Sermon manuscript:
Today I’d like to speak with you about broadening our
understanding of the end times. When the end times come to mind we often think
of Christ’s second coming to judge the living and the dead. We think of heaven
and hell, the life everlasting and the death everlasting. These are, indeed,
end times things, which haven’t happened yet. What I’d like to do today is to
pan out a little bit. Instead of focusing in only on things that are going to
happen in the future, I’d like you to see how we have been living in the end
times for quite some time already. In fact, with Christ’s first coming the end
times were already ushered in. In order to show how this is so, I’ll be
referring to all three of our readings this morning.
Our first reading from Isaiah is a prophecy about the coming
Christ and the coming end times. The prophet Isaiah lived 700 years before
Jesus was born. He foresaw how the kings descended from Jesse, King David’s
father, would be cut down. They’d become a stump. But from the royal line of David
a king would be born. A branch growing out of a stump is nothing much to look
at, and so it was with Jesus. He had no attractiveness and no majesty. He was
born in a stable. Most people laughed at the idea him being king.
But, as Isaiah says in our reading, the Spirit of the Lord
rested upon Jesus. This happened at the Jordan River, when Jesus was baptized
by John. This is when Jesus was anointed. He wasn’t just anointed by oil or by
water, but by the Holy Spirit. Isaiah describes what Jesus the anointed, Jesus
the Christ would be like. He would be wise. He would judge well. He would be
righteous and faithful.
Isaiah also says some strange thing about incompatible
animals being compatible with one another: wolves and sheep, bears and cattle. We’ll
come back to that later. That is the end times work that Jesus brings about.
But let’s move on to what our Gospel reading talks about.
Our Gospel reading describes John the Baptist’s preaching.
He says, “Repent, because the kingdom of heaven is near!” That is a very
end times kind of message. John was the forerunner, the one who prepared the
way for the coming of the Lord. When John speaks about the Christ in our
reading, he talks about judgement, about heaven and hell: “His winnowing
shovel is in his hand.”
A winnowing shovel was the way that they used to thresh
grain. When the grain was harvested it was with the husks and the thrash. To
separate the kernels, which they wanted, from the husks, which they did not
want, they’d toss the mixture into the air on a breezy day. The wind would blow
the lighter husks away. The denser, heavier grain would fall to the earth much
more quickly. Then they’d gather the grain.
John says: “Christ’s winnowing shovel is in his hand, and
he will thoroughly clean out his threshing floor. He will gather his wheat into
the barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” Here you
see that the work of the Christ is to thresh. The good is to be separated from
the bad. That is why we must repent, because the kingdom of God is near. Toward
that end, as John the Baptist says, Jesus baptizes with the Holy Spirit and
with fire.
There are a lot of things I might want to say about this,
but I’ll limit myself to just a couple points. Notice how the Holy Spirit is
given to those who are baptized, just as the Holy Spirit came upon Jesus
according to Isaiah’s prophecy. The Christ has the Holy Spirit. Those whom
Christ baptizes are given the Holy Spirit. It is so very easy for us to despise
baptism and think that it is nothing. It’s a splash of water. It’s a photo op
with the new baby. What John the Baptist says is that it is real and effective
like fire, giving the Holy Spirit.
The other thing I’d like to point out is how having the Holy
Spirit is of the end times, and the Holy Spirit is how it all comes about. How
do we repent? It is only by the Holy Spirit if it is a genuine repentance and
not a fake one. The Holy Spirit gives wisdom so that we know the times, so we
know that the kingdom of God is near. The Holy Spirit alone makes anyone believe
in Jesus as the Christ. The Holy Spirit fights against and will ultimately
conquer evil spirits, including our own evil spirit, so that we are not like
the chaff that is burned up in the unquenchable fire. The Christ has the Holy
Spirit and the Christ gives the Holy Spirit to those he baptizes.
Finally I’d like to say something about the end times our
epistle reading. Paul is marveling over the Gentiles who have been converted by
the Holy Spirit to believe in Jesus as the Christ. The first Christians were
all Jews, blood descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Even at Pentecost,
when 3,000 repented and were baptized—those, also, were Jews. It wasn’t until a
little time later that uncircumcised Gentiles received the Holy Spirit so that
they could say, “Jesus Christ is my Lord.” Gentiles receiving the Holy
Spirit blew those first Christians away. It took some getting used to. But it
was a fulfillment of what was prophesied beforehand in the Old Testament.
Throughout the Old Testament it is said that during the end
times the Gentiles will come streaming into Zion, the mountain of the Lord, the
Temple. At the time those prophecies were made, Gentiles would have had nothing
to do with the true God. Gentiles worship devils and money. Gentiles do not
know the words and promises of God. According to God’s own laws in the Old
Testament, only those who are circumcised and follow the Laws of Moses should
be allowed near the Temple, and, even then, only the descendants of Aaron should
be allowed to enter it.
But at the death of Jesus the curtain in the temple was torn
in two. The dividing wall between Jews and Gentiles was broken down. Jesus is
the fulfillment and culmination of the Old Testament. His body is temple, the
dwelling place of God. His body was put to death, and three days later it was
rebuilt. All who believe and are baptized shall be saved. Whoever does not
believe will be condemned. The Holy Spirit is poured out on all the nations so
that whoever calls on the Name of the Lord shall be saved. Gentiles believing
in Jesus fulfills the Old Testament prophecies that during the end times the
Gentiles will come streaming to the temple. Gentiles who believe in Jesus are
streaming into the dwelling place of God.
So in our epistle reading Paul quotes one Old Testament
passage after another that talk about this end times event: “For this reason
I will praise you among the Gentiles, and I will sing to your Name.” And again
it says: “Rejoice, you Gentiles, with his people.” And again: “Praise the Lord,
all you Gentiles, and let all the peoples give him praise.” And again Isaiah
says: “There will be a Root of Jesse, and he is the one who will rise up to
rule the Gentiles; on him the Gentiles will place their hope.” You can tell
that Paul is in something of ecstasy. It is thrilling to him to see the end
times playing out before his very eyes.
Paul could see this clearly with the eyes of faith, however,
this would not have been recognized with the eyes of reason. Believing in a
crucified man who supposedly is risen from the dead is not very impressive to
our reason. The Gentiles who were being converted were not the big shots.
Slaves, widows, soldiers, poor people were the Gentiles whom Paul knew. That’s
not all that impressive. Plus they weren’t even making impressive pilgrimages
to the Temple in Jerusalem. Instead they confessed with their mouths that Jesus
is Lord. They were baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Spirit. Such things have never been impressive to the eyes of reason, and
therefore get despised all the way down to today.
But this in itself is also fulfillment of prophecy. Mary
says in the Magnificat: “The Lord has scattered the proud in the imagination
of their hearts. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones and has exalted
the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, but the rich he has sent
empty away.”
Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 1: “The message of the
cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved,
it is the power of God. In fact, it is written in the Old Testament: ‘I will
destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will
bring to nothing.’” God’s continual working among us in his Word and
sacraments is an article of faith. It will by no means be seen by everyone.
That, however, does not mean that it is real.
So as you look at our readings today, I’d like you to see
how they are about the end times. A part of the end times has to do with things
that will happen in the future—judgement, heaven and hell. The larger part of
the end times, however, has already happened and is ongoing.
The end times were begun with the woman’s seed, Mary’s seed,
coming to life in her womb, even though she was a virgin. The end times were
underway when the branch from the stump of Jesse was anointed with the Holy
Spirit in the Jordan River. The end times were coming to a fulfillment when
Jesus was judged and condemned on the cross. End times kinds of things happened
on Good Friday. Darkness, earthquakes, rocks were split, the temple curtain was
torn from top to bottom. And what can be more end times-y than the rising of
the dead? He is risen. He is risen indeed. Jesus is the firstfruits of those
who sleep. He is the firstborn of the dead. Jesus then ascended into heaven and
now reigns and rules during these end times from the right hand of God the
Father by his Word and sacraments.
We are now living in the millennium that is mentioned in
Revelation—the time of Jesus’s ruling. That began at Pentecost when the Holy
Spirit was poured out on all people—man and woman, child and elderly. Jesus is
reigning by the preaching of the Gospel. Jesus is now baptizing, giving his
Holy Spirit, causing people to be born again so that they can see the kingdom
of God. Jesus is now giving his end times banquet at his Supper, giving his own
body and blood for the forgiveness of sins. All of this is so that we may be
saved. Saved from whom? Saved from ourselves—our loveless, selfish ways, so
that we may become like God. By God’s power we are being renewed in love, which
will be brought to completion in the life to come.
That life to come will be strange because we will be
completely changed. Here I’d like to go back to what Isaiah says in our Old
Testament reading. Incompatible creatures are made to be compatible: “The
wolf will dwell with the lamb, and the leopard will lie down with the young
goat, the calf, the young lion, and the fattened calf together, and a little
child will lead them. The cow and the bear will graze together, and their young
ones will lie down together. The lion will eat straw like the cattle. The
nursing child will play near the cobra’s hole, and the weaned child will put
his hand into a viper’s den. They will not hurt or destroy anywhere on my holy
mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the
waters cover the sea.”
“They will not hurt or destroy anywhere on my holy
mountain.” That is the hope laid up for us. The Holy Spirit works life and
love through Christ. Hurt and destruction are so common. The number of people
who have been abused, sexually assaulted, bullied, and so on is unbelievable.
Hardly anybody can make it through unscathed. Tragically, flesh and blood can’t
learn from this. So many of those who were abused, then go on to be abusers
themselves. Like begets like.
Not so in the end times, however. The bear, the lion, the
cobra—they should be a certain way, but their natures are changed by the
knowledge of the Lord. That which used to hurt, hurts no more. There is hope,
then, even for us who have sinned, who have hurt, who have destroyed. Repent,
for the kingdom of God is near.
So the end times are not just about the dramatic, obvious
signs and wonders in the future. We are already living in the end times. Jesus
already is risen from the dead. Jesus already is reigning and ruling at the
right hand of God the Father. The Holy Spirit is being poured out, and the
Gentiles are streaming into Zion. People are being baptized, and receiving the
Lord’s Supper. People are believing that Jesus is their Lord, and are being
changed by the power of the Holy Spirit. These current things are the main
course—so to speak—of the end times. Dessert, you might say, is that which is
to come.
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