Sermon for Maundy Thursday - 1 Cor 11:23-32

 

   Maundy Thursday

                                                                                                1 Cor 11:23-32

                                                                                                4/2/26

 

 

“In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.’” These are the words in our epistle lesson for tonight from 1 Corinthians eleven.  Although we hear them using the translation “testament” in the Words of Institution of the liturgy, more literally the word used means “covenant.” In the word “covenant” we receive important insight into what Christ has done for us, and what he gives us in the Sacrament of the Altar.

Yahweh had taken Israel into a covenant with himself at Mt Sinai. He had chosen them as his people and brought them out of slavery in Egypt in the Exodus. At Sinai God gave Israel his Torah – his Law. This was a description of how Israel was to live in this relationship that God had given. God’s word repeatedly emphasized that keeping this law would bring blessing, but breaking it would bring a curse.

At Mt. Sinai Moses read the Book of the Covenant in the hearing of the people. They replied, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.” Then Moses took blood from sacrificed oxen and threw it on the people as he said, “Behold the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.” This act meant that they were now part of the covenant with God.

The Torah offered the way of life with God. But in practice Israel soon demonstrated that while the law itself had this ability, the people did not have the power to carry it out. Instead of being a way of life, the Torah brought judgment upon Israel. The nation worshipped false gods.  It took advantage of the poor. It broke the law again and again. The result was God’s judgment.  In 722 B.C. he used the Assyrians to conquer the northern kingdom and take them into exile, never to return. In 587 B.C. he used the Babylonians to take Judah into exile and destroy the temple. 

During that time as Judah was about to be taken into exile, the prophet Jeremiah wrote, “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord.”

Yahweh said through Jeremiah that he would make a new covenant – one that was different from the covenant that he made at Mt Sinai. He went on to say through the prophet, “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” God said that he would write his law on the hearts of his people. Then he added, “For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”

Around the same time, Yahweh also revealed through Ezekiel that he would do something new.  He said, “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” God said he would bring about a change in the people, one that would make them new. And then he explained how he would do this as he said, “And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.”

The Torah – the law in itself was holy and good. It offered the way of life with God, but the people did not have the power in themselves to reach this goal. Instead, in their breaking of the law they brought the law’s curse upon themselves.   Paul told the Galatians, “For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.’” And so Paul concluded that the law can’t give life. He went on to say, “For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law.”

The apostle stated clearly why the law could not give life. The problem was not the law. Instead we are the problem. He told the Romans, “For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin.” He explained how as fallen people sin remains a power that controls us. This sin takes hold of the law and uses it to prompt more sin. He wrote in Romans chapter seven, “For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, ‘You shall not covet.’ But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead.”

God had said he would make a new covenant. He said that he would put his Spirit within his people. This new covenant arrived in Jesus Christ. Jesus is the One who established the new covenant, but in doing so he was the fulfillment of the covenant God made with Israel. That covenant contained the sacrifices by which God gave forgiveness and enabled the people to live in his presence. Through them atonement was made for sin.

God sent his Son, Jesus Christ as the once and for all sacrifice for sin. Through the sacrifice of the sinless Son of God he judged your sin so that now you can be justified before him. Paul told the Romans, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.” He wrote later, “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh.”

Jesus Christ was conceived by the work of the Spirit.  He was anointed with the Spirit at his baptism. The Spirit of God raised Jesus from the dead. Paul told the Romans that Jesus Christ “was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead.” And then as the risen and ascended Lord, Jesus poured forth the Spirit – the Spirit who is the Spirit of Christ.  Just as Ezekiel had prophesied, God has put his Spirit within us in these last days through the water of baptism.

The new covenant gives life because the Spirit is at work through the Gospel. Paul told the Corinthians, “Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” The letter of the law kills and brings judgment. But the Spirit of  Christ gives life as he works faith in Jesus’ saving death and resurrection.

The Passover meal was a remembrance of the event by which God freed Israel from slavery to bring them into the covenant with himself. The Last Supper was a Passover meal. But Jesus took it and transformed it into something which is now done in remembrance of how Jesus freed us from the slavery of sin and death to bring us into the new covenant with God.

The Words of Institution quoted by Paul say that it was “on the night when he was betrayed.” It is true, of course, that this was the evening when Judas betrayed Jesus into the hands of the Jewish religious leaders. But it was far more than that, for this event was part of God’s plan to save us.  Paul used the exact same word when he told the Romans that Jesus “was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.”

Jesus took bread and said, “This is my body which is for you,” or more literally, “which is on behalf of you.” The Lord said that he was giving them his body to eat – his body which was about to be offered on the cross on behalf of you. He took the cup of wine and said, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood.” Our Lord declared that the cup was the new covenant because the cup held his blood shed to establish the new covenant.

In the Sacrament of the Altar Jesus uses bread and wine to give us his true body and blood. Paul had just said to the Corinthians in the previous chapter, “The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?”

These are questions which in Greek demand a positive answer. Paul assumes that they agree with him that yes, the wine in the cup is a participation – it is a communion in the blood Christ. He knows that they agree with him that yes, the bread is a participation – it is a communion in the body of Christ.

In the Sacrament Jesus takes the very price he paid for your forgiveness and gives it to you. He gives you his true body and blood which was given and shed to establish the new covenant. And in so doing, he confirms that you are included in that covenant.  Each time you receive the Sacrament Jesus is saying that you are part of the forgiven people of God. You are included among those who are receiving his saving work – a saving work that will reach its consummation when you share in his resurrection on the Last Day.

Christ leaves no doubt that this new covenant is for you, because he places his body and blood into your mouth. Just as the blood of the covenant splattered on the bodies of the Israelites at Mt Sinai meant that they were in the covenant, so the body and blood of Jesus given into your body mean that you are in the new covenant. You have forgiveness and salvation that overcomes death itself.

God said through Jeremiah, “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant.” He made the first covenant with Israel alone. But true to his promise to Abraham that in his seed all nations would be blessed, God worked through the covenant with Israel to bring salvation to all. Jesus Christ was the fulfillment of the first covenant. By his death and resurrection he has established the new covenant which gives forgiveness and life to all people – to Jew and Gentile alike.

Christ instituted the Sacrament to be done in remembrance of him. As Paul says in our text, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”  But this remembering is more than just a mental action on our part.  It is the reception of the crucified and risen Lord who comes to us in his body and blood. It is Christ putting his body and blood into you so that you may know with certainty that you share in the saving new covenant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sermon for the Palm Sunday/Sunday of the Passion - Phil 2:5-11

 

  Sunday of the Passion

                                                                                                Phil 2:5-11

                                                                                                3/29/26

 

 

            Around 200 A.D. a person scratched a message into the plaster wall of a room near the Palatine Hill in Rome. He drew a picture of man looking up. Above him was a figure on a cross. However, rather than the head of man, this figure had the head of a donkey. Below the picture this individual wrote a message which said: “Alexamenos worships his god.”

            This famous piece of graffiti was written to mock a Christian and his belief. The person who wrote it was saying that to believe in Christ crucified was to believe in a jackass. He was saying that the faith of Alexamenos – and of all Christians – was completely absurd and ludicrous. Only a complete fool would believe in this crucified criminal.

            In our text this morning the apostle Paul says that Christ “humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” The famous Alexamenos graffiti helps us to understand what Paul means when he says, “even death on a cross.” The weakness, shame, and humiliation of crucifixion meant that it was shocking and offensive to claim that this was God acting to save us.  It seemed that only a fool would worship a crucified Lord.

            In our text this morning Paul explains who Jesus Christ is and what he has done for us. This reading has been chosen for today because Palm Sunday marks the beginning of Holy Week. We have begun the remembrance of the week when Jesus Christ’ saving work reached its culmination.  The reading of the Passion of Our Lord according to St Matthew set before us the events we will commemorate. We will gather on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday as we consider Christ’s last supper with his disciples, his arrest, trial, and crucifixion.

            Paul begins by saying, “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.” The apostle begins by telling us that Jesus is God. He was in the form of God and he had equality with God.

In Galatians Paul tells us that Jesus is the Son of God who existed with the Father. Then, in the fullness of time God sent his Son into the world. In words that describe the incarnation, the apostle says in our text that the Son “did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.” The Son did not consider equality with God to be something that he would continue to grasp and hold onto.

Now it is not that the Son became any less truly God when he entered the world as Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. Paul told the Colossians about Christ: “For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.” Jesus was, and still is, true God.

This emptying of himself was also not the fact that he became true man.  Jesus Christ the ascended Lord is still true God and true man today, and he is not less than the Father because of it. Remember, God declared his created world to be very good. Bodily existence is not in any way a bad thing. And Jesus took on humanity as Adam was created to be – a humanity free from sin.

The key for understanding this emptying of himself is found in the phrase, “by taking the form of a servant.” Jesus Christ was in the world to serve. Though true man, he had not ceased to be true God. He still had all of the power of the One who had created the universe. But the striking thing about Jesus’ ministry is that he did not use this power to serve himself.

Jesus worked mighty miracles. He healed those who were sick.  He gave sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and made the lame walk. He raised the dead. As we heard last Sunday, he fed thousands. But among all of these mighty deeds we do not see Jesus using his power to help himself. We don’t see Jesus using his power to attack and destroy his enemies. Not even in the Garden of Gethsemane as they come to arrest Jesus does he put up any resistance.

Instead, Jesus humbled himself as he carried out the Father’s will to save us. Paul says in our text, “And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” Christ didn’t only take on the form of a servant. He was the Servant of the Lord prophesied by Isaiah. At his baptism the Father designated Jesus as the Servant when he said, “This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased” and put his Spirit upon Jesus.  Jesus the sinless Son of God submitted to John’s baptism of repentance because he was taking our place; because he was taking our sins.

Jesus humbled himself. We on the other hand are not really into humility.  We prefer to focus on me, myself, and I. We want our plan, not God’s plan. We want to focus on our needs, not those of others. We want our lives to be easier and better, even if it means ignoring others in order to achieve this.

 Paul says that Christ “humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” As the Servant of the Lord, Jesus humbled himself by bearing your sins and receiving God’s judgment against them on the cross. God condemned your sin in the flesh of Christ.

We view the cross as a symbol of comfort. We display the cross in our churches and homes. We wear it as jewelry around our neck. But we would never imagine doing such a thing with the guillotine, or gallows, or electric chair. This fact helps us to understand what Paul means when he says “even death on a cross.” Paul freely admitted to the Corinthians, “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.”

To the world the cross is folly – it is moronic. That’s certainly what the person who drew the graffiti mocking Alexamenos was saying. But we know that it is in fact the power of God for salvation. It was the just God justly judging our sin in Christ. By this action he has redeemed us. He has freed us from sin so that now through faith in Christ we are justified. We have the status of being holy in God’s eyes. As Paul told the Romans, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

This week we enter into Holy Week. On Friday, Jesus will hang dead on a cross. On Saturday his body will be buried in a tomb. Paul tells us that Jesus was obedient unto death on a cross. And if death on the cross was the end of things, then faith in Christ truly would be folly.

But Paul goes on to say in our text, “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” God highly exalted Christ by raising him from the dead. A week from today we will celebrate Easter. When God raised Jesus, he demonstrated that he had been working through the cross. What had looked like humiliation, weakness, and failure was in fact God’s most powerful action to save us.

Jesus rose from the dead on Easter. Forty days later he ascended into heaven as he was exalted to God’s right hand.  Now he exercises all power and might as the One who is still true God and true man. Paul says that every knee must bow before him in submission. Every tongue must confess that Jesus is Lord.

This is what you do now. The Holy Spirit has called you to faith in Christ. You have received the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Spirit in the water of Holy Baptism.  You confess that Jesus is Lord – he is your Lord. And because of this you have salvation.  Paul told the Romans that “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

This is what everyone will have to do on the Last Day.  The risen and ascended Lord will return in glory. Every knee will bow before him and call him Lord – even those who rejected him during their life. This will be the vindication for all who have believed and trusted in Christ – for Alexamenos and all Christians who have been mocked and ridiculed by the world. But for those who have rejected Christ the realization of the truth of the Gospel will be too late. Having rejected the forgiveness found in Christ, they will stand before God the judge in their own sinfulness and will receive eternal damnation.

Our text from Philippians is a crucial one for understanding the person and work of Jesus Christ. But what we need to note is that Paul does not engage in this discussion for its own sake. Instead, he talks about Christ in order to guide and shape the way Christians live.

Just before our text Paul says, “So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.”  The apostle calls upon the Philippians to be united with one another as they live in Christ.

Then Paul describes what this looks like as he says, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.” He says that Christians are not to act in self-centered ways. Instead, they are to act in humility – a humility that looks out for others first. In fact Paul says that we are to count others as more significant than ourselves. We are to put them ahead of ourselves.  We are to look out for the interests of others.

Jesus Christ then becomes the model and the reason that we are able to do this. Paul says in our text, “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus.” Christians live and act in humility just as Christ humbled himself to save us. Here Jesus is the model for the way that we live. But he is more than a mere example.

Paul says that we are to think this way as we are in Christ Jesus. You have been baptized into Christ. Through the work of the Spirit you have been joined to Christ and his saving work. And now the Spirit of Christ is at work in you. Or as Paul told Galatians, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” Through his Spirit Christ is at work in you to lead and enable you to live in his humility as you put the needs of others before your own.

This week – Holy Week – we will see how Jesus did this for us. The Son of God did not consider equality with God a thing to which he would cling. Instead he emptied himself by taking on the form of a servant. He did not use his power to serve himself, but instead he humbled himself to the point of death – even death on a cross. That is where this week ends.

The good news of the Gospel is that after seven days there is the eighth day of new creation as God raised Jesus from the dead. There is Easter. We live in the confidence provided by what Paul says today: “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

           

 

 

 

Fifth mid-week Lent sermon: Table of Duties - To Workers and To Employers

 

Mid-Lent 5

                                                                                                 To Workers and

To Employers

                                                                                                 3/25/26

 

            “They call it work for a reason.” This statement captures the fact that no matter how interesting a person may find their job, and no matter how rewarding it may be, there will always be aspects which simply must be done because they have to be done. There is no getting around the fact that our job requires us to do things that we don’t want to do. And then there are also times when we are tired, or sick, or run down and just don’t want to do our job.

            At times – maybe more often than we would like – everyone feels this way. However, Scripture gives us a different perspective on how we should view our jobs. Rather than simply being jobs, they are vocations – callings in life through which God uses us. We learn that our life in Christ changes the way we carry out the responsibilities that we have both to our employer, and to those whom we employ and supervise.

            The texts that are listed by the Small Catechism under “To Workers of All Kinds” and “To Employers and Supervisors” come from Ephesians 6:5-9.  The first thing that probably surprises us is that these are words addressed to slaves and their masters.  Now we may sometimes feel like our job is slavery, but we certainly aren’t really slaves. It probably seems puzzling that the New Testament tells slaves how to act, and that we then take these words and apply them to our lives today as Christians.

            It is necessary to recognize that slavery was an established part of life in the Greco-Roman world. It was a basic cog in the economic system of the Roman Empire.  And it is critically important to understand that the slavery of Paul’s day differed in significant ways from what probably comes to mind when you hear the word “slavery.” 

            When we think of slavery, we think of what existed in the United States prior to the Civil War.  However, the slavery of Paul’s days was very different in important ways. For starters, slavery in the first century had nothing to do with race.  It was also not necessarily a permanent status.  Becoming a freedman was a very real possibility.  While there were slaves who worked in agricultural settings, the majority of slaves were in urban settings. Slaves managed business affairs for their master and could even have their own money.  Frankly, the quality of life for a slave in a household was often better than it was for a poor free man.  Being a slave could provide the opportunities for advancement in life that were not as readily available to a free man.

            Paul’s words do in fact fit very well the situation in which we find ourselves as we work in a job.  The key point that should immediately strike us is that when Paul talks about working in a job, he tells Christians to view what they do in relation to Jesus Christ.  He writes, “Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.  Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but like slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not men, because you know that the Lord will reward everyone for whatever good he does, whether he is slave or free.”

            Paul says that when you work you are to do it as if it is done for Christ.  The reality is that it is done for Christ, because he is the One using you to care for others and provide for their needs.  Martin Luther said that as we serve in our vocations we become the “masks of God.”  God has ordered the world in such a way that we become the means by which our Lord cares for others.

            Now there are two sides to this.  On the one hand, this understanding takes our job – like all of our vocations – and lifts it out of the mundane.  Oh don’t get me wrong, the work itself may be mundane.  But we recognize that as we serve in our vocation God has adorned it with a dignity, worth, and value because he is the One who is working through us.

            On the other hand, it also makes it clear that when we don’t put forward our best effort, it is God whom we are cheating.  As Paul indicates, it’s when the boss is not around that we see who is really running the show – the new man or the old Adam.  Being lazy; choosing not to do a good and thorough job - these things are sinful. They are sins against God.

            The Small Catechism goes on to list Ephesians 6:9 under the heading of “To Employers and Supervisors.”  There Paul writes, “Masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and your is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him.”

            Literally, Paul begins by saying, “Do the same things toward them.”  Paul is telling people in authority over workers that they are to deal with their workers as if they are working for Christ. Now when we talk about positions of authority , the Fourth Commandment is in view.  Working for Christ in this case will mean restraining sin.  It will mean telling people what they need to do.  It will mean admonishment and discipline when sin prevents a worker from performing their duties well.

            But Paul says this needs to be done out of concern.  It is not to be done in a way that threatens or provokes just because the boss is on a power trip. And it must be done fairly.  Paul says this is so because you have Master in heaven, and he shows no partiality.  You have a boss who is evaluating how you act as boss.            

            There are times when we fail to do this as workers.  There are times when we fail to do this as employers.  As we arrive at the end of Lent and are about to enter into Holy Week we draw near to that time of the Church year that urgently reminds us of how Jesus worked to serve our good. This coming Sunday we will watch Jesus enter into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. But on Good Friday we will see Jesus numbered with the transgressors as he hangs on the cross for you.  He will hang there dying for all the times you are lazy and don’t give your best effort.  He will hang there dying for all of the times you abuse your power and don’t treat workers fairly.

             But by his death he will win the forgiveness for all of those sins.  And then on Easter he will rise from the dead.  In his resurrection Jesus has begun the restoration of life as it was intended to be when God created Adam, and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. Through the work of the Spirit who has given us new life in baptism we now seek to fulfill our vocations.  Just as Christ served us, so we serve others because as we work we are indeed serving Christ.  Our service to the Lord becomes the means that he uses to care for others and supply their needs.  Living in Christ as a baptized child of God, we become Christ to our neighbor. And there is nothing mundane about that. 

 

Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent - Heb 9:11-15

 

   Lent 5

                                                                                                            Heb 9:11-15

                                                                                                            3/22/26

 

            I have told Joe Musolino and Chris Atlee, the seminary students from our congregation, that they will make mistakes as they conduct the Divine Service.  It just happens.  You get tired. You lose your concentration. Or for reasons that you can’t even explain, you will do something wrong. So, I have skipped the Prayer of the Church, and then had to be reminded that yes, we do need to pray this morning. Or in my all time favorite, I was in the midst of Words of Institution and was about to pick up the chalice and speak our Lord’s words over the wine – only to realize that I had failed to fill it.

            Now congregation members understand that pastors make mistakes. As long as they know your goal is to conduct the Divine Service in a reverent manner – and they see that you’re not afraid to laugh at yourself after the fact – they will overlook these things.

            Pastors should feel the need to conduct the liturgy in a reverent and competent manner. It’s no small thing to come into the presence of the holy God. But our experience of this is quite different from what Israel’s priests encountered at the tabernacle. In Leviticus chapter ten we read, “Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the Lord, which he had not commanded them. And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord.”

            Nadab and Abihu took the fire from a source other than altar for burnt offering. And they learned that the holy God is a consuming fire. If there was pressure to follow Yahweh’s directions for priests, how much more there was for the high priest who once a year entered the Holy of Holies and carried out the rites of the Day of Atonement before the Ark of the Covenant. This was a setting where if a man entered at any other time he would die. And on the Day of Atonement, being in presence of the Ark – Yahweh’s throne in the midst of Israel – meant doing things correctly was a matter of life and death.

            In our epistle lesson this morning, the writer to the Hebrews emphasizes how Jesus Christ has done something even greater than that of the Old Testament high priests. Jesus entered into the heavenly presence of God as he offered himself once and for all as the sacrifice for our sin.

            The writer to the Hebrews emphasizes again and again that as the fulfillment of God’s Word, Jesus Christ is something greater than what existed in the Old Testament. In this section of the letter he has been talking about the arrangement of the tabernacle. The first two thirds was the Holy Place. This is where the incense altar was located – the one where Zechariah was serving when Gabriel appeared to him.

            The last third was the Holy of Holies. This was the location of the Ark of the Covenant. Only the high priest could enter before the Ark.  He could only do it on the Day of Atonement, and he could only do so after making an offering first for his own sins, and then for the people.

            In Exodus Yahweh commanded Israel to make a tabernacle so that he could dwell in their midst. The design for the tabernacle was not left up to them. Instead God directed, “Exactly as I show you concerning the pattern of the tabernacle, and of all its furniture, so you shall make it.” We learn that this pattern here on earth was reflection of the heavenly reality before God. The writer to the Hebrews tells us that it was “a copy and shadow of the heavenly things.”

            Hebrews tells us that Jesus Christ was superior as a high priest in four different ways. First, Jesus Christ was the holy One. We learn in chapter seven, “For it was indeed fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens. He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.”

            Jesus Christ had no sin because he is the Son of God. The letter begins with words that strain human language as it expresses the fact that the Son is God, and yet distinct from the Father. We learn, “He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power.”

            This holy and mighty Son of God entered our world and became man. He took on our humanity. Hebrews says, “Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things.” But Christ’s humanity was what God created us to be – without sin. And then he lived perfectly according to God’s will. Hebrews tells us, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.” Jesus has walked in our shoes and knows what it is like to face temptation and hardship. And so the writer to the Hebrews concludes, “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

            The second way that Jesus is a superior high priest is that he entered into the heavenly presence of God himself. Hebrews describes Christ’s death on the cross as the event in which he came before God and offered a sacrifice. The high priests of the Old Testament entered the Holy of Holies. But this was only a copy made with hands of the heavenly reality.  We learn in our text, “But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places.”

            On Good Friday, Jesus came before God himself. Just after our text we learn, “For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.”

            And this brings us to the third way that Christ is superior: He did this once and for all. Our text says that, “he entered once for all into the holy places.” And just after our text Hebrews goes on to say, “Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.”

            Hebrews begins by saying, “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son.” The incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Christ means that it is the last days. His saving work means that it is the end of the ages – it is the end times. God’s end time salvation has arrived, and we look for its consummation when Christ returns in glory.

            Christ has offered the sacrifice once and for all. This means that there is no other saving sacrifice to be offered – especially not his. Jesus alone has offered it, and no one else can do this. Christ is the subject of all the verbs here. There is absolutely no way to include us – to include the Church – in the action of offering up Christ as a sacrifice. The Roman Catholic understanding of the Sacrament of the Altar as a sacrifice offered by man contradicts all of this as it makes the same tired old move of trying to take Gospel and turn it into Law. It tries to take what God has done for us in Christ and turn it into something that we do.

            And the final way that Christ is superior is one that runs through all of these.  Our text says, “he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.” The Old Testament high priest offered sacrifices of animals, and used the blood for himself and the people. Instead, Jesus offered himself as the sacrifice. He shed his own blood.

            This is the point Hebrews makes in our text: “For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.”

            Everything the New Testament says is based on what God has revealed about himself in the Old Testament. God really is the holy God. Sinners who sin evoke his wrath and judgment. They cannot exist in fellowship with him and instead receive eternal damnation. The world may not want to hear this kind of talk. It may not sound “caring and inclusive.” But it is true. It is God’s revelation about himself in his inspired and inerrant word.

            However, the holy God has judged your sin.  He did it in Christ. Hebrews says, “Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.” His sacrifice has won forgiveness for you. We learn, “But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.”

            This is the good news of the Gospel. Because of Jesus Christ you now have a holy standing before God. You are saint. And the good news extends even further because Jesus Christ’s death as a sacrifice was not the end of his saving work. Hebrews says, “Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.” Christ passed through death, but in his resurrection on Easter he overcame it. The Lord who was raised from the dead will raise and renew your body on the Last Day to be like his.

            So what does this mean for us? Hebrews tells us as it says, “Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh,

and since we have a great priest over the house of God,

let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.”

            Because of the sacrifice of Jesus and his resurrection, he is the new and living way by which we have are able to enter into God’s presence. Christ is the great high priest who has conquered death and intercedes for us. He is the victorious ascended Lord. Hebrews says, “Now the point in what we are saying is this: we have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven,

a minister in the holy places, in the true tent that the Lord set up, not man.”

            Because of this draw we near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. We do so knowing that our sins have been washed away in the water of Holy Baptism. We draw near knowing that in Christ have been made holy and “because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.”

            And so Hebrews urges, “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.” We live in fallen world – a valley of sorrow. We face challenges as we believe in Jesus Christ in this world. Hebrews tells us to continue in the confession of our hope in Christ, because he who has promised is faithful.

            As I have mentioned recently, the Christian life is not one of the individual in isolation. Instead it is lived in the unity of faith that joins us together, and so the life of faith means that we live it in relationship with each other.  Hebrews adds, “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”

            We seek to remind and prompt one another to live in Christ. It is our shared goal to live lives of love – actions that support others and put their needs first. We bolster one another in doing the good works that God has given us to do in our different vocations. Our gathering for the Divine Service feeds us with Christ’s Means of Grace. But it does something else as well. It brings together so that we can encourage one another.

            We encourage one another because we are living in the end times that began in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We live knowing that the day is drawing near when our Lord will return. Christ who entered this world to be the sacrifice for our sins will return to give us a share in the resurrection that he has begun.  As the writer to the Hebrews says later in this chapter, “And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.”