He Is Risen, As He Said

He Is Risen, As He Said

Matthew 28:1-10

     On this glorious Easter morning, our greeting to one another as we heard it in the opening words of the service is, “Christ is Risen” and the response is “He is risen indeed.”  What a wonderful way to start off an Easter celebration and remind one another of the good news that goes out to all the world through our proclamation of resurrection and our songs of praise.  As we hear the Easter Gospel, we can hear the words of the angel who greeted the women at the tomb.  The angel’s greeting was similar to our Easter greeting but it was a little bit different.  “He is not here, for He has risen, as He said.”  There is great meaning in the words of the angel.  As we think about them this morning, may we praise God for the great victory that has been won for us through the resurrection of Jesus and may we find hope in those words for our lives now and for our all the Easters that God gives us in this life.

     “He has risen, as He said.”  Just as He said He would, He rose from the dead.  There was no doubt on Friday afternoon that Jesus had died.  His lifeless body was placed in the tomb that had been provided by Joseph of Arimathea.  But the Old Testament prophets, particularly David in Psalm 16:10, had said that the Lord would not let His Holy One see corruption.  Jesus, Himself, spoke about His death and resurrection to His disciples several times.  It should not have been a surprise to them that the tomb was empty on that morning after the Sabbath.  It was just as He said.  When the angel said, “He has risen, as He said,” they should have looked at one another and said, “So that’s what He meant.”  Yet we are told that they were filled with fear and locked themselves up, not knowing what was going to happen next.  Only after they had seen Him with their own eyes did they finally believe. 

     Before you get too down on the disciples for their lack of faith, you have to admit that you are no better when you are faced with difficult or seemingly impossible tasks in your life, especially when it comes to your life of faith.  Faced with a challenge, your first reaction is often, “Oh, I could never do that.”  “What would I do?”  “There is no hope for that project.”  “I’m left with no hope of ever getting past this.”  I’m sure the disciples felt that same way after Jesus died on the cross.  “What are we going to do now?”  “We had such hopes for Israel and the Kingdom of God.   Now all hope is gone.”  They forgot His promises, just like you are tempted to forget the promises that God makes to you. 

     But His resurrection shows that His promises are sure.  “He has risen, as He said,” was the truth.  It was just as He said it would be.  That also gives us a sure hope that the rest of what Jesus said was the truth.  Think of some of the other things that Jesus said during His earthly ministry that are recorded for us in the Gospels.  Just in the last weeks of the Lenten season, the Gospel lessons included statements by Jesus that are identified as the “I AM” statements.  We heard, “I am the light of the world.”  He brings the light of God’s love to the darkness of sin and unbelief.  We also heard, “I AM the resurrection and the life, whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.”  You can also recall the words of Jesus before He ascended into heaven, “I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  Each one of those words and promises of Jesus gives the believer hope in this world of sin.  When the world around you seems to be closing in on you and the temptations seem like too much for you to endure, you can be reminded of Jesus’ promises that are true.  Because He kept His promise to rise from the grave, you have a sure and certain hope that He will continue to be the light of your world.  He is still the resurrection and the life and through His resurrection, you too will have life, new life now and life forever with Him in heaven.  He will be with you throughout your life.  Think of what that means for you.  You are never alone.  With that hope in your heart, you can face any challenge in your life. 

     When I use the word hope, you have to understand that this is a certain hope.  The things that you hope for, the things that you need in this life and in the life to come are yours.  There is no doubt about it.  Too often today we use the word hope when there is some doubt in our minds.  You might say, “I hope the Indians can turn things around and win the World Series.”  Are you saying that with certainty.  Probably not.  When you talk about the hope you have in Jesus for those things that He has promised to you like the forgiveness of sins, strength for your faith through the power of the Holy Spirit, eternal life in heaven, you can be sure that His promises are the truth and He will do what He has said.  His resurrection assures us that His promises are true and because of that, there should be no doubt in your mind that you will receive all the blessings that He promises to His people.

     That sounds great and it gives you hope and peace but you still have to deal with your sinful nature.  There will be times in your life when you may begin to wonder if God’s promises to you are as sure and certain as you thought they would be.  When you face trials in your life, and you can be sure that you will, your sinful nature will want you to question God’s goodness.  “Why is this happening to me?”  “What did I do to deserve this?”  It is usually those who are strong in their faith who have to struggle with this kind of temptation.  That shouldn’t surprise you when you think of who the devil is after.  He is after those who are strong so that he can try and get them to doubt.  The other folks he doesn’t need to worry about.  The devil wants to destroy all hope in those who are faithful.  It is a time like this that you can be reminded of Jesus’ resurrection and the fact that it was just as He said it would be.  His promises are sure.  He is always for us.  Nothing can separate us from His love. 

     There will be times when your faith is challenged.  The world around you is constantly sending out messages that challenge what you have learned from the Bible.  Perhaps like never before in your life, you are bombarded with propaganda that tells you to think for yourself, question authority, trust no one but yourself.  When your sinful nature is selfish anyway, that kind of message can be appealing and can tempt you to give up hope in the promises of Jesus.  That can lead you to lose your faith altogether.  When that temptation comes, it is good for you to remember that Jesus rose from the dead, just as He said.  All the other promises are sure as well.  There is hope in things that you can not see.  That is what faith is.  It’s given to us by the work of the Holy Spirit working through the Means of Grace.  That is where true hope is found. 

     It is that hope that comforts you and gives you real peace when the end of your earthly life is near.  Even though you may think that you have lots of time in this life, the hope in the promises of Jesus for eternal life keeps you strong in the faith.  Whatever time you find yourself in this life, you can expect to find temptation, but you also will always have the assurance of the resurrected and living Lord Jesus to bring you comfort, peace, strength and hope.  That’s one of the reasons why we celebrate all the events in the life of Jesus every year.  That is why we make the Easter celebration so special.  Easter reminds us of new life.  Because Jesus lives, we shall live also.  We live for Him now and we live with Him forever in heaven.  Easter brings us that sure and certain hope.   Amen 

Rev. Gerald Matzke
Zion Lutheran Church
Painesville, Ohio
Easter 2014

Christ, Our Great High Priest

Christ, Our Great High Priest

Hebrews 9:11-22

     The Epistle reading for today presents us with a visual image that is not very familiar to most of us.  It talks about a high priest.  I don’t think that any of us has ever seen a high priest so we might miss out on what the writer is trying to say.  The writer directed this letter to people who did know all about a high priest and what he would look like and what he did.  His point was, as you heard in the reading, that Jesus is our great high priest.  The original readers of this letter were Hebrews who knew all about Hebrew tradition and Hebrew worship and the work of the high priest.  They were people who had become believers or who were interested in Jesus and wanted to know more.  The writer does a wonderful job of starting with what they already knew about God and His promise of rescue through the Messiah and showing them that Jesus is truly the one who fulfilled all the prophecies about the Messiah, the Christ.  In this section he is showing how Jesus is our great high priest.  As we think for a few moments about what a high priest did and how Jesus carried out that role on our behalf, may we also see how that role was carried out on that night when Jesus ate the Passover meal with His disciples and instituted the Lord’s Supper for all His followers in the years to come.

     The priests who served the people of Israel came from the tribe of Levi.  When the land was divided after Israel came into the promised land after their forty years of wandering in the wilderness, the tribe of Levi did not receive their own land.  They were spread out throughout the other tribes so that they could serve as the religious leaders of the people.  They were trained in the law, especially as it applies to the religious lives of the people.  They carried out the sacrifices that were required in the law.  They served as examples of a Godly life and they brought the prayers of the people to the Lord.  Aaron, the brother of Moses, was the first high priest.  The robes and the breastplate containing the precious jewels that represented the twelve tribes and the head piece were all part of the clothing that the high priest would wear, following the Lord’s specific commands.  At the time of Jesus, the high priest was still very distinctive in the robes that were worn.  The high priest was also very powerful leader of the people and had a great influence over their religious lives.  As often is the case when someone has great power, there is the danger that the power can cause them to follow their own desires rather than the will of God.  We see that in the Passion Story as the leaders of the Jews ignored their own laws and customs in bringing Jesus to trial.  In spite of all of that, they were still the religious leaders of the people carrying out their traditional roles as priests.  They were seen as examples of a righteous life.  They knew all the customs and traditions and led the people in the observances of all the festivals.  They prayed for the people.  They brought the prayers of the people before the Lord in the Temple.  They were also the ones who carried out the sacrifices of the animals that were brought as atonement for the sins of the people. 

     Into this context then the writer to the Hebrews identifies Jesus as our great High Priest.  In order for this to make sense to the people then and for us now we need to see how Jesus fits the role of the High Priest according to God’s direction.  As the priests were to serve as an example to the people of a Godly life, Jesus, the Son of God, lived a perfect life.  You can’t get a better example than that.  His life and His teaching showed that a true Godly life is not just a matter of putting on a good show for the folks around you.  It is a life that sincerely responds to God’s love and mercy and follows the summary of the Law, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. “  One thing about looking to Jesus and His life and His teaching is that we are confronted with how badly we have fallen short of His example and His teaching.  We have sinned.  But it is important that we realize that so that we look to Him alone for the forgiveness of our sins.  We can’t imitate His righteousness perfectly so we need the help that only He can give.

     Another part of the role of the priest was to pray for the people.  He would intercede for them to the Father.  As we look at the life of Jesus, we see how He prayed for His disciples, not only the ones who were with Him but for all disciples of all time.  Sometime in the same evening when Jesus celebrated the Passover and instituted the Lord’s Supper that we celebrate today, He spoke with them at length about many things.  We find this especially in the Gospel of John.  In chapter 17 of John’s Gospel we find a long prayer that has become known as Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer, where He prays for their safety and for their faithfulness.  In Romans 8:34, we hear that Jesus intercedes for us with the Father.  He knows that we have sinned and He places Himself and His crucifixion as the punishment for our sins so that we could be declared righteous and be reconciled to the Father.  In that way He is also our Great High Priest. 

     As I mentioned before, the priests would also be the ones who would actually carry out the sacrifices that the people would bring to the temple as the atonement for their sins.  All of that sacrificing, the shedding of blood as the punishment for sin, pointed ahead to the one great sacrifice that would be made for the sins of all people.  Jesus was that sacrifice when He gave up Himself on the cross.  The shedding of His holy, precious blood and His innocent suffering and death paid the price for our sins.  He knew that was going to happen.  He prayed that night in the Garden of Gethsemane that, if it were possible, the cup would pass from Him, but not according to His will but according to the Father’s will.  Of course, it was the Father’s plan from the beginning that the power of the devil would be overcome by the sacrifice of His only Son.  It was foretold by the prophets in the Old Testament and now it was going to happen, once for all.  He is truly our great high priest.  He carried out all the functions of a priest and He did it for you and for me. 

     On this Maundy Thursday, commemorating His new command to His disciples, we are gathered to be reminded of that command and to be strengthened by the Holy Spirit, working in us through the Means of Grace, the Word and the Sacraments.  He reminds you that you are to serve one another as He has served you.  When He washed His disciples’ feet that night, He was making it clear that true discipleship means humble service to one another. 

     He also gave a new command as He instituted a special part of the Passover meal to be used to remember His suffering and death.  In the bread and the wine of the meal, He gives you His body and blood, that was shed for the forgiveness of your sins.  It becomes a part of you through your eating and drinking.  As you receive it with faith in the words, “given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins,” you receive exactly what He promises. 

     You also receive the power of the Holy Spirit, working through the Sacrament to strengthen you for your new life in Christ.  You are brought back to Jesus’ life and His teaching as the example for your life.  It is through the power of the Holy Spirit in the Sacrament that you are strengthened to love the Lord with all your heart, soul and mind and love your neighbor as yourself.  You are given the power to overcome the influence of the devil, the world and your own human nature.  When the temptations come, you know that you are not alone.  You have the power that Jesus, your High Priest, has given to you to

overcome all that tries to separate you from God.  May that power be with you throughout your life as you follow your Great High Priest’s commands.   Amen.

Rev. Gerald Matzke

Zion Lutheran Church

Painesville, Ohio

April 17, 2014  Maundy Thursday

I Am the Resurrection and the Life

I Am the Resurrection and the Life

John 11:1-50

     What happens when death meets life?  That is really loaded question because there are many ways that you could interpret it.  In our world today, we could think of what happens to a person when he or she is faced with their own death.  There can be a number of reactions.  Often people are filled with fear.  To may people, death is considered a venture into the unknown and that can be very scary. To others, a confrontation with death can be a time to be calmly thankful to God for the final blessing of this troubled life.  To see death as the door to heaven puts a believer in frame of mind that confirms what we have always believed.  When God wants to take me from this life, I am ready to go.  All things are in His hands.

     You could also think of my original question applying to those who are left here when a loved one dies.  The survivors are faced with the reality of the death of a loved one and that can be a very sobering and disturbing meeting of death and life.  It causes you to evaluate your own relationship with God.  It forces you to perhaps think for the first time in your life about the reality of death.

     My opening question can also apply to the situation that we find in the Gospel lesson for today.  Death met life as Jesus summoned Lazarus from the grave.  Death met life as Mary and Martha mourned for their departed brother and again when they rejoiced that Jesus had brought him back to life.  Death also met life as Jesus spoke to Martha about her faith in Him as the Messiah.  Death also met life a short time later as Jesus Himself died and rose again.  As we consider these confrontations between death and life, may your faith be strengthened as you see the great victory that was won for you by Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God, who is the Resurrection and the Life.

     The scene that is set for us by the Apostle John is one that might be uncomfortably familiar to many of you.  Jesus received word from Mary and Martha, his dear friends from Bethany, that their brother was very seriously ill.  Jesus knew that Lazarus was soon going to die but He also knew that this was going to be an occasion for Him to show His divine power over death and that through all that was going to happen, the glory of God would be displayed.  As Jesus approached the village of Bethany, Martha come out to greet Him and tell Him the news that Lazarus had died.  Martha was a woman of great faith in Jesus and she expressed the feeling that if Jesus had come sooner He could have healed Lazarus so that he would not have died.  Jesus assured her that Lazarus would rise again and Martha responded that she believed in the resurrection of the dead.  It is then that Jesus spoke the words that I read as our text.  “I am the resurrection and the life.  Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.  Do you believe this?”

     Martha’s beautiful confession of faith that follows can serve as a model for all Christians as we confess with our mouths and our hearts the faith that sustains us though life and that saves us.  “Yes, Lord,” she said, “I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”  It is that faith which makes the confrontation between death and life in your life a confident time for you.  As Jesus then raised Lazarus from the dead, He displayed the power that gave new meaning to His words about being the resurrection and the life.  As we look more closely at those words, may we see what they mean for us as we live now and look forward to living with our Lord forever in heaven.

     Jesus began with the words, “I AM.”  This may seem like the simple beginning of a sentence but they are very powerful when Jesus speaks them.  They take us back to when God spoke to Moses from the burning bush.  When Moses asked God how he should identify the one who sent him, God told him to tell the people that “I AM” had sent him.  The Lord is the great “I AM.”  Jesus, the Son of God, sent into the world to be the Savior is also “I AM.”  He is not just sent by God, He is God.  He is the resurrection and the life.  Those two words do not indicate two separate ideas.  They actually go hand in hand.  Resurrection means undoing the power of death and giving its opposite, life.  The life that Jesus gives is eternal life.  That life that Jesus gives is for all who believe in Him as Lord and Savior.  Even though we may face death now in this life here on earth, we shall live with Him eternally.  Death has no power over us because Jesus conquered the power of death and the devil and paid the price required by God for our salvation.  As our life here on earth comes to its end, we have our Lord’s promise that it will only usher us into the glory of heaven which is ours for all eternity.  It is ours, not because we deserve it, not because we have earned it by our good works, not because of our background and heritage, but simply by God’s grace.  It is ours by faith.  As Jesus added,  “Everyone who lives and believes in my shall never die.”  Living and believing in Christ implies a complete trust in Jesus alone for the forgiveness of our sins and the blessings of eternal life.  A complete trust also shows itself in a life of faith that is a response to the great gift of salvation that we have received.  Living in Christ is evidence that you believe in Jesus as your Lord and Savior.

     As we look at this event in the life and ministry of Jesus, you also have to see the connection between what Jesus said to Martha and His own death and resurrection.  What may not be so obvious at first is that this event had a direct connection to the plot by the Jews to have Jesus put away.  It was the raising of Lazarus that prompted the leaders of the Jews to find a way to silence Jesus.  He was gaining in popularity especially after the word travelled around that He had raised someone from the dead.  The Gospel lesson ends with the statement that from that time on they plotted to take His life.  It was His talk of resurrection that really stoked the fire in the hearts of the leaders of the Jews, many of whom did not believe in a resurrection.

     It is important that you realize that the death and resurrection of Jesus are more than simply historical events.  You have to look beyond the events and understand what they mean for you today.  In the death and resurrection of Jesus, you see, first of all, God’s plan of salvation for all mankind being carried out.  The death of Jesus shows us that God was serious when He made death the punishment for sin.  Adam and Eve were told that if they disobeyed God and ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil that they would surely die.  When they disobeyed, they began a process of ageing and death that has been a part of all mankind ever since.  God made sure that His people of the Old Covenant understood this by instituting the system of animal sacrifices as a way of making atonement for sins.  That all pointed ahead to the one great sacrifice that would be for the sins of all.  Even though He never sinned, Jesus died because our sins were laid on His shoulders.  He took our sin to the cross and He died a horrible death.

     His resurrection though shows us that God the Father was satisfied with His Son’s sacrifice.  It was the sufficient ransom for the sins of all.  It showed that all that Jesus said was the truth.  Most importantly for us is that because He lives, we shall live also.  His claims that we shall never die, in other words that we shall win the victory over death, are true and sure.  His resurrection guarantees our resurrection to life eternal. 

     The leaders of the Jews did not realize what they had before them.  They were blind to the truth of the message of repentance and forgiveness that was taught by John the Baptist and then by Jesus Himself.  Even after the High Priest, Caiaphas, made his prophetic statement before the Sanhedrin, they didn’t see what was happening and if they did, they ignored it because they were too concerned with their positions and their way of life.  Caiaphas said that Jesus had to die because it was better for them that one man died for the people than that the whole nation perish.  That is exactly what happened.

     Do you realize and appreciate what you have before you in this Lenten season?  Do you see Jesus as the one who died so that you would not have to perish?  The evidence is there for you. His resurrection proves His power.  It proves the truth of His word.  It proves that the Father’s anger over sin has been appeased and it proves that we too shall rise to be with Him forever in heaven.  May you be strengthened in your faith and trust in Jesus as the resurrection and the life.  May you view the remaining days of the Lenten season with a renewed sense of appreciation for the great gift of salvation that is yours in Christ Jesus.  May you say with Martha, “I believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, who as come into the world to be my Savior, the Resurrection and the Life.”  Amen.

Rev. Gerald Matzke

Zion Lutheran Church

Painesville, OH  44077

5th Sunday in Lent