C, Easter 2 - John 20:19–22 "Reception of Peace and the Holy Spirit"

John 20:19–22 (ESV) On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”  When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.  Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.”  And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit”.

Today, we in the kingdom of God, hear of God’s first ordination in the evening of Jesus’ resurrection.  Ten men are ordained in very simple fashion.  Twice he says to the ten, “Peace be with you”, before saying,  “As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.”  (John 20:21)

These men, referred to as disciples, are sent or called to be apostles, by our Risen Lord Jesus, just as he was by his Father.

Earlier in his ministry, Jesus had designated twelve disciples as apostles and sent them out.  (Matthew 10; Mark 3:13-19; Luke 6:12-16)   After his resurrection, Jesus prepares ten of them with peace and the Holy Spirit.  He does this so they can function in the way God intended them to function as shepherds in his body, his church, after Pentecost.

The last time Jesus spoke of peace was to his eleven disciples after Judas had departed to betray him.  Three times Jesus teaches them about why they need peace, and how they would receive it.

Notice two very important things that cannot be separated from Jesus’ peace and love — God’s Word and the Holy Spirit.

 “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.  Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me.  “These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you.  But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.  Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (John 14:23–27 ESV)

Jesus then goes on to elaborate about the works of the world’s hatred, and the works of the Holy Spirit in those who love God.  They leave the location of the foot washing and travel to the location where Jesus prays his high priestly prayer.  But before he prays, he places his peace upon them for the third and final time, before his crucifixion, saying, “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33 ESV)

Three times he leaves his peace with them before his resurrection.  Now after his resurrection he recalls to remembrance and reinstates this peace.  Twice with the ten disciples and the third time a week later with Thomas the eleventh disciple.

When Jesus left his peace with his disciples before his death, he also taught them about the gift of the Holy Spirit.   So too after his resurrection!  Jesus places his peace and breathes the Holy Spirit upon them with his Word. 

God’s love in Jesus Christ, the peace of God, Jesus’ Word, and the Holy Spirit cannot be disconnected and seen in isolation from each other.  Therefore, here after the resurrection Jesus no longer promises the gift of the Holy Spirit, he makes it a command.   Hear Jesus’ command, “he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” (John 20:22 ESV)

Although the Holy Spirit is a gift, the ten apostles are commanded to “receive” the Holy Spirit.  Some might say, Thomas did not receive the Holy Spirit a week later.  However, Thomas, the doubting one, receives the peace and then receives the Holy Spirit after Jesus gives him the command to believe. 

Receiving the Holy Spirit and believing are one in the same thing.  If you don’t believe, you don’t receive the Holy Spirit.  If you believe Jesus, you receive the Holy Spirit and allow the Holy Spirit to put off all doubts, as well as beliefs in the self and the world that oppose Jesus Christ and his Word.  One who allows the Holy Spirit to do this, allows God’s Word to remain supreme and lives in peace, despite how much the world hates you for bearing the peace of God.

Jesus ordains the eleven apostles in two ways.  The ten get one command, to “Receive the Holy Spirit”. Thomas, the doubter, however, gets five very practical commands. 

He said to Thomas in the presence of the other ten, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.” (John 20:27 ESV)   Thomas then makes the confession of belief, “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28 ESV) Not only is Jesus, master or Lord, but Thomas confesses him as God. 

The eleven apostles have received the Holy Spirit and the peace of God which surpasses all human understanding, so their hearts and minds are guarded in Christ Jesus (Phil 4:7).  The eleven apostles and all other disciples need the Holy Spirit to guard their hearts and minds.  The treatment Jesus received, they received and more, as the body of Christ, the church, grew.

We hear the high priest questioned them,  saying, “We strictly charged you not to teach in this name, yet here you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching, and you intend to bring this man’s blood upon us.”  But Peter and the apostles answered, “We must obey God rather than men.  The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree.  God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Saviour, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.  And we are witnesses to these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him.” (Acts 5:27b–32 ESV)

Here again, God’s Word and the Holy Spirit are connected.  The Acts of the Apostles are really the acts of the Holy Spirit and the Word of God.  The apostles are the means through which the word and the Holy Spirit work.

Today we need God’s Word and the Holy Spirit to function as church.  In John chapter fourteen to sixteen Jesus prepares his eleven disciples with his peace, teaching them about the hatred of the world, loving one’s neighbour, and the coming of the Holy Spirit.

Just as Jesus appointed twelve apostles from the disciples and sent them out.  Pastors have been called and sent to shepherd the flock, to be under shepherds and slaves, of Christ and those sheep whom Christ has called them to serve.  Similar to the apostles, they serve in the love of Christ with the command to bind and loose sinners and their sins, by the power of the Holy Spirit and the word of God, in the stead of Christ.  

We call this the office of the keys in the Lutheran Church.  Those who reject the call to repentance, actively work against God’s work through his servants, to bind their sin to the cross and free them, a sinner.  They’re in danger of sinning against the Holy Spirit, as their sin remains free from the cross, treating Christ’s crucifixion with contempt.

During Jesus’ ministry, he also sent out seventy-two disciples ahead of where he went.  The post-Pentecost church is a church of disciples and disciples called in the apostolic tradition to be pastors.  Disciples are learners of Jesus Christ, students of the Holy Spirit.  Parishioners and Pastors, alike, are all disciples in the body of Christ. 

John tells us what being a disciple is, at the beginning of Revelation, “To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” (Revelation 1:5b –6 ESV)

Every one of us are priests in God’s kingdom, called to practise our priesthood in the world, by loving others with forgiveness as the Father has forgiven us.  Inside God’s church, however, we live in a two-fold priesthood.  This has been the case throughout the history of God’s redemption of humanity.

God called Moses and Aaron to be his mediators or priests for Israel, so he could consecrate Israel through them, saying, “if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” (Exodus 19:5–6a ESV)

The Apostle Peter picks this up calling all disciples of Christ’s body “living stones” and Christ “the corner stone”.   He says, “As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter 2:4–5 ESV)

In these days of disobedience, it seems God’s peace has disappeared.  To some it has for the very reason that they have not received the Holy Spirit, nor have they hung onto God’s Word.

John speaks further to this in our situation today, saying, “Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us. But you have been anointed by the Holy One, and you all have knowledge.” (1 John 2:18–20 ESV)

You have been anointed in baptism, as one in the royal priesthood of believers.  Don’t be ignorant to God’s Word nor the world’s influence on you and God’s church.  Remain in God’s kingdom, remain in Jesus Christ, receive his Word, allow it to breathe the Holy Spirit on you, and the Holy Spirit to breathe Christ in you.

And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4:7 ESV) Amen. 

C, Easter Sunday, The Resurrection of our Lord - 1 Corinthians 15:19-26 "Jesus' Fruitful Rs"

1 Corinthians 15:19–26 (ESV) If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.  But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.  For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.  But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.  Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power.  For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.  The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

If you were asked, “What are the three Rs?”  What would be your answer?  Once upon a time most would have said, “Reading, Writing, and arithmetic (or reckoning)”.  Even though the words don’t begin with “R” they all have that strong “R” sound in their first syllables.

To ask the question of Google, “What are the three Rs?” There is a surprising number of variations.

Another educationally based three Rs are to Read, Reason, and Recite.  In the economy one might look to financial Relief, economic Recovery, and then economic Reform.  These were the three Rs President Roosevelt sought to implement when he entered office.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle are the philosophical three Rs and they’re also the environmental three Rs. These three can be a climate change mantra or even just a commonsense economical use of earthly resources.

Motivationally one might give, Rewards, Recognition, and Reinforcement to move people and productivity in an organisation.

Community orderliness calls for Rhythm, Routines, and Relationships; and those relationships call for Respect, Restraint, and Responsibility.  Marriage calls for Resilience, Respect, and Responsiveness.  In early childhood learning the focus is on Relationships, Repetition, and Routines.

The three R focus for God toward humanity is to Ransom, to Redeem, and to Reconcile. These are the relational three Rs of God to restore the fellowship humanity lost when sin enter the world through Adam and Eve.   Three things led to their sin.  They turned from God’s Reliability, no longer Relishing God, therefore they Required to be like God. God was now less fruitful to them then the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

So, God set about restoring this broken relationship so humanity could come back into fellowship with him.

During the Lenten season we have been called in God’s Word to Reflect, Repent, and be Reconciled.  Lent is a penitential season in the church year.  It is a season of sorrowful reflection, where we’re called to look at ourselves in the mirror of God’s Word and see our sins.  But not just our sins, but also the fruitfulness of God in his giving of a perfect fruit, the first fruit Jesus Christ, through whom we have freedom to continually have our humanity cleansed. 

The Holy Spirit shows us our sin in God’s Word, or the Holy Spirit causes us to know our sin by sending a servant to show us our error.  Therefore, reflection of the self, directed by the Holy Spirit, sees the call to repentance, as a gift, so a child of God can freely repent.  After reflection and repentance occurs, a repentant person knows they have been reconciled to God, as a child of God.  There repentance is not a work to earn salvation, but rather a willing reception of what God has done, what he continues to do, and what he will continue to do as we live and die in him.

In Jesus’ death, the ransom for your sin has been paid in full.  In his sinless death, he was raised as our Redeemer.  And now we are reconciled to God as his children.

So as a child of God what are your three Rs?   Well, there are not just three Rs, there are many Rs that God gifts us with, now that we’re his children. From Jesus’ resurrection we receive, Rebirth, Renewal, Restoration, Regeneration, Righteousness, Reconciliation, Respite, Relief, Rest, Re-creation and Holy Recreation.

Jesus himself is the new fruit of the resurrection.  The old tree of good and evil no longer grows in God’s Garden.  It has no place next to the Tree of Life, Jesus Christ, the fruitful tree of the Resurrection — the tree of Rebirth, Renewal, and Recreation.  The tree of knowledge of good and evil is dead to you in Jesus’ death and resurrection.  You know it because he shows you how good you must be to overcome your evil, and in that shows you your fruitlessness that leads to death.

In Christ’s resurrection Paul proclaims, “Jesus is the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.  For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.  For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.  But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.  Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power.  For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.  The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” (1 Corinthians 15:19–26 ESV)

Paul explains we are made alive in Christ; his resurrection is the hope of our resurrection.  We bear the new fruit of the resurrection which is destroying all the fruits of good and evil, every rule, authority, and power, of and in ourselves, the world, and the devil.  Let your faith in good and evil die with the death of death!  True life is living in the fruit of Jesus Christ.

As you tarry between the death of eternal death in baptism and your human nature’s earthly death, the Holy Spirit wills you to live in the three Rs of God’s fruitful righteousness and faith in Jesus Christ – that is Renewal, Repentance, and Rest.  Amen.

C, Maundy Thursday - All readings "Feasting and Foot Washing"

There is a greet paradox in the readings for Maundy Thursday.  The Old Testament reading tells us of what happened when God passed over Egypt and handed out judgement on the gods of Egypt.   This is a powerful picture of the destroyer, passing through Egypt, killing the firstborn sons of those who did not paint the blood of the Passover Lamb over the door frames of their homes.  The Israelites who did, were spared death as God moved to free them from slavery under Pharoah, four hundred years after Israel found a haven from famine under Joseph in Egypt.

Then we have the picture of Jesus washing feet.  Not a glamorous picture by any stretch of the imagination.  This is a picture of servanthood.  A picture of stooping down in vulnerability without much clothing, taking off other’s footwear, and washing their feet.  Washing someone else’s feet today might seem humiliating enough, dealing with body odour or fungal rashes.  But washing the feet of those who walked in the dusty filth of Roman roads in footwear such as sandals, washing feet was a very unsavoury task.  This was a job for the lowest of slaves.

So, we have this pictorial paradox before us.  God passing over Israel, but God the Son stopping over the feet of his apostles, to wash their feet.

Simon Peter pridefully shuns Jesus in his attempt to enact a servant’s cleansing of Peter’s feet. According to Peter, this was not a job for the Messiah!  But little did Peter understand that this was a demonstration of the duties the Messiah needed to perform physically and spiritually, so all would have a part in the cleansing of the cross.  Little did Peter know, Jesus would commission him and the apostles, after the resurrection, in sharing the glorification of God in what Jesus taught them, how he served them, and in what they witnessed at the cross.

Little did Peter know that Jesus would have to pass over Peter’s sin of denying him three times and then restore him to lead the church in “feeding the lambs”.  Peter and the apostles in their witness and proclamation of what happened to Jesus would cleanse those who allowed Jesus to cover and cleanse their hearts with his blood.   

Beginning the start of the three-day event of Jesus’ death and resurrection always occurs near the Jewish Passover.  This is why Easter Sunday is not nailed down to a single date.  Easter Sunday is a movable feast in the church calendar year.  It occurs after the Paschal full moon. 

The Hebrew calendar is a lunar calendar, and the Passover occurs on the 15^th day of the month of Nisan, the first month of the Hebrew Year.  This relates to the spring equinox in the northern hemisphere; that is the 21^st of March, in our calendar.  Therefore, the Easter festival begins on the first Sunday, after the first full moon (that is, the Paschal full moon) after the 21^st of March.  Easter Sunday always falls between the 22^nd of March and the 25^th of April.

Maundy Thursday means mandate or commandment Thursday and it’s connected with Jesus’ foot washing in John’s Gospel and Jesus’ institution of the Last Supper in the synoptic Gospels. 

The time of the Passover differs between John’s Gospel and the synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke.  The Passover begins in John at six pm Friday evening and concludes at six pm Saturday.  Therefore, John refers to the Passover occurring on the Sabbath in his Gospel as a high day.  In the synoptic Gospels the Passover begins on Thursday evening and ends at six pm Friday when the Sabbath (Saturday) begins.

This means the Passover feast in John’s Gospel occurs when Jesus is already in the tomb, after 6pm on Friday evening (the Sabbath).  Hence, John’s Gospel brings to the fore, the theological truth of Jesus’ servanthood in the foot washing.  Also in John’s Gospel account, the Passover preparation of slaughtering the Passover Lamb is aligned to the same time as Jesus is crucified on the cross, so our sin is passed over with the spilling of his blood.

In the synoptic Gospels the Lambs were slaughtered for the Passover on Thursday evening, where afterwards Jesus shares in the Passover meal, come Last Supper, with the twelve disciples.

Peter and the disciples did not understand the significance of the foot washing, nor what Jesus did at the Last Supper.  They thought they were just remembering the Israelites’ escape from Egypt and following God’s command to remember and eat the Passover.  But this supper of remembrance was the Last Supper they had with Jesus Christ before his death and resurrection, and the first celebratory communion where our being passed over, from death to life, would be connected eternally to Jesus’ death and resurrection.  But even more so, this celebratory commanded meal, looks forward to the heavenly eternal feast after our eternal resurrection from death.

That means now the church gathers regularly for a new feast to continue the remembrance of what Jesus did, what happened to him after he did it, and what’s in store for you in receiving and believing what he did and commands!

With his word, Jesus connects the Last Supper with a new commandment!  To take, to eat, and to drink, the bread and the wine as his body and blood.  The blood of the lamb that covered the lintel of the doorframe of the Israelite homes in Egypt, now, physically and spiritually covers the frames of believers in the consecration of the bread and wine.  Jesus commands us to consecrate the bread and the wine in remembrance of God’s action in Jesus’ incarnation, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension to his right hand.  We are commanded to do all this in remembrance, but we also do it in celebration of our forgiveness of sins, the life we receive from Jesus through faith, and the hope of our resurrection and salvation.

The other command Jesus gives on this Last Supper at the first Maundy, mandate, or commandment Thursday is the church’s command to love as he has loved us.  The servanthood love of Jesus’ foot washing and the celebration of the Sacrament of Holy Communion are now connected with our forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation.

In the Early Church the celebration of the sacrament was called a love feast.  Those outside the church were suspicious of it as some kind of debaucherous orgy of human pleasure seeking.  Indeed, Paul had to correct the Corinthians when the love feast began to turn into a pursuit of personal pleasures to the detriment of the community gathered in Christ.

Tonight, we continue the celebrations of having our sin passed over and covered by the blood of Jesus Christ.  Paradoxically, we also have Jesus’ command not to pass over our neighbour in sharing that same love, which he shares with us at the cross and continues to do so as we receive the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation in the mandated meal of his body and blood.

Our meal is one of remembrance, but not just that.  It’s the refuelling of our being to be outwardly looking!  We’re not hidden away from the world as the disciples were on the day of Jesus’ resurrection.  But rather, God prepares us for his service as we leave this place, each time we receive his love in the body and blood of Jesus Christ.  God empowers you and me to take that forgiveness to the world as have the apostles and countless disciples ever since.  Amen.

C, Palm/Passion - Philippians 2:5–11 "Cross the Crevasse"

Philippians 2:5–11 (ESV) 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. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 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.

The world is in trouble!  Everyone is running for their lives.  As people run, they cut adrift anything that might slow their efforts in escaping the trouble that looms large, like ominous storm clouds building and swirling.  You too, run for your life!  You see others lightening their loads and running on ahead, you contemplate doing the same thing.  You overtake a person who has stopped to cut away excess weight.  Soon, they too run past, with less on their backs than you.

Up ahead, those who have run ahead have stopped, they appear frantic and helpless, like chickens in a chook house invaded by a hungry fox.  You arrive with those who are milling around like startled sheep swirling and shunting each other in the yard.  Then it comes into view, a dirty great big crevasse has opened up in the earth. 

The world is trembling and in the violence of its quaking and shaking, the ground has opened up.  No one can work out how to get across.  It’s too far to jump, and it’s too deep to scale down, cross, and climb the other side.  Anyone who tries is a dead man. Furthermore, at the bottom bubbling larva boils and surges up from eternal depths, turning everything to ash before it even reaches the liquid orange fire.  You can feel its intention to incinerate you, just looking over the edge. 

Others arrive seeking their escape from the same erupting earthquake and melting mountains making their way to meet the molten abyss.  At the edge they gather with you, sandwiched between certain death on every side.  It’s a picture not unlike Moses and the Israelites trapped between Egypt and the Red Sea.  But this red sea is not a sea of water, it’s a sea of red fire!

Great minds gathered with children.  Youthful strength gathered with the elderly.  A unity of military might, greater than that of the United States and China combined, all gather at the edge nervously awaiting their fate.  There’s absolutely nothing they can do.  There’s not a desire or a piece of earthly wisdom that can help this situation!

But from what is humanity running?  And towards what is the chasm they’re running?  It all sounds like a farfetched action movie where the hero pulls off the impossible.  It sounds like an epic battle between humankind and mother nature’s climate change, or a menace from outer space! But it’s not!  It’s much simpler than that.  

The trouble in the world from which humanity is seeking to escape, and the horror to which it arrives is the abyss of ourselves, our humanity, our mortality.  It’s not a make-believe movie script, but the very real everyday struggle of your existence.  Human beings being human means we’re mortal. What are synonyms for being mortal?  In short, human existence is deadly, terminal, transient, temporary, or fatal. 

It matters not how many scientists hypothesise! Nor how many sports or militaries amount might! Nor how many wordsmiths philosophise! Nor how many theologians divide and dilute the Word of God! Nor how much makeup we try to manicure and beautify our being! From the greatest to the least, we cannot escape being human, being mortal!  The greatest fear in a human being, is not being anymore!   

In Philippians chapter two Paul demonstrates how Jesus has crossed the ravine of impossibility, and calls each of us to trust in him alone to cross the crevasse for our salvation.  We hear, “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus”. (Philippians 2:5 ESV)

What is yours in Christ Jesus is a “ God-given-gut-discernment” since “mind” here comes from a Greek word meaning midriff.  This “gut instinct” is not born of your feelings though. Rather, in Jesus Christ, you have been given the Holy Spirit who gives us understanding of God’s Word in this troubled world.  Jesus’ gut instinct to look to our Father alone, is now yours.

Paul continues, “though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped”. (Philippians 2:6 ESV)

The form of God, or morph of God, means Jesus shares in the divine nature of God, and therefore, is God.  He is the second member of the eternal Trinity!  Yet, he didn’t equal himself with God.  Unlike Adam and Eve, he didn’t seek to be “like God” and allow desire within, to take a hold of his divine nature, and grasp it, as they took a hold of fruit from the tree of knowledge and evil.

Instead of grasping his divine right, he did the opposite and emptied himself and willingly allowed himself to be born “like man”, in the likeness of man.  But even lower than man, he willingly allowed himself to be pushed through the birth canal of suffering, to walk the way of death as the servant slave of all people.  Jesus emptied himself and became the Son of Man.

Then Paul says, “And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2:8 ESV)

Picture that! Being knowingly and willingly born into flesh that is fatally flawed.  Just like us caught between the fatality of birth and the hellish chasm of death, Jesus knowingly allowed himself to be born into the shadow of death under Herod the Great and the suffering and death of the cross, to not only endure the human birth canal but to be pushed further and deeper into the depths of hell.

Then we hear, “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name”. (Philippians 2:9 ESV)

God “highly exalted” him, in the Greek is a single word with two parts meaning to “over elevate”.  Both parts of the Greek word have their origins in the Greek word “hyper”. 

One could say that after Jesus allowing the two steps of humiliation to occur, being born into death, and then being delivered over to death, albeit innocently and without sin, God then “hyper hypered” him in a two-part exaltation, as it were!  Jesus’ faithfulness to God as a Son and his faithfulness to us as the fatal servant Son of Man is the reason for God’s hyper exaltation of Jesus and his name!

 After all, Jesus is “the One” who calmly walks through convulsing crowds of panicking people.  He was born and baptised into mortality; to be a human in the face of death, that we’re not.  In fact, Jesus Christ was the only human ever born for the sole purpose to die.  A human being, intentionally being human without the fear of his humanity.  Jesus feared our Heavenly Father more than his humanity and its death and was faithful to his Father unto death.

This is why he calmly walked to the edge of humanity and allowed himself to be lifted up in hellishness on the cross, before being delivered into death’s dominion and separation from God, at his descent into hell. 

However, the innocence of his suffering and death, his holy humanity, was a light not even the darkness of hell’s death could extinguish.  Therefore, God raised him to his right hand, on the other side of the ravine of eternal death.  The mortal is now swallowed by immortality, death is swallowed by true life.

There will come a time when all people shall kneel at the name of Jesus Christ and confess him, to the glory of God the Father.  Those who have bowed to him will continue doing so with eternal joy.  But those who have trusted in their humanity, cutting Christ from their lives to flee immediate troubles, cutting back God’s Word to work their own ways, seemingly cutting off Christ for shallow success, will moan that they didn’t seek him before their mortality failed to save them.

As Paul says to the Philippians, I say to you, “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:12–13 ESV)

God has now implanted in you the knowledge of Jesus Christ, while you live in a world that’s in trouble.  Allow the Holy Spirit to teach you with God’s Word, what to discard, as you advance to the edge of your mortality. Don’t cut off Christ and the cross he calls you to carry.  Work out you salvation with fear and trembling, discarding your deadly understanding of good and evil, and in its place allow a Holy Spirit guided knowledge of what makes your humanity eternal — to cross the crevasse with Christ. Amen.

C, Midweek Lent 5 - Luke 23:48 "Beating the Breast"

Luke 23:48 (ESV) And all the crowds that had assembled for this spectacle, when they saw what had taken place, returned home beating their breasts.

To beat one’s breast is an interesting term not commonly used today.  We might thing of Tarzan’s action, making his telltale call to bring together the primates of the jungle as he beats his breast with macho monkey zeal, then swings through the trees to face his foe.

But in reality, beating one’s breast is not so much an action, rather it’s a symbolic expression, for a person who is downcast in spirit, angry, or expressing woe and distress.  

In the bible we hear of beating one’s breast apart from being beaten by someone else.  Saint Paul speaks figuratively of pummelling his body, so he does not lose the eternal prize saying, “So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified”. (1 Corinthians 9:26–27 ESV)

Back in Luke’s Gospel, chapter eighteen, we hear of the judge, in the parable of the persistent widow, who says to himself, “Though I neither fear God nor respect man, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming.” (Luke 18:4–5 ESV)

Further on in chapter eighteen, Luke focuses in on the reason for beating one’s breast in the parable of the pharisee and the tax collector where we hear of the tax collector who did not trust in himself, nor his righteousness.  Jesus says, “But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18:13–14 ESV)

Beating one’s breast, biblically speaking, is not an act of psyching up the inner spirit, rather it’s an act of humility where one realises the truth of the situation, or they see the spiritual reality within themselves.

The crowd who had gathered for the Passover feast at Jerusalem welcomed Jesus as the Messiah. They saw him as the king whom they hoped would restore the rule of David.  They hoped Jesus would have freed them from Roman rule.  Yet instead of turning and tossing Pilate out of the palace, Jesus turned towards the temple and tossed out those he accused of making God’s house a den of robbers.  

It took only a week for the mob, who welcomed Jesus, to turn and crucify him.  The crowd was easily agitated by a few who made false allegations against Jesus.  They were whipped into a frenzy by activists to act in one accord. These were those who behaved more like Tarzan, moving the mob, stirring individual spirits in uncompromising confusion, moved by the desire to deal out death and destruction on the holy innocence of God’s own Son.  With one accord evil justice was dealt out upon the “Good One” given by God, Jesus Christ, who was sent to serve humanity.

Once the mob’s collective behaviour moved those with authority to sinfully act in fear, the crowd watched the spectacle unfold on that Passover Friday, on the way of suffering, via dolorosa, the way of the cross.

In Lent we are called to understand,  that the passions of our flesh, meet the paschal passion of Christ on the cross.  This is the place where our defiling desires meet the purifying suffering of the Holy Sinless One.  We are reminded of our part in the passion of Jesus Christ, where our sinfulness is easily whipped up into a frenzy because of the fears of losing our idols – our pride, popularity, pleasures, and possessions.

On the day of Jesus’ crucifixion, we hear what the crowd received as the product of their passions fallen on Jesus Christ. “And all the crowds that had assembled for this spectacle, when they saw what had taken place, returned home beating their breasts.” (Luke 23:48 ESV) In one accord the crowd began the day calling for the crucifixion of Christ.  At the end of the day they went away with one accord convicted for crucifying Christ.

On the cross the Holy Spirit caused them to see themselves, the crassness of their passion for popularity, pleasure, and possessions.  They walked away beating their breasts knowing that if the Holy One of God can die, what chance have they got of avoiding death when he who is good, received evil from their evil collaboration?

Your sinful passions are put before you to ponder at Lent.  To see the spectacle of Christ on the cross, crucified unjustly for the desires of your humanity that joins in sinful accord with all people of all time.

But right at the place where our passions point us out as guilty, God points out our Paschal Passover.  The Paschal Lamb has taken away our sin.  We beat our breasts for what we’ve done, what we’ve done to him in our sinful human nature!  He was beaten, bruised and hung, in the spectacle where we once crowded around the cross of his crucifixion.  The cross where you and I rightly should have been crucified!

So, the Holy Spirit moves us with one accord to beat our breast.  But also let the Holy Spirit daily raise you to life anew in Jesus Christ, the Sinless One crucified for you!    Jesus did not stay dead.  Yet the death he died has defeated the defiling desires of your heart, that should have meant our death.  Now after Jesus’ resurrection, the Holy Spirit wills you to live each day in the hope of our resurrection, to live in his Word, as he continues to move us to put off and pass over our defiling passions as we walk the way of the cross, with Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Heavenly Father, help us to resolutely set out faces towards our heavenly goal in Jesus Christ.  As the Holy Spirit moves us to pass over and put off our pride, pleasures, possessions, and popularity, as we suffer in giving up these things and are persecuted by others for doing so, let the Spirit remind us that the night of suffering and death is passing away and the dawning eternal light of love awaits those trust in Jesus Christ and not themselves.  Amen.