- Psalmody: Psalm 55:17b, 18b, 19b, 22a; 1; Psalm 17:8, 2; Psalm 88:1-2; Psalm 25:1–3a; Psalm 51:19
- Lection: Jeremiah 7:1–11; 1 Corinthians 12:2–11; Luke 19:41–48
In the Name of the Father and of the ✠ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Jesus weeps over those who do not know the time of their visitation, because He desires for us to know the things that make for our peace. He weeps because those who do not embrace the grace of His heart and His good intention toward us surrender themselves to destruction, the only other option and outcome, as is seen in His prophecy and its fulfillment in the destruction of Jerusalem, the city of peace that knew not Peace incarnate. The visitation of which He speaks is one that leads all wayward hearts to live under Him in His kingdom, to serve Him in everlasting righteousness, innocence, and blessedness, and to call Him “Lord”. Jesus is Lord. He desires that truth to become our own joyous confession, just as is given to us in the creeds. As Luther explains in the Large Catechism, the entirety of the Apostles’ Creed revolves around the simple fact that God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, has done much to bring us to this glorious confession; a confession that if despised comes with sad and unnecessary consequences.
What we see in Luke 19 is our dear Lord freshly off His triumphal entry now with turmoil in His heart over the reality of Jerusalem’s, its people’s, condition of heart and unbelief in rejecting Him as Lord; of ultimately calling Him accursed by crucifying Him, for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”. What we see are events of the Holy Week, which now governs all others, much to our great, solemn, and joyous remembrance each year; events that are colored even more by St. Paul’s words, “Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus accursed, and no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.” By this, we know that all those who called for His death were not speaking by the Spirit of God, for they could not have done so. It is impossible.
By all this, we can also see playing out in reality the Scriptural truth that we confess clearly and boldly in the Apostles’ Creed. All in Jerusalem that day were bound by the first article, whether they believed in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth or not, for even by His grace have also the wicked been given body and soul, eyes, ears, and all their members, their reason, though deeply corrupted as they were carried away to dumb idols, and all their senses, and only because of His mercy, He still takes care of all poor, miserable, sinful creatures. God the Creator declares His almighty power most chiefly in showing mercy and pity, yet He is also a just God. Let us never put Him to the test as many before us have done and were destroyed. The fact alone that we exist is proof of His grace. Yet, He gives even more evidence to convince our doubting and wandering hearts.
As Jesus weeps over Jerusalem, we also see our Redeemer’s faithful heart, full of grace and truth, the source of all that the Blessed Virgin Mary came to have to be her own. In understanding what we confess in Holy Scripture’s summary in the Creed, we proclaim, “I believe that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true Man, born of the Virgin Mary, is my Lord.” And there it is. That’s a serious confession, no mere lip service. The centrality of faith, the intent of the Most Holy Trinity, Almighty God, is to show Jesus as Lord and for Him to become our Lord. Many call upon Jesus, but not as Lord. The sweetness of how He accomplished the rightful title claim of Lord was playing out in real time in the Gospel text, for after He wept and commended the unbelievers to the destruction that their hearts pursued in despising His reconciliation and peace, He did not then go on to redeem us lost and condemned persons, He did not purchase and win us from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil, by gold or silver, but entered the temple and cleansed it from those worthless mammonly idols, driving out those who bought or sold in it, saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house is a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’ ” And He was teaching daily in the temple. He was teaching what you are taught: that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem; beginning at the place of His rejection, beginning at the place of His tears, beginning at the place of His sacrifice that redeemed, purchased, and won us with His precious Blood and with His innocent suffering and death. He is the Author and Perfector of our faith and He authored and perfected it in what He accomplished in the Jerusalem that knew not the day of their visitation. May our dear Lord preserve us from entering such evil days of not knowing Him!
So, let us ever think upon what it means for each of us that Jesus is Lord. Luther writes, “Now, if you are asked, “What do you believe in the Second Article about Jesus Christ?” answer briefly, “I believe that Jesus Christ, God’s true Son, has become my Lord.” “But what does it mean to become Lord?” “It is this. He has redeemed me from sin, from the devil, from death, and from all evil. For before I did not have a Lord or King, but was captive under the devil’s power, condemned to death, stuck in sin and blindness”. In other words, without Christ, we have no Lord, only a tyrant who holds us captive; imprisoning bars that cannot be seen by unbelieving eyes.
Thus, we consider the importance of our learning and believing that no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit, for God desires no distant relatives whom He rarely has visit Him, as He visits them. All whom He has redeemed He desires to have near, to keep nearby His mighty power and strength shown in His mercy and pity poured out in every gathering in His visitation, in His house. God’s loving and gracious work in creating us (the Father) and redeeming us (the Son) is brought into its intended effect in His sanctifying work in us (the Holy Spirit) through Whom we are brought to and kept in saving belief. The work of creating us was finished at our conception. The work of redeeming us was completed upon the cross and the conquering of the tomb. The work of sanctifying us is now ongoing and it is vital that we acknowledge and live by the blessed Trinity’s full intention for our sanctified lives.
God’s intention isn’t to be midwife, but Father. It isn’t to deliver us into life only to then rarely, if ever, see us again. There is no salvation outside the Church. It is both the place instituted by God to berth us into His everlasting kingdom and to keep us there, not slipping out of it by our refusal to return. No salvation outside the Church is a bold statement that stands even against arguments that include the thief on the cross and the Ethiopian Eunuch, who both now dwell with Jesus in Paradise after coming to salvation outside an official church setting or event. Yet, it remains true that there is no salvation outside the Church, because the Church is God’s intent and means of bestowing life, and so to despise it is to despise Him and His gracious means of salvation.
Per the Third Article of the Creed, I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Christian Church, etc., our confession means that I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to Him. But the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith. (And here is where we see His intent of what is to carry on in this life in His calling each one of us out of the darkness and into His marvelous light:) In the same way He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. Thus, to say, “Jesus is Lord,” to know the things that make for our eternal peace, to know the time of our visitation, is to dedicatedly, joyously, longingly, trustingly, faithfully be where God the Holy Spirit intends to gather all His redeemed, so that we may be kept in Jesus Christ our Lord in the one true faith through the forgiveness of sins by His Word and Blessed Sacrament. God neither intends nor institutes any other means by which we are called, by which we are gathered, by which we are enlightened, by which we are sanctified, or by which we are kept; not worshipping Him on a chair on the beach, not on the back nine at the golf course, not out on the water, not upon the trails out in His creation, not on the couch or recliner, not at a sporting event, nor anywhere else than in His Divine Service. Yes, God is omnipresent. He is everywhere. But He is not everywhere for the forgiveness of sins. The Holy Spirit gathers us around Jesus where Jesus has promised to be to richly forgive all our sins. He visits us and weeps over us when we show that we know this not. May our lips be led and our lives ever gathered by the Holy Spirit, so that we may live and die in sure confidence of the things in Jesus Christ our Savior, our Redeemer, our Lord that make for our peace.
In ✠ Jesus’ Name. Amen.
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