Sermon
for Trinity 5, July 21, 2019
Grace and peace be multiplied to you from the God and Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, who in abundant mercy has given us a living hope through
the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Jeremiah 16:14-21 14Nevertheless, listen to this. The days are coming,
declares the Lord, when people will no longer say, “As surely as the Lord
lives, who brought the children of Israel out from the land of Egypt.” 15But they will say, “As surely as the
Lord lives, who brought the children of Israel out from the land in the north
and from all the lands to which he exiled them.” For
I will restore them to the homeland I gave to their fathers. 16Look, I
am sending for many fishermen, declares the Lord, and they will catch them. After that I will send for many hunters, and
they will hunt for them on every mountain, on every high hill, and in the
crevices of the rocks. 17My eyes are watching everything they do. It is not hidden from me, nor is their guilt
hidden from my eyes. 18But
first I will pay them double for their guilt and their sin, because they
defiled my land with the carcasses of their disgusting idols, and they have
filled my inheritance with their abominations.
19The Lord is my strength and my fortress, my refuge in
times of trouble. Nations will come to
you from the ends of the earth and say, “Our forefathers possessed only false
gods, worthless idols, and there was nothing good in them. 20Can a man make gods for
himself? Yes, but they are not
gods!” 21Therefore I will certainly teach them. This time I will teach them my power and my
strength, and then they will know that my name is the Lord.
The LORD gives hope for
His people.
Dear
fellow redeemed,
As He was being led out to Golgotha to be put to death on
the cross, Jesus gave the same warning that was given through the prophet,
Hosea, Then they will begin to say to the mountains, "Cover us!"
and to the hills, "Fall on us!" (Luke 23:30) A Judgment Day is coming, and it will be a
horrible day for everyone who has rejected the Lord of life.
Likewise,
judgment was soon to come upon the Children of Israel when Jeremiah wrote the
words of our sermon text, and God’s warning to them was just as shattering. The idolatry and wretched unfaithfulness of
God’s chosen people had reached its zenith and would be tolerated no longer. Neither would they be able to hide themselves
or to escape from the agents of God’s wrath.
Yet, even as He declared His intention to bring just punishment upon the
Children of Israel, The
LORD gives hope for His people.
In many
ways, the history of the nation of Israel serves as a warning, and a promise,
for all the people who come after them.
Here in Jeremiah’s prophecy, this is again evident. This chosen nation, a people that God had
lifted up out of slavery and degradation so that He could pour out His blessings
upon them in overwhelming abundance, had continually turned away from their
Savior to follow man-made idols, either of their heathen neighbors or their own
imaginations. And, because of their multi-generational
unfaithfulness to the one true God Who had loved them and cared for them, the
Israelites would, now, be given into the hands of destroyers.
Their
destruction would not be pretty: " Look, I am sending for many fishermen,
declares the Lord, and they will catch them.
After that I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt for them on
every mountain, on every high hill, and in the crevices of the rocks.” Just as a fisherman drags his catch with a
hook in the lip, so the best and brightest of Israel would be snared and
dragged away from the rich land their forefathers had been given into captivity
in exile. At the same time, vast numbers
of the people would be slaughtered as if for sport. The armies that were being sent to bring
judgment upon Israel
Sadly, the
Israelites had deceived themselves with the idea that the gods of their
neighbors would give them safety, and they listened to the false belief that
serving those dead idols would bring abundance to the land. Though they pretended to worship the God of
Abraham, the LORD was not fooled. He
declared, " My eyes are watching everything they do. It is not hidden from me, nor is their guilt
hidden from my eyes. But first I will
pay them double for their guilt and their sin, because they defiled my land
with the carcasses of their disgusting idols, and they have filled my
inheritance with their abominations.” Israel had been given that bountiful land
with the command to eliminate the idolatrous Canaanites, but they had instead
been beguiled by the idolatrous ways and had become a stench in God’s
nostrils. The reminder for us, today, is
that there is no wickedness hidden from God’s attention. Though He allows us to live in peace, the
Lord doesn’t fail to notice the deceitfulness of those who serve other gods.
You see,
when the LORD made Israel His chosen people, He had solemnly declared to them, "You shall have no other gods beside me…for
I the LORD your God am a
jealous God. I follow up on the guilt of
the fathers with their children, their grandchildren, and their
great-grandchildren, if they also hate me.” (Exodus 20:3, 5) This was part of
God’s covenant with Israel. God had
chosen them, solely, out of His pure mercy and grace. They didn’t deserve His love any more than
any other people, yet the LORD had poured out blessings upon Israel in rich
abundance. But, for generations, the
chosen people had turned aside from the Lord to seek help and pleasure from
man-made idols. Thus, God’s righteous anger
against Israel was long deserved.
It’s a sad fact that unbelieving parents often also
lead their children into unbelief. It is
also certain that apart from sincere faith in the Triune God, the end will only
be destruction and eternal condemnation.
That is the lesson we must learn from this part of history. Israel’s chief sin was unfaithfulness to
God. That, of course, led to all kinds
of other sins, but it was their lack of trust in the LORD that caused their downfall.
So, how about you and me? And, how about our nation? Do we stand in danger of God’s just wrath? Thinking about the present moral, ethical,
social, and political situation in our world confronts us with a sobering
reality, doesn’t it? We live in a nation
that God has blessed with freedom and wealth so immeasurably great that many,
many people of almost every nation in our world long to live within our borders
so that they, too, can share in the abundance of God’s blessing. Yet, at the same time, it appears as if our nation
has forgotten the source of these blessings, and our people have abandoned the
one true God to follow idols of human imagination and pagan neighbors. In light of this reality, therefore, we each
should ask ourselves, and answer truthfully, whether we ourselves have put all
our trust in the Savior God, or do we rely on the idols of our neighbors, our
works, or our own imaginations?
If we are honest, we will admit that our guilt is as
great as anyone who has lived before us.
We too have sometimes trusted in governments, in human reason, and in
the labors of our hands. We too may have
mistaken God’s forbearance as proof that we deserved every blessing He has
given us. At the minimum, we were born
trusting in anything but the God who created us and loved us with the sacrifice
of His Son. Through Jeremiah, then, God
reminds us that men do make gods for themselves, but they are not really gods,
only idolatrous and dangerous imaginations.
Like Israel, we also deserved God’s wrath, but
again, the answer is faith in the one true God—the God of Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob; the God who has made Himself known through His holy Scriptures; the God
who loved faithful and unfaithful people alike, so much so, that He sent His
only begotten Son to live and die for our redemption. Those who trust solely in the Triune God have
His promise of sure forgiveness and salvation, even as all others face His just
anger as did unfaithful Israel. Just as
they were hunted down, and snared by God’s avengers, so on the last day will
all the unbelieving masses of history be searched out from their hiding places
to face eternal judgment.
Thanks be to God, The LORD
gives hope for His people.
Through
Jeremiah, He promised, "The days are coming, declares the Lord, when
people will no longer say, ‘As surely as the Lord lives, who brought the
children of Israel out from the land of Egypt.’
But they will say, ‘As surely as the Lord lives, who brought the
children of Israel out from the land in the north and from all the lands to
which he exiled them.’ For I will
restore them to the homeland I gave to their fathers.” Yet again, God would demonstrate His love and
mercy for all the world to see. Those humbled
people would be redeemed from their captors as another foreshadowing of the
redemption God would accomplish for the whole world, and just as He rescued His
chosen people from their enemies, so God rescued both Jew and Gentile from the
snares of Satan and his fellow betrayers by the sacrifice of Jesus.
When Jeremiah heard God’s promise to restore a
remnant people into their promised land, he rejoiced: “The
Lord is my strength and my fortress, my refuge in times of trouble. Nations will come to you from the ends
of the earth." That is our confession as well. The true God who created all things is our
Refuge and our Fortress. Though we have
sinned against God, God’s Son paid double for our sins upon a cross outside
Jerusalem. In His mercy, God has wiped away our guilt through faith in Christ
Jesus. Since He bore the sins of the
whole world upon His innocent shoulders, Jesus has paid for your sins and mine;
He paid the sin-debt of our fathers, our children, our friends, and our
enemies. Now, in the day of affliction,
we have a hiding place that is sure. In
Christ Jesus, we have complete immunity from God’s righteous anger, because
Jesus received all of God’s wrath and just punishment. Jesus bore our condemnation so that we could
be restored to holiness in God’s presence.
And through faith in Jesus which the Holy Spirit brought to us through
Word and Sacrament, we have been restored to the rich promises God gave to
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
The LORD gives hope for His people. So that we might not be lost, the Lord
said, " Therefore I will certainly teach them.
This time I will teach them my power and my strength, and then they will
know that my name is the Lord.”
The nation of Israel saw many displays of God’s power and grace. Likewise, great things have been done for you
and me, as well, and the greatest display of God’s power and mercy is seen in
the resurrection of His Son from the grave.
There at the open tomb, we see His power over death and everything else that
could destroy us. There, we see how
Jesus’ great love, which caused Him to bear our sins and the punishment we
deserved, was rewarded with life everlasting.
And there at Jesus’ open tomb, we see our future: not of death but a
resurrection to everlasting life.
Unfaithful
Israel had to suffer the snares of fishermen and hunters sent to tear them away
from God’s blessing. Today, however, God
sends His fishermen to gather His elect into His kingdom of peace. In our Gospel lesson a few moments ago, we
heard Jesus call His first disciples to be fishers of men: fishermen Jesus appointed
to spread His good news to a world so in need of salvation. Still today, called servants of the Lord
continue in that role: sharing the good news of Jesus to a dying world. As you and I were made believers through
God’s gift of grace, He also called us to participate in sharing His good news
with those around us, so that more and more of those still lost may yet be
gathered in.
What does
this all mean for you and me? In Paul’s
letter to the Romans, we read, “For what
does Scripture say? ‘Abraham believed God, and it was credited
to him as righteousness.’" (Romans 4:3)
Likewise, because we, who had nothing to boast about before God, have
been given saving faith in Christ Jesus, you and I are among those who have
been declared righteous before God by faith, and thus, we receive an eternal
welcome into God’s heavenly kingdom, and with Jeremiah we confidently sing, “The Lord is my strength and my fortress, my refuge in times of
trouble.
Dear friends, God gave all of His Word so that you
and I would know without doubt that we have a Savior from sin and death. All the history recorded in the Bible has
that one purpose: to teach us about Christ and His salvation. The nation of Israel suffered much for their
unfaithfulness, and those who refused God’s mercy were cut off from life. However, everyone who believed and repented
of their sins, no matter how terrible, was given the sure hope of the
Savior. Their hope is also ours. Because of Christ Jesus, we have God’s
forgiveness and a home in heaven.
Everyone who trusts in Christ for forgiveness and salvation will live
with Him forever, because The LORD gives hope for
His people. Amen.
The peace
of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ
Jesus unto life everlasting. Amen.
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