Easter 4

John 16:16-23 - Jubilate, Easter IV - April 21, 2013 

80^th Anniversary of Trinity Lutheran Church

A few months ago, the idea was suggested that we celebrate our 80^th anniversary this spring.  December 11 marked 80 years since this congregation was first founded.  That’s a long time.  And yet it’s young enough to be remembered by several of our oldest members.  There is a lot to celebrate here.  How many of you, and your children have been baptized here and confirmed here?  How many of you were married here?  How many of you, in sadder times, looked at the face of a beloved husband or wife or mother or child for the last time here – and yet received here the certain consolation that you would see them again?  And this is all because here it is that we hear the word of God.  We celebrate 80 years of God doing what God does.  He calls us, gathers us, enlightens and sanctifies us – by His word.  He fills our greatest need.  How many of you having been burdened by sin, or having been stiff-necked and bitter at God, or perhaps filled with doubt and unanswered questions – how many of you, having been reproved by the law and persuaded of your sin, were then compelled to confess them here to a gracious God, only then to be served by that gracious God through the preaching of your crucified Savior Jesus Christ?  How many of you, having been fed with His very body and blood have received what Jesus secured for you in His resurrection?  —How many of you have thus been strengthened and preserved in the one true faith?  That’s what God does here.  That’s what we celebrate.  He forgives your sin and gives you life everlasting. 

Joy, O joy, beyond all gladness!
Christ hath done away with sadness!
Hence, all sorrow and repining,
For the Son of grace is shining.

It was just a few months ago that some of the ladies here were planning a date to celebrate.  Jubilate Sunday was suggested.  That means rejoice, right?  Yes, it does.  How appropriate.  I agreed.  But I must confess that I knew the irony of this suggestion from the beginning.  And if you listened to our Gospel lesson this morning, maybe you know what I’m talking about — The story of joy must always include its seasons of sadness.  True joy is not a contrived happiness that celebrates itself.  True joy, as we know well, comes to grips with reality, faces it, and rejoices in the promise of the Gospel that overcomes it all.  So let’s consider where sorrow first began in order that, as Christians, we might also see where true rejoicing begins. 

We go back to the Garden of Eden.  Adam and Eve sinned by rejecting God’s word.  They believed a lie – a little lie – they didn’t think it was a big deal.  But by rejecting God’s word, they rejected God Himself.  They turned themselves away from His face.  But God did not turn His face away from them.  In spite of their fall into disobedience, God still shined His gracious face upon them even before the curse came into full effect.  He promised that the woman’s Seed would crush the head of the evil foe.  And by crushing the devil’s head, God would save sinful man from the lies that our flesh is still inclined to believe.  Even before He pronounced the law that exposes our sin, God established the foundation of saving faith by preaching the Gospel: God promised to send His Son to fulfill the law and to die in our place. 

The first curse that God spoke, He spoke to the devil; and in his curse, our first parents seized onto the first promise of salvation.  They looked forward to the coming Seed.  Despite their sorrow, here it was that they found their hope of joy. 

But you know the Gospel doesn’t make the law go away.  The Gospel puts the law in its proper place.  Christ is the end of the law for all who believe.  Amen.  In repentance, Adam and Eve believed it.  So do we.  But just as we, on account of our sinful flesh, still need the law to serve us by daily driving home our need for God’s mercy, so also, our first parents needed to hear the curse so that they might likewise live by faith — so that they might continue to find their righteousness apart from their own works and good feelings, but in Jesus Christ alone who would obey the law in their place. 

So, God spoke His curse.  He cursed the woman.  In pain she would conceive and bear children.  Her submission to her husband would no longer be the spontaneous joy that God created her to have, but would become an external imposition upon her that she would resist.  She would come to know the sorrow of being a sinful wife and mother. 

And God cursed the man.  Adam would come to know the sorrow of fruitless labor, working by the sweat of his brow to provide, but in the end having to rely on God’s grace and mercy to feed and clothe his growing family.  He would come to know the sorrow of being a sinful husband and father.  He, his wife, and all his children would return to the ground from which he was formed. 

What sadness!  But all was not lost.  The curse wouldn’t last forever.  Despite the sorrow and pain, they knew it was just temporary!  God said so.  By her Seed, through the life that God would place into the woman’s womb, God would put an end to this awful curse and redeem them.  And so it would actually be through her sorrow and pain that God would do this great thing!  And that’s why Adam named his wife Eve – because she was the mother of all living.  Through her, all life would be born – but more than that – through her, the One who would bring eternal life would make His home among us. 

Isn’t this wonderful?  Adam believed the Gospel.  He named her Eve because it was through the fruit of her womb that their Savior would be born, who would take the curse upon Himself and save us all.  She truly was the mother of all living. 

In the meantime, the only thing that could make the pain of the curse bearable – including the pain of bearing children – was that they knew their sadness would last only a while.  This was the promise.  In fact, it was after Eve had given birth to her first son that she too expressed faith in the promise.  She named her son Cain, which means “acquired,” saying, “I have acquired a man, the Lord.”  That’s Genesis 4:1.  Eve     thought that she had just given birth to the Messiah. 

Of course, she couldn’t have been more wrong.  Cain would not be the One who was to give life.  In fact, he was the first to take life.  Her son became a murderer.  Like every mother here, she gave birth to a sinner who needed a savior just as much as we do – a sinner who disappointed her and brought heartache to her life.  Adam and Eve learned the hard way that what Jesus said was true: “That which is born of flesh is flesh.”  Yes, but, as Jesus continues, “that which is born of Spirit is spirit.”  Therefore, in the face of earthly disappointments – whatever they are – what more can we do than cling to the promise of the Gospel, through which we find new life. 

That’s what Adam and Eve did.  Unfortunately for them, their “little while” lasted a little longer than they had hoped.  But, you know, the Gospel remained true.  They died knowing that, in good time, they would be redeemed and raised to life.  And their hope was not disappointed.  For, as Paul writes in Galatians 4, when the fullness of time had finally come, God did indeed send forth His Son, born of a woman – just like He said – made under the law, to redeem those who – with their first parents – languished under the curse.   

In our Gospel lesson this morning, the long while that spanned the ages of the Old Testament was swiftly drawing to its fulfillment as Jesus spoke with His disciples. “Just a little while longer,” He told them, “A little while, and you will see Me no longer; and again a little while, and you will see Me.”  What Jesus was talking about was plain enough.  He would die and rise.  This was good news.  Jesus was about to endure the curse that God had spoken against all humanity, just as He promised He would.  It was the curse spoken to Adam and Eve.  It was the curse that still indicts our sinful flesh and condemns our thoughts and actions.  It was the curse of the law.  And Jesus was about to bear it for us.  In order for Jesus to bruise the serpent’s head, the serpent would have to bruise His heel — as St. Paul tells us in Galatians 3:13, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (as it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.’).” 

Jesus told His disciples that in a little while He would die on the cross to take away their sins and on the third day rise again.  But they didn’t understand Him.  They were confused.   And the reason was simple: they didn’t know the value of suffering. 

Suffering for them was something to avoid.  It was something that they were supposed to be rescued from.  And now their only hope for salvation, Jesus, is found here speaking about how He Himself is going to suffer.  They had hoped for something a little more glorious, you know?  A little more triumphant. 

And isn’t this how it goes?  Salvation should be joyous, right?  Sadness just ruins it all.  And so when trouble comes, or problems arise that bring us sorrow and disappointment, we talk amongst ourselves to see how we might make sense of it, or even fix it.  That’s what the disciples did.  But they came to no solution.  Only Jesus could give them the answer they needed.  And the answer that Jesus gave required that they suffer too.  “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.” 

True joy comes through sorrow.  Adam and Eve’s suffering didn’t earn them anything.  We know that.  But it was valuable.  Because it taught them the measure of their strength, and it directed them to their Savior who would suffer in their place.  True joy comes through sorrow.  The very thing that was about to make the disciples so sad was to become the foundation of their eternal happiness. 

What makes us so sad?  What little whiles must we endure, that seem to last forever?  Are you a sinful wife or mother, or a disobedient child?  Are you a sinful husband or father?  Have you neglected your duties?  Have you chafed under God’s chastening hand?  Have you regarded your suffering as pointless?  But dear Christians, in our suffering and sadness, even when we’re enduring the pain that our own sin has brought us, Jesus directs us to what He endured in our place.  Jesus binds us to Himself in His suffering in order that He might be bound to us in our sorrow.  He does this by preserving for us the pure message of the cross.  He teaches you the Gospel.  That’s what He does here where we preach Christ crucified.  Suffering is not pointless.  In the cross of Jesus we see what it has earned.  And so we are enabled to bear our own crosses too. 

This church is full this morning.  That makes me happy.  I know it makes you happy too.  In fact, it might even bring back memories of what seem like better times.  It’s tempting to make this the standard of success and joy.  Because it hurts to see this place empty.  And it hurts to see the world rejoice.  

The world rejoices to see this church shrink in number, and the Church at large lose influence in the culture.  Our nation has turned away from the word of God.  Some of our children have as well.  This congregation is not brimming with people every Sunday like I have heard it once did.  We sorrow.  But it will only last a little while.  In the meantime, God teaches us, as He taught Adam and Eve, and as Jesus taught His disciples — true joy comes through sorrow. 

So we don’t look for what we think will make us happy. 

A woman who has given birth is not filled with joy simply because the pain is over.  She is filled with joy because she has borne life.  A human being has been born into the world. 

What have we borne?  Through Christ, faith is borne. 

Whether 2, 3, 19 or 200 people gathered here, what we celebrate is not what we look like, but what we possess by faith – through the proclamation that we gather to hear! 

This joy no one will ever take away!  It is not possible where Christ crucified is preached. 

In Jesus’ name, let us pray: 

Jesus, guard and guide Thy members,
Fill Thy brethren with Thy grace,
Hear their prayers in every place.
Quicken now life’s faintest embers;
Grant all Christians, gath’ring here,
Holy peace, through coming years!
Joy, O joy, beyond all gladness,
Christ hath done away with sadness!
Hence, all sorrow and repining,
For the Sun of Grace is shining!  Amen.