her as the very instrument through which Christ has promised to work salvation today.)

Jesus twists together leather cords today and makes his whip and drives out the money changers. It just feels good to see him get so angry and for such a righteous cause. They were richly deserving of that sting. The scoundrels Jesus drove out would eventually put him to death for his impudent failure to see the necessity of such compromise. The pilgrims who gathered and who had been fleeced by these money changers and sacrificial animal sellers probably cheered mightily to see Jesus get his dander up and drive them out. Little did they suspect that this was not the beginning of a revolution but the occasion of his death. John says that Jesus would not entrust himself to them. The “them” of which he speaks were not the money changers. “They” were the crowds of believers who rallied to his side when cast out the money changers. He had just done something 17

dramatic and powerful, but to them he did not entrust himself. They would have made his kingdom into a political revolution.

He would entrust himself instead to a bunch of miserable slaves, illiterates and weaklings in Corinth. They had not gathered to Jesus because he took on the powers of Rome or any other temporal power. They had been gathered around the very cross on which Jesus died. They were not a great bunch of people. Corinth was not a nice place; it was the sin city of the Mediterranean world. The congregation was strife torn, immoral, sinful, and had serious theological problems. As Paul tells them, they were no catch, not wise, not powerful, not intelligent, and not wealthy. But those were exactly the sort of people Jesus called and it was to them that he had entrusted the continuance of his ministry. We too have not gathered around the Jesus who drives out the moneychangers because he has driven them out.

We have gathered around the Jesus who went onto that cross where he took our weaknesses and infirmities to himself and gave us his perfect life instead. He has entrusted himself, his very self, to us. The disciples believed what Jesus said after he rose from the dead. He was building a new temple, not with stones and mortar, but with flesh and blood, one baptized Christian at a time, one congregation, one sinner, at a time. Today we are the people whom this Jesus has called into this place to be the boasters in Christ. Through the weak and the poor, the old and the gray, He will show his strength and his heavenly treasure in us.

You are the body of Christ, united to him in this sacrament – he has taken up his dwelling in you. You have not seen the signs and wonders, but Jesus has called you blessed and he has entrusted himself to you, so that you be his feet, he his hands, his lips. He makes his appeal to this world through you to the people that you meet, the folks you encounter.

This sermon will want to address the fact that often we doubt this reality. We imagine that the kingdom of God can only happen if we make it happen, if we have the strength to pull this off. This sermon preaches hope. We do not base our decision to act upon whether we think we can do this. We hear a call, we rejoice that God has chosen to use us, and we look forward to what he will do through us.

You might also play with the idea that he has entrusted his mission, his church, his kingdom itself to us. Everyone who has believed on Jesus has this gift. We have all been called to this. He has gifted us and will use us in ways we can perhaps not even imagine.

Is the Law then the paralysis which afflicts us when we see scope of the challenge? Do we not even try, and thereby do we cause the kingdom of God to seek its expression among others? If we wait until we have all the resources and answers before we act, we will never start. Indeed he has entrusted himself to us, and we in turn trust him. I don’t know how this will all finally take shape, but I know he goes into every scenario with me. 18

I can face a problem with a bit of panache, a strut, a swagger. After all, Jesus is there, he has entrusted himself to me. I can boast in him.

2. I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt…The commandments of the LORD… are sweeter than honey, sweeter than the honeycomb. (Psalm and OT – That the hearer rejoice to see the perfection of Christ given to him/her and transformation of his/her life into his perfection.)

The preacher will want to keep a certain Marcionite tendency in mind. Many of our people will come to church with a preconception that the OT is filled with harsh and judgmental messages. But they miss the great love of God for his people which is the real message of these texts.

These Ten Commandments present us with a terrible burden. Not only are we supposed to do them, but we really are supposed to like doing them. If I only can hear them as that burden, they always will be hateful to me. But the Psalmist calls these very commandments of God sweet, sweeter than honey itself. Is he nuts? No, of course not, but he sees something here, which we delight to see as well. These commandments which lay such a burden on us are also the very truth of Jesus. They point to my sin, but they also describe him perfectly. So far, that is not yet reason to call them sweeter than honey, but it might be the start of it. For the righteousness that Jesus has and which I need, is also given to me in his death for me on a cross. In a few short weeks we will observe the holy days of holy week. Jesus will ride into Jerusalem, he will be betrayed, tried, scourged, crucified, died, buried, and raised again. It is the great Passover of Christianity, the moment of our liberation from the slavery imposed on us by the evil taskmasters sin and death.

The commandments begin with the affirmation that God is the God who rescues from slavery. The commandments themselves are not conditions for God’s love, but responses to God’s great love. Likewise for us, they are not the things we do so that God will love us, but because Christ has loved us, what is more, they are empowered by the very love of Christ which he has poured into our hearts. The commandments which once were the terrible burden, the accusing finger which threatened us with death and destruction at the hands of an angry God have become the very sweetness of God. They are the description of Jesus, and because Jesus has given his life to me, they have become the very description of me as well.

Now I know that I am not a perfect man in your eyes and you are not in mine, but in God’s eyes, the eyes which really count, by the gift of Christ, I am a perfect man. I can embrace these commandments as a true description of Christ and the rightness which is mine and I can eagerly ask how they might become the definition of my life today. They are the sweetness I desire, the joy of my life. The irony of this is that the commandments put Jesus on that cross, and his life and death and resurrection took them off my back. 19

3. You are and instrument of God (Epistle – That the Spirit of God would work through the weakness and foolishness of the people of God to bring about Christ’s righteous reign in this place)

Paul’s letter to the Corinthians could be written to us. We like power. We like how works, we understand it, we appreciate it, and we crave it. Power seems to make our world go round and it is the powerful who enjoy life. But power is also our problem. The astute observer of human nature, Lord Acton once opined that power tends to corrupt people and absolute power corrupts them absolutely. Great men are almost all bad men.

The divisions within the people of God, perhaps even within this congregation are often rooted in our lust for power. The many evils we see depicted on our television’s nightly news and our internet feeds are often rooted in power. We think that we can be powerful and good, but so often we choose power over the good. This is true on the great scale of the powerful of the world and it is true on the micro-scale of our relationships and families. Who doesn’t know the petty co-worker who delights in power and self-advancement over the good of peers? Perhaps your experience with the power-hungry is much closer to home and for that reason even more of a problem for you.

Paul imagines a wholly other kingdom or reign in which power is not the goal but service and love are the goals. It sounds foolish and it sounds like it is the recipe to be stomped on and destroyed, but don’t be deceived by the logic of our enemy and the world. This is the very kingdom of God. In this kingdom winning is losing, the king wears a crown of thorns, the dead live, and the weak and helpless (children) are at the top of the foodchain. Paul rejoices in suffering in this kingdom. Jesus says that persecuted are blessed. Watched any news footage of ISIS and hostages lately? Is that hard to say?

The cross, which is foolishness to the world and Satan is the very salvation which God has wrought. It is a power of another sort, a power which changes people instead of controlling them, a power which liberates instead of enslaving, and a power which is not grasped but given.

The preacher will need to put skin on this. The closer to home you can make it, the better. I am right now teaching a class which is looking at the Lord of the Rings by Tolkien and Frodo’s role in this whole story seems to be an exploration of this theology of the cross. But I am not sure how effective that is as a sermon illustration but in the right context it could be effective to show a clip from the film.

Of course Jesus is not only asking for this, he does it. The cross is the emblem of Christianity for a reason. It marks the mechanism of God’s kingdom come, his will done, his creation restored. It happens when God loses all and that self-losing God has taken up residence in our hearts and lives today.

As one old crusty preacher once said to a bunch of new confirmands: “I hope you look good on wood!” 20

4. Destroy this temple and in three days I will rebuild it (That the hearer would embrace the strange and paradoxical ways of God’s kingdom)

Jesus is on his way to the cross here. It would seem that the whole of John’s Gospel is on the way to the cross. As is usually the case, the disciples are pretty thick about this, but are we really any better? This strikes us as odd. Our culture has told us that we win when we dominate, when we come out on top, when we are victors. Jesus spreads his arms out and says, “destroy this temple…” Yes, it is description, but it also seems to be an invitation. He wants them to destroy this temple.

When know how this story ends with empty tomb and glorious resurrection. But do we know it well enough to follow along on that road with him? Do we trust? Do we listen? The desire to be winners and victors is powerful. The fear of the pain and suffering and loss has a firm grip on us. Jesus’ road seems to be madness. If we don’t think so, we are probably not thinking clearly about it. It is madness. God’s foolishness is wiser than the wisdom of the world and this is where that is clearest.

The preacher will want to ask how his congregation, both its individual members and as a body is seeking the guarantees and sure things of this world. How have we refused to be God’s cruciform people? Remember, this is a time to repent. It is good thing to do.

But of course Jesus went to that cross because we are so out of touch with God’s kingdom, did he not? He went to die for this rebellious world, including this parish. As is often the case, the Word which condemns us is also the Word which saves us. Jesus’s embrace of the Kingdom’s strange mechanisms scares us, but it also empowers us. Jesus goes to cross and grave. And resurrection is on the other side of that. The preacher will also need to preach that. Jesus does rebuild the temple.