Sermon for Easter 7, Exaudi, May 16,
2021
Grace to you
and peace from Him who is, who was, and who is coming. Amen.
Ezekiel 36:25-27 25 I will sprinkle purifying water on you, and you will be
clean. I will cleanse you from all your
impurity and from all your filthy idols.
26 Then I will give you a
new heart and put a new spirit inside you.
I will remove the heart of stone from your body and give you a heart of
flesh. 27 I will
put my Spirit within you and will cause you to walk in my statutes, and you
will carefully observe my ordinances. (EHV)
God gives life to His
people.
Dear disciples of the ascended Lord,
The
liturgy for the final Sunday in the Easter season adds a hint of melancholy to
the normally joyous Eastertide, perhaps recalling the uncertainty the apostles
experienced after their Savior and Lord ascended to heaven while they waited
with uneasy expectation for the mysterious Helper Jesus promised to send. There was so much Jesus’ disciples didn’t yet
understand. Yet, while they waited for the
Spirit of the Lord to bring them better understanding of God’s salvation plan,
they could turn to that which was already certain: God’s message of grace in
Moses and the prophets.
This morning, we focus on God’s gracious
promise of deliverance and rescue given to God’s people through the prophet, Ezekiel. In these words, we see how God has glorified
Himself by bringing salvation to sinners like you and me. There is nothing we can do to save ourselves,
but in His great mercy and for the glory of His holy name, God gives life to
His people.
By the time of our sermon text, centuries of
vile idol worship and disregard for God’s instruction and care had caused the
Lord to become completely disgusted with the people of Judah. Three separate times, large numbers of God’s
chosen people were carted off into exile in Babylon. Ezekiel, one of the few remaining faithful
ones, was carried off along with thousands who, at the time of this prophecy, had
been in exile for more than ten years with fifty more ahead of them. Jerusalem and the temple had been destroyed. There was no reason for the Lord to offer any
future to such an unfaithful people, but for the honor of His name, God would
keep His promises.
For you and me, the story is the same. There was nothing good or honorable in us that
would make God desire us. (Psalm 8:4)
Born in sin, we had nothing to offer.
Yet, God does not condemn just because we are born sinners. Sinners are the only people God wants to
save, because there are no other kind.
Still, God is faithful to His promises. From the time Adam and Eve first sinned, God
had been promising a Savior. The Lord
kept His promise even when the world became so vile God felt obligated to
destroy it completely. Thus, He saved a
remnant alive through that worldwide flood to rebuild a people for His
name. By the time Israel was languishing
in slavery in Egypt, there was precious little faith left to warrant God
intervening for Abraham’s descendants, but again, God remained true to His
promises and for His own name’s sake, He rescued that people and delivered them
to the land He had promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
This story line is repeated throughout the
Bible. St. Paul quoted the ancient
writers, “There is no one who is righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands. There is no one who searches for God. They all turned away; together they became
useless. There is no one who does what
is good; there is not even one.” (Romans 3:10-12)
This prophecy in our sermon text, given through
Ezekiel, wasn’t given because anyone deserved it. Rather, God was committed to keeping His name
pure, and He was committed to showing love to a people who don’t deserve it but
needed His mercy.
You and I should have nothing but gratitude in
our hearts, because it is God’s love that has shown mercy to us. What Ezekiel wrote is fulfilled in people
like you and me. Because of God’s great
love, mercy, and grace, we have been delivered from the curse of death by a
rite that on its surface seems too simple to make any difference. When God has one of His servants take simple
water, has him sprinkle or pour those few handfuls over the head of a child, or
an adult, then with the promise of the Gospel and the application of God’s name
as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, God Himself cleanses us from sin and gives
life to His people.
Through Ezekiel God declares, “I will
sprinkle purifying water on you, and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your impurity and
from all your filthy idols.” Just as
God washed away the filth of the world in the great flood, God washed away all
your wickedness and guilt in Baptism.
Now, we don’t even usually recognize our own
idolatry, but how often doesn’t some ordinary thing in our lives take
precedence over our relationship with God?
How often don’t we offend our Savior when we misuse His name? How often don’t we fail to follow God’s
instructions with a pure heart? Yet, God
washes away all our guilt in Baptism.
Of course, God doesn’t do that without
reason. First of all, God is fulfilling
His commitment to love us. He is also
fulfilling His commitment to justice.
Our sins had to bear punishment. Our
sins deserved death for us. There is no
entrance into heaven with a sin debt left unpaid. But God gave His Son into death to bear the
sin of all people of all time, and to pay the debt for everyone. God’s justice then demands that He declare
all people righteous for Jesus’ sake—and He does.
Still, no dead, defiled sinner can come to God
by his own volition. Spiritually dead,
blind, and enemies of God, we could not find nor reach the Almighty. Therefore, He comes to us. God came to us first in His Son. Thereafter, God comes to us through His Spirit
in the Word. Because “God our
Savior,… wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth,”
(1 Timothy 2:3-4) He meets us here on earth through the water and Word of
Baptism. There, in that simple washing, God
makes us His own dear children. As St.
Paul wrote to Titus:
“When the kindness and
love of God our Savior toward mankind appeared, he saved us—not by righteous
works that we did ourselves, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth
and the renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us abundantly through
Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might
become heirs in keeping with the hope of eternal life.” (Titus 3:4-7)
Since God has saved us and made us His own dear
children, He refuses to abandon us.
Through Ezekiel He says, “Then I will give you a new heart and put a
new spirit inside you. I will remove the
heart of stone from your body and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my Spirit within you and will
cause you to walk in my statutes, and you will carefully observe my ordinances.” By this washing that removed our sins, God
also gives us life. That spiritually
stone-dead heart, that could do nothing good before God, was thrown away and
replaced with a heart that lives.
That new life beating in us wants to walk with
the Lord in thought, word, and dead.
That isn’t because we suddenly have power on our own, but because God
the Holy Spirit is now working in us to desire those things God desires, to do
those things God has prepared in advance for us to do (Ephesians 2:10), to pray
for those things God wills, and to seek diligently to obey His
instructions.
Still, we know that we struggle mightily with
our old sinful nature and the temptations of the devil and the world. St. Paul also wrote about this:
I find this law at
work: When I want to do good, evil is present with me. I certainly delight in God’s law according to
my inner self, but I see a different law at work in my members, waging war
against the law of my mind and taking me captive to the law of sin, which is
present in my members. What a miserable
wretch I am! Who will rescue me from
this body of death? I thank God through
Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:21-25)
In Jesus Christ our Lord, God gives life to
His people. That’s what the Bible is
all about. That’s what our worship is
all about. That’s what faithful
Christians are all about. We are about
Jesus. God’s Son lived for us, died for
us, rose from the grave, also for us, and ascended to heaven so that He could
send the Spirit to us so that God could keep this promise made through Ezekiel
and rescue you and me from sin and death.
In some ways, I suppose, we are a bit like the
disciples as they waited apprehensively those ten days in Jerusalem for the
Spirit of God to pour out upon them.
Jesus was no longer physically in their presence. They didn’t have a clue, really, as to what
was about to happen, or how the Spirit would appear to them. Yet, they waited trusting in God’s promises.
Today, we see the signs all around us that tell
us Jesus’ return is growing very near.
We don’t know whether that return will come today or a thousand years
from now. We do know that much trouble
appears around us, and Satan and his hoards grow ever more bold. Apprehensions and fears constantly trouble
us, because the devil continues to roar his ugly threats.
Remember though, dear friends, Satan no longer
has access to God’s throne. Only Jesus
is there to speak for or against us, and we have God’s assurance of life and
forgiveness through the writers our Savior assigned to bring us His Word; St.
John wrote, “If anyone does sin, we have an Advocate before the Father:
Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is
the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the
whole world.” (1 John 2:1-2)
Therefore, with all your heart, rely on God’s
promises. He has given us new life and
faith through Baptism and the hearing of the Word. He promises that He walks with us and hears
our every prayer. Jesus assures us, with
His own real body and blood in the bread and wine of His Supper, that our sins
are forgiven and Paradise is ours. Furthermore,
He will not leave us alone as we face the trials of this depraved and falling
world. In fact, concerning those who
believe in Him, “The Lord says, Because he clings to me, I will rescue
him. I will protect him, because he
acknowledges my name. He will call on
me, and I will answer him. I will be
with him in distress. I will deliver him
and I will honor him. With long life I
will satisfy him, and I will let him see my salvation.” (Psalms 91:14-16) Rejoice and sing praise to the Lord, God
gives life to 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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