Jesus pleads for you and me.

Sermon for New Year’s Eve, December 31, 2019

Now may the God of hope fill you with complete joy and peace as you continue to believe, so that you overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Jesus pleads for you and me.

Dear brothers and sisters of Christ,

            “Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?…Produce fruit in keeping with repentance!” Matthew 3:8)  So said John the Baptist to the leaders and teachers of Judea when they came out to challenge him.  Likewise, when some men came to Jesus assuming that certain Galileans and accident victims were worse sinners than others since God had allowed them to be tragically killed, Jesus used this parable as a continuation of His rather blunt answer: “But unless you repent, you will all perish too.” (Luke 13:5)  In other words, death is the everlasting end for anyone who does not repent.  On the other hand, salvation has been provided us, because Jesus pleads for you and me.

Luke 13:6-9  ⁶ He told them this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard.  He came looking for fruit on it, but he did not find any.  ⁷ So he said to the gardener, ‘Look, for three years now I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and I have found none.  Cut it down.  Why even let it use up the soil?’  ⁸ But the gardener replied to him, ‘Sir, leave it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put fertilizer on it.  ⁹ If it produces fruit next year, fine.  But if not, then cut it down.’” (EHV)

The first inclination a pastor might have, as he prepares to preach on this text, is to command people to produce fruit for the Lord.  At least, that was my temptation.  Yet, Jesus’ parable gives no command to the tree, even though it is in the tree that the owner seeks fruit.  Instead, in Jesus’ comparison, the gardener intercedes on the tree’s behalf with the promise of doing all he can to help the tree become productive.  Then having done so, the chips, we might say, would fall as they may.  What this parable shows us today is that

1.    Jesus pleads with us for our repentance.

2.    He pleads with the Father for time for us to repent.

3.    And through Word and Sacrament He feeds and nourishes us for repentance.

In telling this parable, Jesus was pleading for those questioning people to repent.  He was also pleading with us to repent.  What does it mean to repent?  Does it mean just saying you are sorry for something?  Does it mean there is some penance we must do to qualify a confession as repentance?

When little children hurt a playmate or take a toy without asking, they are often told, “Say you are sorry.”  From that experience growing up, it isn’t all that uncommon for people to assume that repenting means just saying you are sorry, and the hurt party should just get over it.  Yet, our consciences somehow tell us that isn’t exactly the definition of repentance, because the hurt is often still there.  So, what does repentance mean in the kingdom of God?

In applying this parable, we need to realize that it is directed at the citizens of God’s kingdom.  The Jews were in that kingdom by their faith in God’s covenant promises as demonstrated by their use of circumcision, which was the sign of God’s covenant with Israel. 

We are members of God’s kingdom by a new covenant, and the sign for us is Baptism.  Baptism gives rebirth to spiritual life, works faith in the sinner, cleanses us of our sins, and welcomes us into God’s kingdom.  And in His kingdom, Jesus pleads for our fruit of repentance.

The literal meaning of repentance is to turn around.  Remorse for our sins is certainly part of repentance, but not the only part.  Along with sorrow for what we have done wrong comes seeking to do what is right, and most important of all, repentance in the Kingdom of God means turning away from pretending to please God by ourselves, because our works will never do it.  Instead, repentance means that we will find our forgiveness, and our righteousness, in Christ Jesus. 

The people Jesus spoke to, here, thought they could win God’s favor by their works, but Jesus was warning them that they were headed to destruction with that pagan idea.  The unproductive fig tree in the vineyard represented the people of Israel who were rejecting Jesus.  In the picture, when the owner of the vineyard found no fruit on this particular tree of his vineyard, he was ready to excise it from his ground.  What good was it doing by taking up the space?  Cut it down.  Get rid of it.  Burn it for firewood.  This shows that the final fate for anyone who does not repent is the fires of hell.

What spared the tree was an intercessor, someone pleading its cause.  For you and me, and Israel too, that Intercessor is Jesus.  Just like the gardener in the parable, Jesus pleads for you and me.  Jesus pleads with us to repent, and He pleads with His Father in heaven to give us time—time for His intervention to work in our lives—a growing season in which we might be brought to faith so that the true fruit of repentance may well up in our lives bringing changed hearts and actions, and especially, true faith in our Redeemer. 

In his letter to the Roman congregation, St. Paul wrote, “Christ Jesus, who died and, more than that, was raised to life, is the one who is at God’s right hand and who is also interceding for us!” (Romans 8:34)  Peter also spoke of this when he wrote, “The Lord is not slow to do what he promised, as some consider slowness.  Instead, he is patient for your sakes, not wanting anyone to perish, but all to come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)

The fact is, however, just giving us more time wouldn’t help us sinners produce true fruit in God’s vineyard.  We need the Lord to do His work, and He does.  In the parable, “the gardener replied to him, ‘Sir, leave it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put fertilizer on it.  If it produces fruit next year, fine.  But if not, then cut it down.’” 

The gardener would do everything in his power to help that tree be productive.  Jesus does the same for you and me.  First of all, as we all know, Jesus took our sins upon Himself and paid the full penalty for our guilt on the cross.  We dare not minimize that, for without His intercession for us there, we wouldn’t even have the chance to repent.  But let’s not forget the holy life He lived for us during His time on earth.  Christ’s perfect obedience is credited to us by faith, so that the Father in heaven can now rightly look on the members of His kingdom as holy and acceptable in His sight.

Still, that leaves our days on earth as a time to grow in our fruitfulness.  And again, the Lord is our answer.  The Lord sends His Spirit through Word and Sacrament to work the soil in our hearts and lives so that we are first brought to faith and implanted in His heavenly kingdom.  He then continues His work through pastors, teachers, and loving parents who regularly bring their children before the Lord to hear His word, to receive His blessing, to nourish them with the love of God in Christ Jesus.  Just like it isn’t considered good parenting to give your family a meal once or twice a month, faithful people let the Word of God surround them and their children with daily nourishment, doing so as the Lord Jesus moves them to share His love with each other.

Furthermore, the Lord Jesus feeds us in the most direct way possible by putting His own precious body and blood on our lips and tongues.  The blood He shed on our behalf on that cross outside Jerusalem is in, with, and under the wine of His Supper, empowering us to produce the fruit of repentance God seeks in us.  The very flesh of the Lamb of God, who bore the stripes we deserved and was sacrificed for us on the altar of the cross, is there in the bread just as Jesus said.  St. Paul verified Jesus’ promise when he wrote,

“The Lord Jesus, on the night when he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, ‘This is my body, which is for you.  Do this in remembrance of me.’  In the same way, after the meal, he also took the cup, saying,  ‘This cup is the new testament in my blood.  Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.’  For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” (1 Corinthians 11:23-26)

As we close out the old year and enter the new, Jesus pleads for you and me.  Jesus pleads with us to turn away from the ways of the world, urging us to turn away from the sins and corruption so rampant in society, and to walk with Him by faith with His light shining forth in our lives of service to those around us.  Continually, He pleads our case with the Father in heaven, holding back the judgment we deserved for our unproductive pasts, while He holds up His own righteousness as ours, and promises us, “I will do whatever you ask in my name so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.” (John 14:13)  Finally, our Intercessor comes to us again and again through Word and Sacrament, nourishing our repentance—inviting, empowering, teaching, and filling us with His love.

In the final days before Jesus suffered His passion on our behalf, He told His disciples, “If anyone loves me, he will hold on to my word.  My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.” (John 14:23).  This is the blessing of the repentance Jesus seeks in us.  Not trusting in ourselves, or in our own works, but holding on to His righteousness, innocence, and blessedness—shared with us in His Gospel—as the source of our salvation.

Dear brothers and sisters of the Living Savior, know, as you come forward tonight to eat and drink Christ’s body and blood, that all your sins are forgiven for Jesus’ sake, and by the faith He has grown in you, you have been made fruitful because Jesus pleads for you and me.  Amen.

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless in the presence of His glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, be glory, majesty, power, and authority through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all time, now, and to all eternity.  Amen.