Cantate – Sunday 28 April A✠D 2024
✠ Psalmody: Psalm 98:1b, 3-4, 1a, 2b;118:16, Romans 6:9
✠ Lection: Isaiah 12:1–6;James 1:17–21;St. John 16:5–15
Alleluia, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia!
In the Name of the Father and of the ✠ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Within salvation and sanctification in the life of a sinner, blindness gives way to sight as a redeemed believer comes to see the unseen. This does not mean that once faith is granted to a person that he or she is then able to see demons hiding behind bushes or angels standing at the foot of the bed. Spiritual sight runs much deeper than the eyes for it is connected to all that we are, including the heart, soul, mind, thoughts, and will. Much of the Christian life deals with our intentions and how we respond to the Holy Spirit guiding us by God’s objective Word. The Lord and Giver of Life gives sight with which comes the ability to understand, and believe, what the eyes cannot see, but that which by faith is known to be true by the Spirit enlightening us with His gifts.
Our Lord Jesus said to His disciples, “I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you.” As we continue through Easter toward the Ascension, and then again to Pentecost, we remember the mighty things seen that day with tongues of fire and signs given for the furtherment of the Gospel. Yet Jesus speaks in our text today of markers of Him physically in their midst, able to be seen, able to be embraced, able to be touched, a scenario that would be different from the Church Age in which the disciples would find themselves and in which we find ourselves today. The Lord was preparing them and us for the transition from the seen, from Emmanuel, God with us, tabernacled in our midst, to the unseen work within us of the Helper, the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, also fully God Himself, the third Person of the Holy Trinity, Who proclaims the crucified and risen Son so that we may believe and receive Him in His Word and Sacrament. Jesus preparing the disciples for His going away was, in essence, a return to the life of faith that was lived by the Old Testament saints, who mostly never saw God in cloud, fire, or human flesh, yet lived by His Word and by the faith the Lord worked in them Himself.
The work of the Holy Spirit has always been necessary in the world, for without Him, there is no one to work faith in the hearts of sinners; there is no one to regenerate the wicked by the washing of regeneration with the Word; there is no one to “convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.” Left to our own devices, to our own inclinations, to our own subjective moral compasses, we would never find anything wrong with ourselves. There would be plenty of error, foolishness, and evil in other people, but we would be our own sparkling examples among a world of fools. Objectively speaking, there is foolishness, but it is not determined by us, only rightfully judged according to the objective, external Word of God. He sets the standards. No matter the level of our earthly brilliance, no matter the higher education degrees and pieces of paper framed and hung on a wall, no matter the real-life experience we have either rough or easy, without the Holy Spirit dwelling in any human being, there is blindness and foolishness that is insurmountable by the power, reason, and will of man. On our own before God, we all stand as condemned, blind fools, yet if this sad truth is pointed out to the most intellectual and haughty unbelieving heart, rage and disgust are bound to boil up inside, if not erupt from the mouth or social media account. It’s a hard truth to hear that unbelief condemns to eternal punishment because as our own gods, we want to be the ones to decide whether we deserve heaven or hell. We want to be a good and decent enough person so that we, by our own measure, may stand before the Almighty one day and say, “Yes, I believe that I was a good enough person in my life to go to heaven.” Self-righteousness is no righteousness because the purity that we need does not and cannot come from us. On our own, we are never good enough to go to heaven, and no amount of bad-mouthing the Kingdom of God by those who detest it and Him will lead the Maker of heaven and earth to cower away in politically-corrected fear and trembling and admit into His heaven those who reject the sacrificial grace of His crucified and risen Son. God does not worship man, nor does He fear us, nor does He owe us anything. The unbelieving world exposes its foolishness in waging war against Him and in the utter absurdity of its actions when it thinks it can actually lay hold of what is good according to its commandments. It is full of a multitude of worldly wise, spiritually foolish people who claim to know what the right things to do are, the right ways to live are, the right causes to support are, the right groups to publicly condemn and ostracize are, yet it can’t even distinguish what a sin is, often in its most simple forms, or even what a man or a woman is for that matter. This, God the Holy Spirit convicts them of, even if they never repent when confronted with the truth, because He has delivered the truth to the world in the Word of God, has kept the Church going strong for thousands of years, and will preserve it to the End. Whether the world realizes or acknowledges it in this life, all of us stand convicted before God Almighty.
The conviction that the Holy Spirit brings is not one solely focused on outward behavior change and actions. God’s Law, including His Holy Ten Commandments, were never given to the world simply to make it a better place to live, though that is one of its uses, to keep evil in check, to curb the sinful proclivity of every sinful heart. The primary use of God’s Law is how the Holy Spirit uses it to expose to us our own heart’s condition, all Christians included and on an ongoing basis until this life is done. Regardless of how pious we view ourselves to be, the truth remains that even the most devout believers among us struggle with what Scripture commands us to do and not to do. It can be seen when we’re given the freedom to act in certain ways, to freely do things out of love for neighbor versus when we are compelled or commanded to such things. Resistance kicks in, and at times, we can’t even tell why we’re hesitant to serve our neighbor other than just the fact that we were told to do it. If we didn’t have the Law of God, this world would devour itself within a very short period of time simply due to the love of self over the love of neighbor.
Obeying God’s commandments makes us miserable, at least when we view them and try to keep them as sinners apart from the work of the Holy Spirit. Our days can, and by default will, continue on in misery and disdain of seeing God and His Holy Word as an intrusion, as a burden, as a downer when we resist the Holy Spirit’s work out of our pride and self-worship. The world’s ways, its pleasures, its temporary, fleeting delights seem to our flesh like the path that we deserve and would enjoy if it weren’t for that grand ole party-pooper in the sky and His invasive Spirit ruining our fun. But, like much in our world these days, lies, deception, and control are peddled off as gospel truth that will only tempt us away from righteous, eternal joy that works to fight against all the worldly misery that’s disguised as true happiness and pleasure.
The true joy that is yours now and forever is found in the full counsel and comfort of the Holy Spirit, for His desire is not to leave you death-stricken with conviction of your sin, but to glorify Christ, for the Spirit takes what is Christ’s and declares it to you: deliverance, redemption, forgiveness, reconciliation with God, your worthiness to enter heaven only by Christ’s righteousness that He gives to you by faith. You aren’t good enough to go to heaven, but Christ your risen Redeemer is and baptized in His Name clothes you with that righteousness. Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of Truth, delivers you day-by-day by driving you constantly to the only, reliable, uncorruptible source of truth that you have in this world: Jesus Christ in His Word and Sacraments. He takes your sinful heart that is unwilling to love God and neighbor and causes it to want to keep His commandments and to savor all the blessings that come by doing so. None such enjoyment can come out of your own reason, out of your own determination, out of your own ability or by any other way than by the salvific and sanctifying work of the Holy Trinity for you and within you, even in this very moment. Praise God that the wondrous work of the forgiveness of your sins won by Christ’s death on the cross is so much more than a distant, historical event that will one day guarantee you heaven. The work of the Holy Spirit, the Helper, the Comforter, is more active in you that you can see. Take joy in the truth that the Lord and Giver of Life dwells, and marvelously works, within you. By His work, we rejoice and say:
Alleluia, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, Alleluia!
In ✠ Jesus’ Name. Amen.
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