Last Sunday our sermon dealt with the crosses that Christ
lays on his Christians. Crosses are hard
to bear – whether they be something bad that God adds to your life or something
good that he takes away. Generally,
because of the pain and personal nature of whatever hurts, folks would rather
talk to some sort of professional counselor than to their pastor. But the highest arts of sociology and
psychology fall infinitely short of providing what the Christian most dearly
needs in time of deep sorrow. Oh, a
counselor can help. Please don’t get me
wrong. They are often well trained and
experienced and can give wonderful and wise advice. Sometimes all that’s needed is to have a
discreet listener who will let you spill out your heart. That can be, as they say, cathartic.
That
word cathartic means purifying. It’s where we get the name Catherine, which
means pure – a beautiful name! God makes
things pure by purging them. Pure and purge come from the word for pyre
or fire. To purge is to cleanse by fire, usually in
relation to metals like gold and silver or iron. The Medieval Church entertained the
superstition of purgatory where God, through pain, would purify those who died without
being pure enough for heaven. Of course
this isn’t true. What a terrible attack
on the comfort of the gospel! The Bible
teaches that our purity is found in Christ by faith, and that this purity will
be perfected in us in the twinkling
of an eye on the Last Day when Christ returns.
Our pain doesn’t earn our purity.
Christ’s pain already has!
So
no, we are pure and holy by faith even now.
But our faith itself is often mixed with all sorts of doubts and
misdirected desires and superstitions.
Because of this, and therefore, since faith is so precious since it is
by faith we are pure, we can see that whatever God does to purify our faith is
most certainly an act of extreme love and faithfulness. And what does he do? He purges.
He burns away the dross. He lays
crosses on us so that our faith is perfected and our comfort is all the
clearer. Here and now is our purgatory,
so to speak. Here and now we do not pay
for our sins, but we learn to let God be God as Jesus did on the cross, and
endure whatever he prescribes for the strengthening and sharpening of our faith,
which, as St. Peter writes, “much more precious than gold that perishes,
though it be tested by fire” (1 Peter 1:7). Because of this, it is very good for all of
you who may suffer a very heavy cross, some great sorrow, or pain or loss, to
talk to your pastor – not because he is an expert on grief, but because it is
his job to teach you to what purpose God permits it and how to bear it.
A
counselor might be able to help you cope with your pain until it goes
away. But a minister of Christ is there
to teach you how your pain can strengthen your faith. A counselor can help you get what they call “closure.” But a minister of the gospel is sent by
Christ to help you know in whose arms you are already enclosed. Without learning such a lesson, the pain is
useless. But when our crosses serve to
purge us and purify our faith, then we learn to rejoice even as long as the
pain may last, knowing that he who sent the cross cares for us, as it is
written at the end of that same Epistle by St. Peter, “Therefore humble yourselves
under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all
your care upon Him, for He cares for you” (1 Peter 5:6-7).
So
as we discussed this topic last Sunday – the crosses that each Christian bears
– today we consider those unique burdens that Christ’s ministers bear. St. John the Baptist knew a thing or two
about bearing a cross. He who, on
account of the vow he was born to make, never knew the joy of marriage, meat,
or a good hard drink also spent his adult life excluded from the rest of his
community, wearing camel’s hair and eating locust and wild honey instead. He spent his ministry “‘turning the hearts of the
fathers to the children,’ and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to
make ready a people prepared for the Lord” (Luke 1:17). And yet how was he repaid? He ended up in prison until he died a
humiliating, and seemingly pointless death.
This
was the cross John bore. Every minister
bears such a cross. It is the cross of
being faithful when the world is demanding you bend like a reed in the wind. It is the cross of being expected to be
marvelously successful, when God commands you simply to be faithful. Both Habakkuk and Malachi began their books
of the Bible by calling their duty to preach to a resistant and disobedient
Israel a burden. It is a great joy, to be sure, to preach the
glad tidings of great joy to all people, especially to Christ’s lambs. But it is a
burden for a minister of Christ to have to rebuke sin, correct
superstition, and warn constantly about the ungodly and stealthy influence of
the world around us. It is a burden to
speak of the ax that is laid at the root of the tree, ready to chop down
whatever does not bear fruit to be cast into the fire. But it is a necessary burden, because these
things must be preached. We need to be
taught. We need that which is worldly
and common to be constantly purged from the temple of our hearts. This is what we pray for in the children’s Christmas
hymn,
Ah
dearest Jesus, holy Child
Make Thee a bed, soft, undefiled
Within my heart, that it may be
A quiet chamber, Lord, for Thee.
Make Thee a bed, soft, undefiled
Within my heart, that it may be
A quiet chamber, Lord, for Thee.
A
minister of Christ who does not bear any sort of cross is necessarily
unfaithful. He who wears kings’
clothing, that is, who flaunts his wealth and prestige and success instead of quietly
devoting himself to the study and application of God’s word – such is one who
has shirked his duties and who cares nothing for the souls of those he was sent
to teach. Jesus tells us when we are
fasting to anoint our heads and wash our faces so that we do not wear our grief
on our sleeve (Matthew 6). So we do not
expect our ministers to walk around with a dour face and a whiny voice. He is to be an example to the flock (1
Timothy 4:12). He is to exhibit to some
extent the joy and hope of the faith he preaches. This is precisely what St. John the Baptist
did in our Gospel lesson. He did it
marvelously!
His
direction to his disciples was not an indication that he had despaired. It was a manifestation of his earlier
prophecy that he must decrease and Christ must increase. “You
see me in prison. You see me bear my
cross. You see that the gospel has no
earthly reward. So be it. Our Father who sees in secret will reward us
openly. Go ask Jesus if he is the One. He is your reward. He is mine.” Certainly John would have had his own
personal doubts. We call him Saint John, not because he had no sin,
but for the same reason we call them saints who washed their robes in the blood
of the Lamb. He was flesh and blood like
us. Like ours, his faith may have
wavered. But strong or weak, his faith
knew its object. He knew Christ. His faith cannot be called into question
here. We see his faith in the message he
preached: “Behold, the Lamb of God who
takes away the sin of the world. Behold!
It is he whose blood shall cleanse you and make you pure and holy to rejoice
around his throne in heaven. See him who
is chosen to suffer more than I – to bear a greater cross than you – and who by
doing so sets the prisoners free, gives sight to the blind, hearing to the
deaf, mobility to the lame, who cleanses the lepers and preaches the gospel to
the poor. Behold him who compels me even
now to direct you to him even while I am in chains!”
What
greater way for a minister to exhibit the purpose and blessed goal of the
crosses we all must bear than for him to direct his hearers to Christ even as
he bears shame and contempt himself? This
is the purpose of preaching. To preach
is to direct people away from one’s own service to the service and ministry of
the One who sent him – the One who stands among us today with peace and
blessing bought with his own blood. See
your minister bear his cross. He does so
not by whining about it. He does so not
by demonstrating how heroic he is to suffer.
He does so by speaking boldly and plainly even in the face of resistance
– the resistance of pride that dwells in the hearts of all men, including the
lambs of God whom Jesus has commanded him to feed and tend. There he bears his cross – when he fulfills
his duty to preach the full frankness of the law to those who must repent, and
when he preaches the sweetness of the gospel, knowing how much of it will be
trampled and forgotten by fools. But
God’s word goes out. The preacher who
bears his cross is the sower who says “Oh
what of that?” when the fruit of his labor remains hidden from his
eyes.
John
was a prophet, and more than a prophet. What
made him more than a prophet is obvious.
He was the forerunner of the long-awaited Christ – — Immanuel who
ransoms captive Israel. What prophets
foretold they never saw. But what John
pointed to was the fulfillment of all that had been preached since Adam and Eve
first learned to bear their cross. John
was sent to prepare sinners to find their righteousness in the cross of Jesus,
the true Seed of the woman who by rising from the dead would leave the devil’s
head crushed in the dust.
It
is into this death and resurrection that Baptism joins us. This death and resurrection is summarized
purely and simply by John the Baptist’s famous message: “Repent, for the kingdom of God
is near.” So we repent, we turn
from our sins. We acknowledge how they
themselves are the source of our pain and grief and ruined relationships. We do not seek vengeance on earth, but
confess that all misery is a result of the very seed that the devil sowed even
in our own hearts. And have we not
watered that seed? Have we not nurtured
the sprout? Have we not protected our
pride and fed our lusts? To repent is to
let God pluck these out so that the incorruptible seed of his enduring Word
might take root and be strengthened and watered and bear fruit. This seed is
the gospel. Its incorruptibility is
linked to the incorruptibility of your inheritance as God’s child. It is
the answer of a good conscience before God.
This word teaches you what your Baptism gave you.
Your
sins have been washed away – not by how very sincere you were, or how
determined you were to clean up your act or commit yourself to something good,
no but by the precious blood of Christ.
It is his obedience that he gives you in place of your sin. He does so
freely, willingly, and often. His
patience with you is as pure and comforting as the genuineness of his
pity. Has he not forgiven you? Then behold.
Then behold again. Then return
and see him who still stands in mercy to lift your burden and give you rest. He who alone is pure and holy, your God – he became your Brother in order to offer
his pure and holy obedience as a Man for you.
Taking all human sin upon himself, he alone endured the punishing and
purging fire of God’s holy wrath – for you.
By pure mercy alone, he clothes you in his purity and holiness when he
gives you faith to believe that he did it for you. He alone has pure hands. He has entered the Holy Place. And even now he pleads as your High Priest before
the throne of God. Knowing this, nothing
can separate you from the love of God — no more than either heaven or hell can
separate Christ from the flesh and blood he assumed to redeem you. Know this.
Believe this. By God it is
true! This is the purpose of preaching. This is the purpose of learning from God what
the preacher is sent to teach you.
Most
folks don’t want a preacher. They want a
priest. They don’t want to be told that
their own religion is flawed, or that they need yet to be taught by God. They would rather have their own natural
religion be facilitated. They’d prefer a
religious figurehead to add charm and legitimacy to their spiritual
sentiments. They want a reed shaking in
the wind who will make them feel validated in their own notions and worldly
opinions. But St. John chopped down all
such foolish expectations and cast them into the fire. So must every faithful servant of
Christ. He deals with that which belongs
to his Lord. He is a steward – a steward
of the mysteries of God. These mysteries
belong to God for the continual use and benefit of the priesthood. John’s father Zachariah was a priest, from
the priestly tribe of Levi. But John
wasn’t a priest. He was a prophet. But he was sent to priests to bring an end to
the Levitical priesthood and replace it with a royal priesthood. He prepared the priesthood for the High
Priest, Jesus Christ, the royal Son of David.
As Malachi foretold of him,
“He will sit
as a refiner and a purifier of silver;
He will purify the sons of Levi,
And purge them as gold and silver,
That they may offer to the Lord
An offering in righteousness.”
He will purify the sons of Levi,
And purge them as gold and silver,
That they may offer to the Lord
An offering in righteousness.”
And
so he does. He who is pure – whose
purity before God is yours by faith – purifies your faith because, in his love
for you, your faith is more precious than gold or silver. As a priest, you yourself may approach God
too as pure and holy and righteous in his sight. “You are a chosen generation, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the
praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light”
(1 Peter 2:9). This is an offering in
righteousness, dear Christian. It is to
hear and believe and confess with your mouth what the preacher preaches. “Behold, the Lamb of God – We preach Christ
crucified.” Through him you have
obtained mercy. And in him you shall
receive the end of your faith, the salvation of your souls. Amen.
