Emmanuel Lutheran Church

Sermon for Trinity 26

2 Thessalonians 1:3-10  +  Matthew 25:31-46

The Bible clearly tells us that this earth and this universe won’t last forever. A “last day” is coming, and in last week’s Epistle from 1 Thessalonians, St. Paul told us about something important that will happen on that day. The Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. In those verses, Paul focused just on the resurrection of those who believed in Christ and on the joyful reunion believers will have on that day as we gather together forever around the Lord Jesus. But those who died in unbelief will be raised, too, and in today’s Epistle from 2 Thessalonians, Paul describes another aspect of the Last Day, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. He speaks of punishment with everlasting destruction for unbelievers, even as the Lord will be glorified among His saints and admired among all those who believe. It’s this picture of judgment on the Last Day that we want to focus on today, since it’s also the focus of Jesus’ parable in the Gospel, the parable of the sheep and the goats.

Judgment is one aspect of judgment day, but we need to understand that correctly. There will be no hearing, no investigation, no trial. Because by the time the Judge finally comes, He will have already made all His decisions. Jesus says, When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then he will sit upon his glorious throne. And all nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will set the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. See? No trial, no hearing, no giving anyone a chance to defend himself and sway the Judge one way or the other. The judgment is made before the Last Day, here and now.

In fact, Jesus doesn’t even talk about the basis of the judgment in this text. He does talk about it elsewhere, like in John 3: For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. Or again in John 5: For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.

So the judgment is made here and now. All people have earned God’s condemnation, according to His holy Law, because all are sinners. No one has given away enough food to anyone to earn an innocent verdict and a place in heaven. No one has been kind enough to a stranger, or made enough visits to the sick or to the imprisoned to purchase a place at the Judge’s right hand. No, God sent His Son into the world to save sinners, to call us by His Gospel to repent of our sins and to believe in Him who bore our sins on the cross and was raised to life again, to be brought into His salvation through faith and through Holy Baptism. As St. Paul says in the book of Romans, There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Faith in Jesus Christ is what makes someone a sheep of the Good Shepherd. Faith in Jesus Christ is what reserves a place for us at the Judge’s right hand.

It’s to these whom the Judge will speak first on Judgment Day: Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you blessed ones of my Father! Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” It will be a day of joy and celebration for believers, a day when we get to hear only words of peace and blessing from Jesus. What we have to look forward to is an “inheritance” in God’s kingdom, the inheritance He has been preparing for the chosen children of God since before the world was created. Remember, an inheritance isn’t given on the basis of good works. An inheritance is given on the basis of a person’s relationship to someone, which makes perfect sense, because, as Paul writes to the Galatians, You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

But good works are evidence of faith and fruits of faith, and Jesus wants us to understand that He is paying attention to those fruits. He focuses in this parable on just one kind of good work: the small works of kindness that believers do for other believers in Christ. I was hungry, and you gave me food; I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in; naked, and you clothed me; I was sick, and you visited me; I was in prison, and you came to me. Now, only a handful of people in history had the chance to do any of those things for Jesus directly. Mary and Joseph, Mary and Martha, and a few others. But that’s not what Jesus is talking about here. Truly, I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these my brothers, you did for me. The small works of kindness toward Jesus’ brothers, our fellow Christians—whether done for a little baby or a little child, for an elderly Christian in a nursing home, or for anyone in between—Jesus is counting them up, every one, not as reasons to let a person into heaven, but as evidence that this person was indeed righteous by faith and a child and heir of heaven, because that’s how the heirs of heaven behave toward their fellow heirs of heaven. As Jesus said to His disciples, By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.

On the other hand, there are the unbelievers, the unrighteous, the goats—those who ended their lives in impenitence, still clinging to their sins, not trusting in the Lord Jesus for forgiveness. To them Jesus, the King, will say, Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. These people spent their earthly lives and will now spend eternity under God’s curse. That’s how all people begin this life, under the curse of sin and death and eternal separation from God. Those who are persuaded by the Gospel to look to Christ for forgiveness have their curse removed. As Paul writes to the Galatians, Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”), that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the nations in Christ Jesus. God held out this curse-lifting Gospel to the nations, but all those among the nations who didn’t believe in Christ Jesus remain under the curse.

That means that they’ll have to answer for all their sins. They’ll be held accountable by God for every unclean thought, word, and deed. Every act of adultery and sexual immorality, every lustful desire. Every drunken party, every sinful worry, every act of disobedience, every prayer offered to idols. But those aren’t even the sins Jesus mentions in today’s parable. I was hungry, and you did not give Me food, thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, etc…Whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me. The things Jesus mentions here seem so small, so harmless compared to the great deeds of wickedness that men engage in. But that’s just the thing with God’s holy Law. It doesn’t only demand that you avoid leading a grossly immoral life. It demands the little deeds of love, too. And Jesus shows here that He is especially offended when people who have the opportunity to help a little Christian in need fail to offer the needed help. He takes it personally. He takes it as a sin committed directly against Him, against the Judge of all mankind. Of course, even those sins He was willing to forgive during this life, if a person should repent and believe in Him. But not anymore, once the Last Day arrives. Then there will be no opportunity given for repentance. Then Christ will no longer offer to wash away anyone’s sins in Holy Baptism. Then, for the unrighteous, there will be only judgment.

And these will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.

So, what does Jesus’ description of Judgment Day do for you? How does it help you? If you remain outside of Christ, where you have to answer for every one of your misdeeds, it should frighten you more than your worst nightmare, because you eventually wake up from a nightmare, but there is no end to eternal punishment. If you’re frightened because of your sins, then this description should encourage you to seek a pardon from the Judge before Judgment Day comes, to be baptized, to come into Christ’s holy Church, where you will be safe on the Day of Judgment. If you’re already a believing member of Christ’s holy Church, then this description of Judgment Day should compel you to remain a living member of Christ’s Church, to be diligent about hearing the Word of God and receiving the body and blood of the Judge in His perpetual meal of forgiveness, and to be diligent about investigating and tending to the needs of your fellow Christians, great and small, because in serving them you are also serving the Lord Jesus Himself, and He will not forget those little deeds of kindness. Finally, if you’re a member of Christ’s Church and doing all these things, then Jesus’ description of Judgment Day should fill you will joy and peace and hope, because He will come in vengeance on those who make life miserable for you in this life, and He’ll settle all the scores, while you have eternal life and goodness and love to look forward to. What greater incentive could there be to eagerly and joyfully await that day? And so we say with St. Peter, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. Amen.

Sermon for Trinity 25 – Third-to-last Sunday

1 Thessalonians 4:13-18  +  Matthew 24:15-28

We’ve come to one of my favorite Sundays of the Church Year. Not because its Scripture lessons are especially foundational to our religion, but because it describes so well the odd situation in which we find ourselves in the Church, the ecclesiastical chaos all around us, the outward disunity we find in the Christian Church. Sometimes it almost feels like our little independent Lutheran church is a church without a home in the larger world of Christianity. But, as Jesus describes today, that’s exactly how it has to be in the days leading up to His return. In today’s Gospel, Jesus predicts this apparent “homelessness” for the faithful, but He also gives us good reasons not to worry about it, but to take comfort in His promises and to follow His instructions so that we may escape the terrible destruction that’s coming upon those who fail to flee from their home when their home is invaded by the abomination that causes desolation.

It was the end of the day on Tuesday of Holy Week, and Jesus had some final instructions for His disciples. He had just finished telling them about the destruction of Jerusalem that was going to take place. Looking back, we know it took place about 40 years after Jesus predicted it. The disciples, assuming that the destruction of Jerusalem must mean the end of the world and Jesus’ coming again at the end of the age, asked Jesus, Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age? As it turns out the destruction of Jerusalem would not be so closely tied to the end of the world. But it would foreshadow the eventual apostasy and destruction of the Church, leading up to the return of Christ and the end of the age. So the things Jesus says about Jerusalem’s destruction, and the warnings He attaches to them, are not only intended for the Christians living at that time, but for us as well.

In answer to His disciples’ questions, Jesus first goes on to describe the New Testament period and the signs of His coming, including the sign that the gospel would be preached to all nations, and then the end will come. Then He goes back and describes the conditions leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem, which are similar to the conditions leading up to the end of the world. He says that they will see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place. 550 years before Jesus was born, the prophet Daniel prophesied an abomination of desolation, an idol that would cause desolation and destruction, being set up in the temple in Jerusalem. That was partially fulfilled about 160 years before Jesus was born when the Syrian ruler Antiochus set up an altar to Zeus on top of the altar to God in the temple and sacrificed pigs on it. But Jesus says that wasn’t the only fulfillment. Another abomination causing desolation would be set up in the temple.

That was fulfilled in the years after Jesus’ ascension, when Jerusalem refused to believe the Gospel. The Jews kept offering their sacrifices in the temple. Those sacrifices once pointed ahead to Christ’s all-sufficient sacrifice for the sins of the world. But now they were being offered in rejection of the Christ. So the very sacrifices that once were pleasing to God had become an abomination in His sight. By rejecting Jesus as their Messiah, the Jews had become idolaters. The more entrenched they became in that anti-Christian idolatry, the worse their behavior became, until they engaged in open revolt against Rome, and then the Roman armies besieged Jerusalem, and finally went in and destroyed the city.

But Jesus knew that something similar would happen to the temple of the outward Christian Church, the Visible Church. Idolatry would take root in the Church and become an abomination in God’s sight, causing the desolation of the outward Church. That happened with the various forms of idolatry that were promoted under the Roman papacy, all of which pushed Jesus and His Word to the background and replaced Gospel with Law, faith with works, and forgiveness with constant guilt. But it has also happened throughout Protestantism, and even within Lutheranism. Idols are set up in the Church. Jesus is pushed to the background, and all sorts of other things are pushed into His place, so that His Word is twisted, so that His Gospel is minimized, so that preserving the institution of the church that a person grew up in becomes more important than preserving the Word of God itself. And hearts that are supposed to be clinging to Jesus begin to cling instead to manmade things. All of that is an abomination in God’s sight, and it has caused untold desolation within the Visible Church, to the point that it’s basically now every man for himself when it comes to interpreting the Bible and understanding the truth. This is all part of what Jesus refers to as the great tribulation. Jerusalem lived through it in the first century. And the Christian Church has been living through it for quite some time.

Other conditions during this great tribulation include false christs and false prophets performing great signs and wonders that will deceive many, that will come close even to deceiving the elect. In other words, these false prophets and their “signs” will not be easy to detect as false, or at least, will be so widely accepted that it will take great courage to denounce them as false. That can include the supposed apparitions of the virgin Mary. It can include the miracles that the Pentecostals claim they can do. It can also include “science” as the teaching of evolution, for example, has almost entirely supplanted the teaching of God’s Word, not only out there among the atheists, but among most who call themselves Christians as well. How many people have been led astray from the Word of God by that idolatrous teaching! And then there are the other false doctrines that become so popular in their various churches and church bodies that practically no one is willing to challenge them anymore. False doctrine becomes “settled doctrine,” and then the abomination has truly taken hold.

But the days will be shortened, Jesus says, for the sake of the elect. And Jesus will return before it becomes impossible to hold onto faith. But He won’t return in secret. He won’t return two or three times. He won’t be coming to perform some kind of rapture and then going away again for a while. No, He’ll return once, at the end of the age. And everyone will see Him at once. His return will be public and visible to all.

Those are the conditions that will exist in the Church and in the world in this New Testament era. Now, given these conditions, what instructions does Jesus leave for us?

First, very simply, let the reader understand. In other words, search the prophets, search the Old Testament Scriptures and study the Bible, whether it’s the prophet Daniel or the prophet Isaiah or the Psalms or the five books of Moses. Read and think about what you read. Read and pray for the Holy Spirit’s enlightenment and spiritual insight.

Second, when you see the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place, that is, when you see idolatry begin to take root in the holy place of the Church, Flee! Flee to the mountains! Flee from your “home.” And do it sooner rather than later! That’s what those references mean about, if a person is on the housetop, not coming down to get anything out of his house, or a man in the field not turning back to get his clothes. It’s also what that reference means when Jesus bemoans the poor women who are nursing or pregnant, or those who may have to travel on the Sabbath day. Those were literal impediments to fleeing leading up to Jerusalem’s destruction. But the urgency in Jesus’ words still applies very much to our situation.

What does it mean to “flee to the mountains”? It means getting away from idolatry in all its forms. Whether that idolatry is set up within a given church or a given church body, leave it behind, and do it quickly. Get out of that visible church. Leave your “home.” That doesn’t mean get out of the Christian Church entirely, of course! But it means you may not be able to stay in the church of your youth. You may have to spend months or years searching for a little church up in the mountains, that is, disconnected from the big and powerful church bodies in the world.

Practically all of you here, in our little “church in the mountains,” have already done this, so you know what it entails. You know what it is to be “homeless” in a spiritual sense. Here in Las Cruces we’ve still been mercifully blessed with a beautiful church building, but not all of our members live close enough to enjoy it. You know what it is to not have a big and impressive church body to take comfort it, or to have a big church with choirs and multiple musicians and all kinds of programs, to not have a voice in the world or a seat at the table with prestigious religious leaders. And why would we expect any of that, if we’re being faithful to Jesus’ instruction? Why would anyone who is in the process of fleeing from his home expect to have all the comforts of home?

Third, Jesus tells His fleeing Church to keep praying that our flight may not be hindered or delayed. God alone provides the ministry of His Word. And God alone provides the strength and the courage we need to live in away from “home.” Our sinful flesh would love nothing more than to stay where it’s comfortable, or even to return to a comfortable home, in spite of the abomination that may be there. But, Jesus says, “Remember Lot’s wife!” She started to flee from her home in Sodom, but turned back toward it in longing and suffered a tragic end. So keep praying that the Lord would guide and protect us as we flee, and guide and protect and strengthen all His children throughout the world, that all may flee from every abomination before the desolation comes.

Jesus’ final instruction to His fleeing Church is this: When people try to convince you that Christ is to be found here or over there, don’t believe it. Don’t be deceived. Don’t go out. It’s easy to grow impatient as we wait, especially in the midst of the great tribulation. So it can be tempting to go looking for Jesus and His salvation wherever anybody tells you you can find Him. In this place, in that practice, in this novel doctrine, like the rapture or the millennium or the real absence of His body and blood in the Lord’s Supper. But Jesus’ instruction is, don’t believe any of that. Hold onto His Word and wait patiently for His very public return. Look for the true Church in the marks of the Church: in the pure preaching of the Gospel of Christ and in the proper administration of His Holy Sacraments. And be content with that until He comes.

St. Paul told us a little bit about that coming in today’s Epistle, with everything taking place in quick succession. First He’ll raise from the dead those who have fallen asleep in Him. And then He’ll bring the still-living believers up into the heavens to join the newly raised believers, all safely and joyfully gathered around our Lord.

So, in the midst of this great tribulation, in the midst of fleeing from idolatry in the Visible Church and living as those who have no earthly home, keep watching for the Lord’s return, as eagles carefully scan the countryside for the meal they so eagerly desire, and then all converge on it as soon as they spot it. So set your hearts on the Lord Jesus Christ and be watching diligently for Him. In the midst of the tribulation, in the midst of our flight, Jesus will preserve His homeless Christians. He will shorten the days of this tribulation as much as necessary, so that not a single one of His believers has to miss out on the salvation He’s coming to bring. Amen.