The Lord demands that we acknowledge the truth

Posted on May 1, 2024 by Rev. Paul Rydecki

Sermon for Midweek of Easter 4

Isaiah 46:1-13

Throughout Jesus’ state of humiliation, from His conception to His burial in the tomb, God revealed to us His humility and His meekness. But meekness and humility are not His only traits. In Isaiah 46, the LORD “boasts” about Himself, in a sense. We usually think of boasting as something negative, as a character flaw. But it’s not a flaw when our God does it. When He speaks of His greatness, He’s simply speaking the truth, and, at times, defending the truth against those who don’t wish to accept it, against those who worship false gods. Such is the case in this short chapter, where the Lord demands that we acknowledge the truth of His greatness in actually doing something to deliver His people, unlike the false gods of the nations.

We meet two of the false gods in the Babylonians here in Isaiah 46: Bel and Nebo. Bel was one of their important gods. You see his name reflected in “Belshazzar,” the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar who was eventually overthrown by the Cyrus the Persian. He’s also known as Marduk, as he’s referred to in the book of Jeremiah. Bel was their sky-god and the supreme ruler of the gods. Nebo or Nabu was another Babylonian god, the son of Bel and the god of wisdom. You see his name reflected in the name Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian king who destroyed Jerusalem and took the Jews captive in the first place. What does Isaiah say about Bel and Nebo?

Bel bows down, Nebo stoops; Their idols were on the beasts and on the cattle. Your carriages were heavily loaded, A burden to the weary beast. They stoop, they bow down together; They could not deliver the burden, But have themselves gone into captivity.

Normally it’s people bowing or stooping down before their god. But, in utter shame and disgrace, the statues of Bel and Nebo would be the ones “bowing down” to the Lord, because, when the Persians came in and conquered Babylon, they took the Babylonian statues of their gods and laid them face down on a cart pulled by animals through the city, as a display of shame and disgrace. The Babylonians had hoped in their gods to deliver them and carry them to victory, but instead their gods were carried away into captivity, as the Lord predicts in these verses.

“Listen to Me, O house of Jacob, And all the remnant of the house of Israel, Who have been upheld by Me from birth, Who have been carried from the womb: Even to your old age, I am He, And even to gray hairs I will carry you! I have made, and I will bear; Even I will carry, and will deliver you.

Now the Lord reminds what’s left of the people of Israel who He is, who the true God is. He reminds them: I have upheld you from birth. I gave birth to you, I’ve carried you since that time, and I will still be the one carrying you in your old age. We can certainly apply those beautiful words to how God carries individual believers in His fatherly arms. But these words are spoken here directly to the nation of Israel as a whole, as God’s “son” to whom He had “given birth” by choosing Jacob and making him in a great nation, how He preserved that nation through slavery in Egypt, through the conquest of Canaan, through all the bitter enemies who had threatened them and through all the wretched kings who had ruled over them. The Lord was the One who had carried them, as on eagles’ wings, and He promises to keep doing it “even to gray hairs.”

And He did, returning them safely to the land of Canaan, delivering and carrying them through still more hardships in the coming centuries, all the way up to the coming of Christ. At that point the Israel that has God’s promise of continual deliverance is not a biological nation, but a spiritual one. It’s to His Holy Christian Church that this promise now applies, to whom God speaks, “Even to gray hairs I will carry you! I have made you, I will carry you, I will deliver you.”

“To whom will you liken Me, and make Me equal And compare Me, that we should be alike? They lavish gold out of the bag, And weigh silver on the scales; They hire a goldsmith, and he makes it a god; They prostrate themselves, yes, they worship. They bear it on the shoulder, they carry it And set it in its place, and it stands; From its place it shall not move. Though one cries out to it, yet it cannot answer Nor save him out of his trouble.

Here’s another example of the gods being carried instead of being able to carry. People carry around a bag of gold. They hire someone to make a god out of it. Then they carry around their god on their should, set it up, and leave it there. It doesn’t move. It can’t move. It doesn’t lift a finger to help them, even if they cry out to it really loud. But no one has carried the Lord around. He is the one who carries His people. And He does move to deliver them. He acted in history to save Israel from Babylon. But more than that, He acted in history to descend to the earth in the Person of His Son, whose every action was the movement of God to save sinful mankind. Seriously, to whom will you liken God? To whom can anyone compare Him?

“Remember this, and show yourselves men; Recall to mind, O you transgressors. Remember the former things of old, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me, Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, And I will do all My pleasure,’ Calling a bird of prey from the east, The man who executes My counsel, from a far country. Indeed I have spoken it; I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it; I will also do it.

Acknowledge the truth, God says to His people, especially to those who had been denying it. He is the only true God, the only God who actually speaks to His people, who acts for His people, who delivers His people, and who told them ahead of time that He would do it, from the deliverance from Egypt, which He had told Abraham about ahead of time, to the conquest of Canaan, to the captivity in Babylon, to the return from captivity (which God alludes to here again as He calls His “bird of prey from the East,” that is, Cyrus, to defeat the Babylonians), to the birth, life, death, and resurrection of the Christ. What is it that separates Christianity from every other religion? It’s the fact that Christianity is based on truth, that which agrees with reality. It’s a historical religion, with historical writings, and with a God who has acted in human history and who even became a part of human history.

“Listen to Me, you stubborn-hearted, Who are far from righteousness: I bring My righteousness near, it shall not be far off; My salvation shall not delay. And I will place salvation in Zion, For Israel My glory.

Listen to Me, God says. He demands that unbelievers set aside their stubbornness and acknowledge the truth. He is the true God. And interacts with His people and comes to their aid. He placed salvation—His Son, the Christ—in Zion. And now He places His salvation in the spiritual Zion, in the Church that preaches the Gospel of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Here in His Church, here through His Son, God offers His salvation, to you, and to all! That’s the truth! Amen.

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The Holy Spirit, the Truth-Teller

Posted on April 28, 2024 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Cantate – Easter 4

James 1:16-21  +  John 16:5-15

As we said last week, these weeks leading up to the celebration of Jesus Ascension into heaven focus on His words spoken in the upper room, before heading out to the Garden of Gethsemane. He’s preparing His disciples for some of the challenges we’ll face in the world, before He returns at the end of the age. And the greatest help that the Church will have during this age is the help of the Holy Spirit. People today think wrongly of the Holy Spirit as a feeling that moves through the building, or as a divine whisper in the ear, or as a burden on the heart. Or, people think that the Holy Spirit is here to enable people to speak in tongues or perform some other miracle. But the role of the Holy Spirit, according to Jesus, has nothing to do with those former feelings, and very little to do with those latter signs. At first, on the Day of Pentecost and at various times during the lifetime of the apostles, the Spirit’s presence was accompanied with mighty outward signs of His presence. But those signs were never His primary work. Jesus talks about two of the main works of the Holy Spirit in today’s Gospel, and these works continue throughout this New Testament period. They’re vital for the Church in this world. There is a work He does toward the world, and there is a work He does toward the Christian, and both revolve around truth-telling, because the “Spirit of truth,” as Jesus calls Him in today’s Gospel, is the true Truth-Teller.

Jesus begins by comforting His disciples in today’s Gospel. They were sad to hear that He would be going away (speaking, again, about His ascension into heaven, which would take place within 43 days). But He assures them, It is to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. Here we run across this title of the Holy Spirit, which means “Helper” or “Intercessor” or “Advocate” or “Comforter.” It can even have the sense of “Attorney,” and that’s essentially the work that Jesus describes in the next few verses. The Holy Spirit is like an attorney representing Jesus’ disciples, like a prosecuting attorney who makes His case against the unbelieving world.

When he comes, he will convict the world regarding sin, and regarding righteousness, and regarding judgment. Regarding sin, because they do not believe in me; regarding righteousness, because I go to my Father and you will not see me any longer; regarding judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. The word “convict” here means to speak the truth against someone, to speak the truth revealing the crimes someone has committed. And that’s what the Holy Spirit does toward the unbelieving world, not as a voice calling down from heaven, but through the preaching of the Word of God that is carried out in the world. The Holy Spirit, Jesus promises, will be working when God’s Word is preached, speaking the truth, whether the world accepts it as truth or not.

He will convict the world regarding sin, because they do not believe in me. The truth-telling Spirit speaks the truth against the world concerning their sins, because people deny their sinfulness before God. They refuse to accept God’s judgment about what’s right and wrong. And so the Spirit of truth comes along and reveals the sins that the world refuses to recognize: the sin of worshiping false gods, the sin of atheism, the sin of making up your own religion and your own “truth,” the sin of badmouthing other people and ruining their reputation, the sin of lying, the sin of coveting what doesn’t belong to you, and all the sexual sins that the world indulges in.

But the greatest sin revealed by the Holy Spirit is to not believe in Jesus as the Christ and as the Savior of the world. It’s the greatest sin, because Jesus is the Father’s greatest gift to the world, because when a person repents of his sins and believes in the Lord Jesus, all his grievous sins are washed away. But where there is no repentance and faith in Christ, then all a person’s sins are still charged to his or her account. And there will be no escaping the truth on the Last Day.

He will convict the world regarding righteousness, because I go to my Father and you will not see me any longer. The truth-telling Spirit will speak the truth against the world concerning righteousness, because no one knows what it truly is. People have their own ideas of righteousness. All the people fighting for the climate, or fighting for a woman’s right to have an abortion, or fighting for illegal immigrants, or defending homosexuality or drag queen shows, or engaging in angry, violent protests—all these people think their causes are righteous, making them righteous. But they aren’t.

Or take just your average people of the world, who do the best they can in the world. They work hard. They don’t bother anyone. They take care of their families. And many think they’re righteous because of that. But the truth revealed by the Holy Spirit is that true righteousness, the kind that God recognizes, begins with worshiping the true God and serving Him only, fearing, loving, and trusting in Him above all things. It continues with honoring His Word and the preaching of it. True righteousness then continues with loving your neighbor as God defines love. True righteousness is wrapped up in Jesus Christ, who is called in Scripture the Righteous One. It isn’t to be found in anyone else, including ourselves. It’s to be found in Jesus whom we don’t see, because He has gone to the Father, but whose ministry is still offered to us in Word and Sacrament. Here is righteousness and the forgiveness of sins, in the Gospel of Christ crucified, risen, and ascended. But the world won’t seek God’s righteousness there, and so the Spirit of truth speaks against the world’s idea of righteousness.

He will convict the world regarding judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. The truth-telling Spirit will speak the truth against the world when it comes to judgment. Not only do people claim that their sins aren’t sins. Not only do they claim to be righteous. But they also try to convince themselves that they won’t have to face God’s judgment in the end, that there is no divine judgment. There is only the here and now. But the prince of the here and now, the devil, is already judged. And God’s judgment will come upon this world, and each individual will face God’s judgment when we die. If you’re found at the judgment to be on the side of the prince of this world, then you will share his fate. But if you’re found to be taking refuge by faith in Christ Jesus, then you will stand in the judgment, and you’ll share in the victory of Christ the King.

Now, all of that will be going on during this entire New Testament period, that work of the Holy Spirit, revealing the truth to the world about the futility of unbelief. The world has tried and will try to silence that truth, to not let it be spoken or heard. But the Spirit will see to it that the truth is told, no matter what.

The other work of the Holy Spirit highlighted here by Jesus is His work among the Christians themselves. When he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak from himself; but whatever he hears, that he will speak, and he will reveal to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take of what is mine and proclaim it to you. That work was first fulfilled among the apostles. The “speaking” that Jesus refers to here isn’t an audible kind of speaking, but the “speaking” of opening their minds and helping them to understand the meaning of the Old Testament prophecies, and of the words of Jesus Himself, allowing them to preach and teach, and eventually write down in the New Testament Gospels and Epistles, not their own ideas about what it all meant, but the truth of what it all meant. The truth-telling Spirit would “guide them into all truth.”

The Holy Spirit still carries on that work in the hearts and minds of Christians, helping us to understand the Word of God, to hear the truth and to recognize it as truth. But notice the Spirit’s focus: “He will glorify Me,” Jesus says. The Spirit isn’t out there giving random guidance about life, or about the future. He’s guiding us to know Jesus rightly and so to glorify Him in truth. That’s one way you can tell that the modern Pentecostal teachers are false teachers, because they put so much emphasis on the Holy Spirit that Jesus becomes almost an afterthought. That does not bring glory to Him. It’s also how you can tell that all these modern Christians going on and on about modern Israel as God’s chosen people are following a false spirit, not the Holy Spirit. It brings no glory to Jesus to express Christian solidarity with a nation that rejects Jesus and His Word. On the contrary, such teachings rob Christ of His glory and mislead countless Christians to minimize Jesus, and to support unbelief and earthly-mindedness instead.

But if we rely on the truth that the Holy Spirit has already told, the truth recorded in Holy Scripture, then we will not be so easily misled with the guidance of a false spirit. The better we know the Word of God and listen to the Word of God, the better we’ll be able to recognize and follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

There are other works of the Holy Spirit that we’ll talk about over the coming weeks. But for today, give thanks to the Lord Jesus for these two works of the truth-telling Helper: first, for His truth-telling against the unbelieving world, which is the enemy of Christians. How do we deal with this enemy? Not with hatred. Not with anger. Certainly not with violence. But by relying on the word and power of God the Holy Spirit, who enables us to speak the truth in love, and who will see to it that the truth is heard, if not always believed. And, second, give thanks for the Spirit’s truth-telling among us, guiding us to recognize which teachings are true and which ones aren’t. We will face many challenges in these days leading up to Christ’s return, challenges from the unbelieving world, challenges in understanding God’s Word rightly amid all the false teachings and unbelief surrounding us. But we will also have the continual presence of God’s Holy Spirit, the Helper promised by Jesus. Rely on His help, and give thanks for it! Because the truth will prevail in the end! God will see to it.  Amen.

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For enlightening the Gentiles and for glory to Israel

Posted on April 24, 2024 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Midweek of Easter 3

Isaiah 45:14-25

Every Sunday, after Communion, we sing the Nunc Dimittis, where Simeon praises God for revealing to him the Christ, who is the salvation which God had prepared before the face of all peoples, a light for enlightening the Gentiles and for glory to His people Israel. What we have in our verses this evening from the second half of Isaiah 45 is essentially saying the same thing as Simeon. It’s God’s promise to bring the Gentiles into His plan of salvation and to bring glory to Israel in the process.

Thus says the LORD: “The labor of Egypt and merchandise of Cush And of the Sabeans, men of stature, Shall come over to you, and they shall be yours; They shall walk behind you, They shall come over in chains; And they shall bow down to you. They will make supplication to you, saying, ‘Surely God is in you, And there is no other; There is no other God.’ ”

God has just informed the captive Israelites in Babylon that He will surely be sending Cyrus to deliver them back to their homeland, back to Jerusalem and Judea. But with their return from captivity would come even greater blessings. He mentions Egypt and the surrounding nations here, coming over to Israel, yielding to Israel, humbling themselves before Israel, pleading to them for a place in Israel. Why? Because “surely God is among you, and there is no other God.”

The Egyptians here are symbolic of all Gentile nations. And the coming over to Israel is also symbolic. This is not God promising Israel an earthly kingdom to which all the secular governments of the world must submit. He’s promising that the Gentiles would come into God’s Church and seek salvation in the only place where it was to be found: among the people of Israel, from whom the Christ would come. And the Gentiles would acknowledge Israel’s God—including Jesus Christ, the Son of God—to be the true God.

Truly You are God, who hide Yourself, O God of Israel, the Savior!

This is the confession of all of us who have come to Israel, to the people from whom Christ came. We Gentiles have recognized Israel—Old Testament Israel—to be God’s chosen people, who preserved His Word and His religion long enough for Jesus, the world’s Savior, to be born. We have rejected the pagan gods of our pagan ancestors and have come to know the true God as the One who revealed Himself to Israel. In that sense, He is a God who hides Himself. Yes, He reveals many things about Himself in nature, things that all the Gentiles could recognize: that He is all-powerful, wise, kind, righteous, and eternal. But the true God can’t truly be known except to the extent that He reveals Himself to us in His Word. Part of His governance of the world included hiding Himself from the Gentiles for a time, and even now He remains mostly hidden from all men. But He revealed enough of Himself to Israel that both they and we could know a small part of His greatness, and all we need to know about His plan to save us through His Son, Jesus Christ, who is a light for enlightening the Gentiles and for bringing glory to Israel.

Isaiah continues: They shall be ashamed and also disgraced, all of them; They shall go in confusion together, Who are makers of idols. But Israel shall be saved by the LORD with an everlasting salvation; You shall not be ashamed or disgraced forever and ever.

The Lord assures Israel that the Gentile idolaters, including all who had oppressed them in the past, would be put to shame, that the victory of the unbelievers would be temporary, while the salvation of Israel through the coming Christ would be eternal.

In the next set of verses, God assures the people of Israel that He means what He says about this plan of salvation, for enlightening the Gentiles and for bringing glory to Israel.

For thus says the LORD, Who created the heavens, Who is God, Who formed the earth and made it, Who has established it, Who did not create it in vain, Who formed it to be inhabited: “I am the LORD, and there is no other. I have not spoken in secret, In a dark place of the earth; I did not say to the seed of Jacob, ‘Seek Me in vain’; I, the LORD, speak righteousness, I declare things that are right.

The Lord did not create the heavens and the earth in vain, for no purpose. He made them so that the earth might be inhabited. In the same way, He hasn’t been telling Israel for the last thousand years to seek Him in vain, for no purpose, so that He can abandon them now. No, they’re about to find out that their trust in Him was well-placed when He carries out this plan of salvation, for enlightening the Gentiles and for bringing glory to Israel.

“Assemble yourselves and come; Draw near together, You who have escaped from the nations. They have no knowledge, Who carry the wood of their carved image, And pray to a god that cannot save. Tell and bring forth your case; Yes, let them take counsel together. Who has declared this from ancient time? Who has told it from that time? Have not I, the LORD? And there is no other God besides Me, A just God and a Savior; There is none besides Me.

The Lord’s words here to “you who have escaped from the nations” can be applied equally to Israel, who was about to escape from their captivity in Babylon, and to the Gentiles who have escaped from their captivity to idolatry and have found the true God among the people of Israel. God challenges them all to compare Him with the idols of the nations, and to recognize that He is the only true God, the true Governor of the world, and also a righteous God and a Savior God, who isn’t like the gods that the nations worship—gods that demand sacrifices for their own benefit and honor. No, our God instituted sacrifices among the people of Israel for their benefit, to make them aware of their sins, so that they might one day put their faith in God’s great sacrifice of His own Son on the cross. Truly there is no God or Savior besides Him.

Finally, God calls out to all the world with this saving invitation, “Look to Me, and be saved, All you ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other. I have sworn by Myself; The word has gone out of My mouth in righteousness, And shall not return, That to Me every knee shall bow, Every tongue shall take an oath. He shall say, ‘Surely in the LORD I have righteousness and strength. To Him men shall come, And all shall be ashamed Who are incensed against Him. In the LORD all the descendants of Israel Shall be justified, and shall glory.’ ”

This grand invitation goes out to all mankind: All are invited! All are welcome! Come, and acknowledge the Lord God of Israel as the true God! Acknowledge His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, as your Savior from sin! Come and bow down before Him in faith, and you will be grafted into the believing descendants of Israel. In Christ you will be justified and glorified! But, if you will not, if you, whether Jew or Gentile, refuse to believe in this God and in His Son Jesus Christ, understand that whoever sets himself against the Lord will bow down before the Lord Christ, not in worship, but in shame.

The invitation was there already in the Book of Isaiah. But it wasn’t until the days of old Simeon that the Lord actually brought His salvation into the world, and by God’s grace, Simeon recognized it as he held the baby Jesus in his arms. Here it was, the salvation that God had promised so long ago through the prophet Isaiah, the One who would be a Light for enlightening the Gentiles and for bringing glory to the people of Israel, the One before whom every knee will bow, the One in whom all the spiritual descendants of Israel, both Christian Jews and Christian Gentiles, will be justified, and will glory! Amen.

 

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The sorrow will be temporary

Posted on April 21, 2024 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Jubilate – Easter 3

1 Peter 2:11-20  +  John 16:16-23

Today we begin a five-week stretch in which we hear the Gospel, every week, from a portion of John’s Gospel, chapters 14-16. These chapters in John all recount some of Jesus’ final words to His disciples before His arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane, all spoken from that same upper room where He celebrated the Last Supper and instituted the Lord’s Supper with His disciples. The suppers are finished. And Jesus spends these precious last moments preparing His disciples, not just for the next three days, but for what life would be like after His ascension. The help of the Holy Spirit would be essential for His Church going forward, and He’ll talk about that help in the other texts we’ll consider in the coming weeks. But in today’s Gospel, Jesus is specifically preparing His disciples for a time of sorrow they’d have to endure, a “little while” of not seeing Him. But the main thing He emphasizes to them is that this time of sorrow would be temporary, and that their sorrow would, soon enough, be turned to joy—joy so great that it overshadows all the sorrow that came before. These words were spoken for their benefit, but they were recorded in Holy Scripture for our benefit. So let’s consider the text.

“A little while, and you will not see me. And again, a little while, and you will see me, because I am going to the Father.” They didn’t understand what He was talking about, and they were afraid to ask, so He goes on to explain, although still in a somewhat cryptic way. Jesus said to them, “You are asking one another about what I said, ‘A little while, and you will not see me. And again, a little while, and you will see me.’ Truly, truly, I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy.

There are two fulfillments of Jesus’ words here. The first little while, the first time of sorrow His disciples would experience, would be the next 72 hours or so. Within a few hours, Jesus would be taken away from them, arrested, tried, convicted, tortured, tried again, tortured again, convicted again, crucified, and buried. During that time, Jesus’ disciples would be the most sorrowful they had ever been or would ever be, because Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God, was actually dead, and they thought it was permanent. If only they had believed these words Jesus had spoken to them! But they didn’t. And so they were sorrowful, while the unbelievers in Jerusalem rejoiced that they had finally gotten rid of that troublemaker, Jesus of Nazareth. The disciples would be sorrowful right up until the moment Jesus appeared to them again, in that same upper room, on Easter Sunday evening. Then they rejoiced when they saw the Lord, just as He said they would.

The second “little while” of sorrow wouldn’t be as little as 72 hours, but it also wouldn’t be as sorrowful, because for the rest of their lives, they knew and believed that Jesus was alive and reigning at the right hand of God. That’s what Jesus actually meant when He said that He was “going to the Father.” He was talking about His ascension, which would take place 40 days after He rose from the dead, His permanent removal of His visible presence from this earth—permanent in the sense that He wouldn’t be making any more appearances until the very end of the age, when He returns to this earth for judgment. For the rest of their earthly lives, Jesus’ disciples wouldn’t see Jesus again.

That time of separation from Jesus wouldn’t be pure sorrow, like it was when Jesus was dead and buried, but it would have its share of sorrow. And remember, we’re talking here only about the sorrow that Christians have because they’re Christians. All people have sorrow in this world because of sin and its consequences. But Jesus was talking about the kind of sorrow that affects Christians only, while the unbelieving world goes on rejoicing. What would Jesus’ disciples face in this world after He departed and went to the Father? They would face brutal opposition from their own countrymen and from the Gentiles. They would face torture and imprisonment, ridicule and mockery, slander and lies. Eventually they would witness the Roman empire turning against them and their fellow Christians with a vengeance. They would watch, or hear about, one another being put to death, one after the other, for carrying out the mission Jesus had given them. What’s more, while they lived, the apostles would witness even false brothers quickly start to introduce false teachings into the church and would have to spend a good deal of time stamping out the fires of heresy. There would be plenty of sorrow during that “little while” of the rest of their earthly lives.

But as soon as they closed their eyes in the sleep of Christian death, they would see Jesus again. They would be with the Lord in Paradise, just like the thief who died next to Jesus on the cross, where they still are today, nearly 2,000 years later. And their joy has known no end.

Jesus compared their sorrow to that of a woman in labor: “A woman has sorrow when she is giving birth, because her hour has come. But as soon as she gives birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish because of her joy that a human being has been born into the world. So it is that you also have sorrow now. But I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you.”

Now these words of Jesus apply just as much to the Christians living after the time of apostles, maybe even more, because we’ve never seen Jesus at all. All we’ve known is this time in between Jesus’ ascension and His eventual coming again. By the miracle of God’s Holy Spirit, working through the preaching of the Gospel of Christ, we’ve come to believe in Jesus, without seeing Him. We believe that His words were faithfully recorded in the Bible, and that everything He said is true. We’ve been brought to repent of our sins, to trust in Him for the forgiveness of sins, and to hope that He is indeed preparing a place for us now in the heavenly mansions, so that when we close our eyes in the sleep of Christian death, or when He returns to judge the earth—whichever comes first—we will see Him and rejoice.

But that also means that our entire life on earth is a “little while” of sorrow. Not pure sorrow, because we know that Jesus is alive, that He has conquered death for us and will return for us. But there’s sorrow, nonetheless—real sorrow, because the world hates Jesus even more now than it did back then. It hates the truth and loves the lies that the devil spews. So the world rejoices that Jesus is unseen during this time. It means that the lies can grow and evil can fester in the world largely unchecked, and it has! The infection has almost completely ravaged mankind, as it did leading up to Noah’s flood, and that causes Christians no end of sorrow, just as righteous Lot, Abraham’s nephew, was tormented from day to day by seeing and hearing the lawless deeds of those around him in the wicked city of Sodom.

What are some of those sorrows? What things torment our souls?

First of all, we’re grieved by our own sinful flesh. The world rejoices to indulge in every sinful pleasure and activity, and to place one temptation after another before our eyes, but the Christian is grieved by temptation, and by his own sins, and yearns to be rid of them. But that sorrow is temporary, because this sinful flesh is temporary. One day we’ll shed it, and we’ll see Jesus, and that sorrow will be replaced with pure joy.

We’re grieved by the world’s largescale rejection of truth itself, and the embracing of lies. The lies are everywhere (and we point them out often precisely because they aren’t recognized as lies by the rest of the world): the lie of evolution and a billions-of-years-old universe has swept the world and practically consumed it as it shakes its fist at its Creator and claims, “You didn’t put this here! We don’t have to serve You!” There’s the lie of homosexuality as something natural and good. There’s the lie of transgenderism and the crushing pressure to accept it. There’s the lie that sex is free, and free of consequences, and free of responsibility. There’s the lie that the little child growing in her mother’s womb is a disposable clump of cells, and that preserving some degree of baby murder is a good thing. There are the lies of the politicians, the lies of the media, the lies of those who want to make Christianity into the greatest evil ever unleashed on this planet, because it robbed pagan cultures of their pagan worship practices and spread the “harmful” doctrine of Christ everywhere. Add to that the persecution of Christians, and the tyranny of corporations and of governments—including our own—which is now turned most acutely against Christians, and that will not change. Add to that all the false doctrines that have flooded the outward Christian Church, to the point that many Christians aren’t even Christians anymore, according to a Biblical definition. These things affect us. They affect our children. They’re painful, and they make it, sometimes, almost unbearable to live in this world of sorrow for the Christian.

But I think many women would say the same thing about the pains of childbirth. Painful, sorrowful, almost unbearable—until it’s over. And a child is born. And all the pain was worth it. Even forgotten, in a sense. That’s how it will be for believers, too. The sorrow is temporary. Temporary, not because eventually the Christian Church will succeed against the world and take over the world and convert the world to Christianity. No, temporary, because we will see Jesus again. You only have to live through the sorrow of this world for a several decades, at most. Then you’ll see Jesus. The world doesn’t have much longer to exist. Then all people will see Him. This sorrow will have an end, and knowing that, with the certainty of faith, will help you get through it.

What else will help you get through the sorrow? Well, you have the promise of the good Shepherd, that He is still with you, walking with you even through the valley of the shadow of death. You don’t see Him. But He tells you He’s there, and He doesn’t lie. And He promises that He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear.

What else? The ministers whom Christ sends you and the fellow Christians God places around you. These are gifts of God, like the doctors and nurses in the delivery room, to help you make it through the little while of sorrow.

What else? You have the Word of God, which is living and active, sheltering you and strengthening you with dependable truth. You have the promises attached to Holy Baptism. You have a special kind of presence of Jesus, His very body and blood, given to you in Holy Communion, so that He becomes a part of you, even now when you don’t see Him.

All these promises and gifts will enable you to push through the sorrow, to lean into it instead of running away from it. They will enable you to rejoice in the future that’s coming, just as a woman in labor, at least a part of her, can rejoice in the child who is about to be born. And these promises and gifts of God will even enable you to choose sorrow and suffering, when necessary. Because, yes, the Christian is often confronted with a choice, with many choices throughout one’s life. Do the right thing and face suffering for it, or do the wrong thing, or keep quiet, in order to avoid suffering and sorrow. St. Peter reminds us, in today’s Epistle, that doing the wrong thing to avoid suffering is simply not an option for the one who wants to be a follower of Christ Jesus.

So in those moments, whether long or short, when the sorrow begins to overwhelm you, remember Christ Jesus, crucified and risen from the dead. Just as His time in the grave was temporary, so will your sorrow be. The Lord promises that, soon enough, you will see Him. And your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you. Amen.

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God has raised up the heavenly Cyrus

Posted on April 17, 2024 by Rev. Paul Rydecki
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Sermon for Midweek of Easter 2

Isaiah 45:1-13

On Sunday, we heard the Gospel about Jesus as the Good Shepherd. That title fits Jesus, not only because it describes so well His relationship with believers, but because it identifies Him as the Son of David, the great Shepherd-King of Israel, and as the LORD God Himself, as He reveals Himself in Psalm 23: The LORD is my shepherd. The title of shepherd is also most fitting for Jesus, because He is the true deliverer of Israel of whom Cyrus was a symbol. If you recall from last week, Isaiah 44 ended with a prophecy about the Lord’s “shepherd” named Cyrus, whom we identified as Cyrus II, also known as Cyrus the Great, king of Persia, whom God chose and sent before he was even born to return captive Israel from Babylon to Judea. We meet Cyrus again here in Isaiah 45:

“Thus says the LORD to His anointed, To Cyrus, whose right hand I have held— To subdue nations before him And loose the armor of kings, To open before him the double doors, So that the gates will not be shut.  So God referred to Cyrus as His “shepherd” in the previous chapter. Here, you noticed what He called him? The Lord’s “anointed.” And you know what the Hebrew word for anointed is, don’t you? It’s Messiah. The Lord says to His Messiah, Cyrus. Now, that word Messiah is used for several offices in the Old Testament. It’s used for prophets, priests, and kings, and it’s also used for the furnishings of the temple, which were anointed with the special anointing oil prescribed in the Law of Moses. But here the Gentile ruler named Cyrus is called the Lord’s anointed—anointed, not literally, but figuratively. That is, he was solemnly chosen by God and set aside for the special purpose of delivering His people from captivity.

You can see, then, how Cyrus was a type or a pattern of the coming Messiah, the Christ, the true Anointed One of God, sent to be both Shepherd and Conqueror, to deliver God’s people from our captivity to sin, death, and the devil and to shepherd us safely through this life. Some of the prophecies in this chapter are specific to Cyrus and Old Testament Israel, but most of the prophecies here also apply to Christ and the New Testament Church.

God promises to go before Cyrus and make the crooked places straight, removing all the obstacles to his conquest of Babylon. That’s the exact same thing God promised to do for the coming Christ by sending the forerunner, John the Baptist, to make the crooked places straight through the preaching of repentance. God promises to break in pieces the gates and the bars of Babylon. But in Daniel’s prophecy about the statue Nebuchadnezzar saw in his dream, it’s Christ’s kingdom that breaks in pieces all the kingdoms of the earth. Here God says that he holds the hand of Cyrus and has called him by name. But in Isaiah 42 those same words were spoken, not about Cyrus, but directly about the coming Christ, “I, the LORD, have called You in righteousness, and will hold Your hand; I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, as a light to the Gentiles.”

The only thing said here that can’t be applied to the Christ is the phrase, “though you have not known Me.” Cyrus didn’t know the God of Israel. He didn’t serve the Lord intentionally. But Christ certainly knew the Lord as the eternal Son of God, as the one who is, as John writes, “in the Father’s bosom,” who is true God by nature. And He did serve the Lord intentionally, as we heard just this last Sunday, “I lay down My life for the sheep.” And a few verses later, “No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.”

Rain down, you heavens, from above, And let the skies pour down righteousness; Let the earth open, let them bring forth salvation, And let righteousness spring up together. I, the LORD, have created it. You may not remember this, but that verse serves as the Introit for the 4th Sunday of Advent. Rain down, you heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness. Let the earth open and bring forth salvation. It’s a picture of Christ, isn’t it?, who both came down from heaven as the Lord our righteousness, and who was also born from the earth, born of a woman, to be the salvation of mankind.

“Woe to him who strives with his Maker! Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the earth! Shall the clay say to him who forms it, ‘What are you making?’ Or shall your handiwork say, ‘He has no hands’? Woe to him who says to his father, ‘What are you begetting?’ Or to the woman, ‘What have you brought forth?’ ”

Here God scolds Israel for all their past doubt, all their disagreement with how He rules the world, including His plan to allow them to be conquered by the Babylonians and taken into captivity. It really is arrogant for the created thing to criticize the Creator, like a lump of clay that thinks it’s smarter than the potter, that thinks it has the right to know the potter’s plans. It doesn’t. The Creator has every right to make what He wants and to use it how He wants to. This text serves to humble us all and to expose our arrogance for thinking that we should have some say in God’s plans, or, even worse, that we have the right to criticize His plans.

In His mercy, God has revealed many of His plans to us. He didn’t have to, but He did. He revealed to Israel the reason for their captivity and the general outline of His plan to rescue them from it. He has revealed to us the general reason for the suffering and death that we endure. But He has also revealed much of His plan to save us through Christ. As for the present chaos of this world, we don’t need to know God’s plan. We just need to trust that it’s good. And as for the future, God has revealed enough of that, too, to give us hope and sustain our faith. Let that be enough.

Thus says the LORD, The Holy One of Israel, and his Maker: “Ask Me of things to come concerning My sons; And concerning the work of My hands, you command Me. I have made the earth, And created man on it. I—My hands—stretched out the heavens, And all their host I have commanded. I have raised him up in righteousness, And I will direct all his ways; He shall build My city And let My exiles go free, Not for price nor reward,” Says the LORD of hosts.

Even though God doesn’t have to reveal His plans to us, His creatures, He tells us to ask Him, in this case. He wants us to know. The one who designed and stretched out this universe has chosen to focus His attention on His chosen people, to raise up an earthly savior for Israel—Cyrus, who would decree freedom for the captives. But as we’ve seen, that earthly savior was a symbol of the heavenly Savior, of Jesus Christ, who has decreed freedom for those held captive by sin, death, and the devil. The Lord designed and maneuvered the first four thousand years of human history to bring about Jesus’ birth, suffering, death, and resurrection, and has been working tirelessly for these last two thousand years to make sure that you and I had our part in the Savior’s kingdom and in His work of building it. God has raised up the heavenly Cyrus to save His people and has given you a place in His kingdom. Now trust the rest of the Lord’s plans for you and for this world, and know that the heavenly Cyrus will soon return to deliver God’s people from every form of captivity. Amen.

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