B, Lent 5 - John 12:20-33 "God's Glory is the death of our Sin"
Text – John 12:20-33 NIV
20 Now there were some Greeks among those who went up to worship at the Feast. 21 They came to Philip, who was from
Sermon
During Lent we are given an opportunity to examine ourselves and repent of our sin. We have an opportunity to stock take, expose, and chuck out everything from the most stupid to the innermost depraved sins in our lives, giving them to Jesus so he can deal with them on the cross. Temptations are avoided in Lent, serving God takes centre stage. ‘Where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honour the one who serves me’, are Jesus’ words. In Lent we are preoccupied with serving God and separating ourselves from the influences of this world. Joyfully handing our sin over to Jesus who can destroy it once and for all.
Reflection on my life – a session in the Lenten room full of mirrors – doesn’t conjure up feelings of happiness and joy in me. When I cast my eyes over this gospel text for the first time, I feel uncomfortable. When words and phrases like ‘servant’, ‘hates his life in this world’, ‘whoever serves me must follow me’, and ‘Now is the time for judgment’ sink into my heart for the first time, a sickening pain hits me in the gut. I cry out, ‘God forgive my sin’, but at the same time I really want to enjoy the world. The hour of Christ’s glorification, makes me feel uneasy as I walk with him from the garden to
Hearing God’s word we realise that others struggled and suffered with sin in their lives. Take King David’s appeal in Psalm 51 for instance; his plea to the Lord after he took Bathsheba; committed adultery with her; and had her husband killed in battle. He was a king enthroned by God through his prophet, and loved by God. But he carelessly misused his office, for sexual pleasure and murder of an innocent man. Hear the angst in his cry for a clean heart, ‘Against you, you only, have I sinned… Surly I was sinful from birth sinful from the time my mother conceived me… Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice… Hide your face from my sins and blot out my iniquity. David’s innermost sin now exposed by his prophet Nathan. God illuminates sin, revealing evil – joy and happiness are nowhere to be found. David cries out with great suffering, ‘Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me’. David begs God – he can’t escape from his sinfulness. In his spirit he knows his willingness to sin will be too great for him to resist.
Jesus troubled in heart cries out to God too. As he draws closer to the hour of his death, he suffered bitterly. Just like sin exposed and realised in David, and in us, Jesus too is embittered by the effects of sin. Sins he didn’t commit, but took on. The hour of death was closing in on Jesus; the Son of God was left holding the bag, the bag of suffering, death, sin, and separation from God. Hear what is written in Hebrews 5, ‘During his life of earth, Jesus offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.’ Where we fail, where David struggles, Christ suffers and struggles, but he doesn’t fail. The writer of Hebrews continues, ‘Although he was a son he learned obedience from what he suffered and once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation.’ He wasn’t made perfect because he was God, the Son, but rather because he was a son of Mary, a person like you and me, who kept the law perfectly and suffered in his innocence.
Through his troubled heart, through his loud cries, through his willing obedience to carry sinful baggage, God was glorified by Christ, the new Adam, the prototype of a new person, the first person to obey the law to the full. God who bore our sin in full. In this hour sin was exposed. Yes it caused suffering, pain and turmoil, but yes it was also conquered by the one who was obedient to death. For us and all of humanity who suffer under the burden of sin, we’ve been given the opportunity to live in this world hating our sin, and at the same time living a life in eternity – a life with God sin free!
However, many people stumble at this free offer of sin removal. They reject the suffering God on the cross, looking instead for a miracle worker to give them happiness in this life. Even though they know the needs of their innermost beings, they hide their true natures, being deluded by their own visions of grandeur and self-glorification. For them suffering, struggling, and conquering sin though death doesn’t glorify anyone or anything; and even less does it show the all-powerfulness of the one true God. This seed of God planted within the midst of humanity to routing out sin, frightens those who get a glimpse of their sin. So they gouge out the seed and continue on in their ignorant lives of blissful denial and deception.
Praise God I don’t live blissfully with my sin. The Lenten stock take that shoves my conscience into turmoil, isn’t as bad as I first thought. Judgement time is a time not to be feared but one that brings peace and eternal happiness. Our sin is judged, it is condemned, and we are judged too, but our judgement is not one of condemnation, but rather one of restoration. Our sin is condemned, but we are made right before the judge.
This judge likens himself to a grain of wheat. Hear what Jesus says of himself in the text, ‘I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.’ Jesus, carrying the grain of our sin, falls to the ground – dies and is buried. In his death, our sin is dead and buried. Hear in Galatians 2:20 the words of
So how did we, sinners, end up with this holiness; how can stand before a holy God without receiving wrath? Well, Jesus Christ, the grain of wheat buried in death, has sprung up and is producing seeds. These fruitful seeds are seeds of faith. They are buried in us and have germinated through the Holy Spirit’s energy. As Paul says, ‘Christ lives in me.’ Now our old nature is buried under Christ’s holiness. When we stand before God, he sees the glory of Christ in us, even though the old nature struggles to take back what Christ has claimed, causing us pain and suffering in our lives.
But you know our suffering never happens alone. Christ suffered and was crucified and now he lives with us – suffering with us the turmoil and trials of what the devil tries to expose and use to condemn us. But sin and death now have no power, nor does Old Nick – he is beaten. You see the sin he throws in our faces, is the same sin Christ has destroyed in his death bringing glory to God the Father. In his hour of glory he drives Satan, the prince of this world, out. The exposure of sin within us, the suffering it causes, doesn’t nullify the new covenant made with his blood; for God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Our sin doesn’t separate us from God anymore, not like it did under the old covenant of law. No our sin now serves us as a reminder that we are inherent sinners, that sin is inborn. And our struggle and suffering with sin chases us daily to the cross and the king enthroned upon it, where our sin is exchange for a perfect record.
And the peace of God which passed all understanding, keep our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, Amen!
