Sermon manuscript:
The Good Friday service is probably the most unusual service
we do all year. The candles get snuffed out. The lights get lowered. The book
gets slammed. A person might come to this service just to have an experience.
I’ve been to a few Good Friday services in my life. More
often than not I keep an eye out for something in myself—an experience, a
reaction. On this day we recall how our Lord suffered, was crucified, and died.
I must confess that I’ve often held up a mirror to myself: Am I sad? Am I
stirred? Maybe what I’m really looking for behind those questions is: Do I
believe? If I’m really moved, then I must have a really strong faith. I’m
pleased with myself when I’m saddened.
It’s hard to imagine a more narcissistic thing a person
could do. It’s like a person being happy that something bad has happened,
because then he or she can get some attention—even if that attention be from
one’s own self. It’s like being moved to tears, and then immediately running to
the bathroom mirror to see what you look like. Here today we are talking about
the Son of God dying because of our sin. And what am I looking for? How I’m
feeling. How disgusting.
But now I might say to myself, “That’s it Preacher! Keep it
up. You’re disgusting! You’ve manage to squeeze some kind of experience out of
that cold dead soul. Let’em have it! Then we can go home feeling good about how
bad we felt.” How shallow and disgusting.
There’s a line from the service of Corporate Confession and
Absolution that we used last night that I quite like. In that lengthy
exhortation that I read to you it says, “It is proper that we diligently
examine ourselves.” But then it goes on to say, “But when we examine our hearts
and consciences, we find nothing in us but sin and death, from which we are
incapable of delivering ourselves.”
No kidding. When we examine ourselves on this Good Friday we
aren’t going to find anything good. Maybe we are sufficiently pleased with
ourselves for how sad we feel. Maybe we were hoping for more of an experience.
Regardless, however we feel is beside the point. If we are digging around
within ourselves the best conclusion we can come up with is that we are
sinners—narcissistic liars. Our feelings, even at their very best, are going to
be tainted. We aren’t going to find any assurance of salvation in here.
What on this day must be pointed out, in fact, is that Jesus
does everything himself for our salvation. He didn’t ask for our permission. He
didn’t ask for our cooperation. You can see this already at that time. His
disciples at the time were certainly saved by their Lord and Savior. Jesus says
so. What, however, did they contribute towards that salvation? Nothing good. On
that Good Friday, they were not dependable or helpful. The closest disciples,
the eleven, ran away, except for John. Peter ran away after cursing and
swearing that he didn’t know anything about this Jesus of Nazareth.
Some folks might point to the women as cutting a better
figure. Mary, the mother of our Lord, Mary Magdalene, and a couple other women
were at the cross. As respectable as that might have been, their faith didn’t
hold out. None of them believed what Jesus had told them beforehand—that he was
going to rise from the dead. The reason why the women were coming to the tomb
on Easter was not to welcome the resurrected Lord, but to finish the hasty job
of preparing his body for burial that they didn’t have time to do properly
before the onset of the Sabbath on Friday afternoon. If we want to talk about
any contribution of the disciples it’s going to be nothing but sin and death
from which we are incapable of delivering ourselves.
But Jesus knew all this. Our salvation is not at all
dependent upon us. If it were
dependent upon us we could never be sure that we’ve done well enough. If you
put your trust in yourself and your tender Christian feelings, then this just
might come back to haunt you on your deathbed. Even if you’ve managed to live a
somewhat, outwardly respectable life, you might remember there on our deathbed
how bored we were at all those Good Friday services. Or, what’s probably worse,
how pleased we were with ourselves at all those Good Friday services. “All
glory, laud, and honor be to me. Look at me. Look how well I’ve done.” This
would be dreadful because you’re not good enough, no matter what you might tell
yourself.
Our salvation was worked completely by Jesus the Christ.
From beginning to end it is all him. He became man so that he could fulfill all
righteousness, so that he could suffer and die. He took upon himself the sin of
the entire world. He became the propitiating sacrifice—that means the atoning
sacrifice for all sin. The punishment that the Law requires for our
transgressions was placed upon him. The Law, therefore, is completely
fulfilled. Jesus lived a perfect life in our place, which the Law requires,
which is credited to us. Jesus was punished in our place, which the Law demands
for our breaking of the Law. The Law has no claim on us anymore because Jesus
has fulfilled it.
We must go one step further: All people have been forgiven
by what Jesus did for us. This is what Paul teaches in Romans chapter 5. He
compares Jesus to Adam. Through one man, Adam, sin entered the world and
through sin death entered the world. There’s no exempting yourself from that.
If you are mortal, then you are descendant of Adam no matter how you might feel
about that.
The same thing is true with Jesus. Paul says that we were
reconciled to God by the death of his Son. This is something that God did,
entirely apart from you. All people have been reconciled to God by the death of
Jesus. All people have been justified by his blood. Just as by one man all
people sinned and are going to die, so also through the one man, Jesus Christ,
God’s Son, our Lord—through him justification, righteousness, and life is an
accomplished fact for all people. Adam’s action had its effect, whether you
like it or not. Jesus’s action had its effect, whether you like it or not.
Now our Old Adam, our reason, immediately howls in protest:
“Wait just a minute,” it says. “If Jesus had justified all people completely
and perfectly, then why aren’t all people saved? How can the Bible talk about
anybody going to hell if all people are justified and forgiven by Jesus’s
death?” We have a Bible verse for that. Jesus said, “Whoever believes and is
baptized shall be saved, whoever does not believe will be condemned.” The
reason why not all people are going to go to heaven is because not all people
believe that they are justified for Jesus’s sake.
“Aha!” our reason pops up again. “So we do have to do our part! We do have to believe!” Our reason is
really inept when it comes to spiritual things! Even just an earthly example can
show how stupid it is to say that we have to do our part in order to be saved.
Let’s say that our house has caught on fire. We are
unconscious in our bed. The fireman comes in, picks us up, carries us out to
safety, and revives us. What credit is this to you that you have been saved?
What part did you play? None. It was all the fireman’s doing.
The Bible, however, does not just describe us human beings
as unconscious. It describes us as being dead. Ephesians 2 says that we all
were dead and lost in our trespasses and sins. What can a dead person do?
Nothing. Absolutely nothing. But, as that passage goes on to say, “even when
we were dead in our trespasses, God made us alive together with Christ.”
This was not our own doing. It was God’s doing.
This shows us precisely the thing that we must come away
with tonight: All people are forgiven in Christ. All people are reconciled to
God by Christ’s death. Not all people are going to believe that, and so it
won’t be of benefit to them, but that is a different matter. Their unbelief
doesn’t undo what God has done. What God has done is he has worked forgiveness
and justification for all people in Jesus’s death.
If all people are forgiven and justified by what Jesus has
done, then that means that you have been forgiven and justified. But what about
your sins? Doesn’t matter. What about how you are feeling? Doesn’t matter.
There is literally nothing that you can do to undo what God has done. All
people are forgiven and justified by what Jesus has done. Therefore you are
forgiven and justified.
This is why Good Friday and Easter are such a devastating
defeat for the devil. Jesus has completely demolished him and taken away all
his power. It’s not like Jesus found some little loophole or some crazy way
that we are to be saved. All sin is atoned for. The truth is on our side. We
are saved by Jesus’s death. No doubt this is why the devil has to lie and lie
and lie some more to keep people from embracing the truth.
Lies can make the truth hard to believe, because we’re
constantly being hounded by the thought that it is too good to be true. There
has to be some catch. Our reason wants to master how all of this can be, but
our reason can’t master it. We’re not God. We can’t understand all things. Plus
our reason is fallen and sinful. How can you expect such a defective instrument
to work well at all?
It is much better for us to stick with the plain and simple
truth. Our faith is to be like that of a child’s. What we are to believe is
that Jesus saved us completely and totally on Good Friday. As God’s Word says,
“God reconciled us to himself by Jesus’s death.” Period. That’s what God
did. You are his workmanship. You are in his hands.
No comments:
Post a Comment