Sermon by the Rev. Dr. James A. Gibson III
Fourth Sunday in Lent
Texts: 2 Chronicles 36:14-23, Ephesians 2:4-10,
John 6:1-5
“Whoever
is among you of all his people, may the LORD his God be with him. Let him go
up.”
*****
Collect of the Day
Gracious Father, whose blessed Son
Jesus Christ came down from heaven to be the true bread which gives life to the
world: Evermore give us this bread, that he may live in us, and we in him; who
lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen
*****
A
tragedy that ends on a high note.
A tale
of despair that ends with a word of hope.
A story
of death that ends with the promise of life.
Don’t
tell me that God didn’t have a hand in writing all of this.
The history of ancient Israel, from the
rise of King Saul to the fall of the southern kingdom of Judah, is one of
unrelenting faithfulness on the part of God and of unending failure on the part
of his chosen people.
Israel was to be a beacon of hope to all
the nations, calling them out of the darkness of their pagan ways and into the
light of the one true and living God. But instead of shining the light, she
allowed herself to be overcome by the darkness.
There were some bright spots along the
way, to be sure. There was David, the man after God’s own heart, but even he
was not without grave moral shortcomings. There was Solomon with all his wisdom,
but he was not immune to the temptations of the flesh. There was Josiah, the
great reformer who died tragically young because God did not will for him to
see his kingdom fall.
Faithfulness and failure always went
hand in hand throughout the history of Israel, the northern kingdom that fell some
years earlier, and Judah, the southern kingdom that, from time to time, did
show some signs of life. God, being faithful, “sent persistently to them by his
messengers, because he had compassion on his people and on his dwelling place.
But they kept mocking the messengers of God, despising his words and scoffing
at his prophets, until the wrath of the LORD rose against his people, until
there was no remedy.”
Even the patience of God has its
limits. The end finally came, as God “brought up against them the King of the
Chaldeans, who killed their young men with the sword in the house of their
sanctuary and had no compassion on young man or virgin, old man or aged.”
The consequences of disobedience, of
failure to be the people God called them to be, were harsh and severe. Even the
very house of God would not survive—for if it could not be pure and undefiled,
it might as well not exist at all.
“And all the vessels of the house of
God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of the LORD, and the
treasures of the king and of his princes, all these he brought to Babylon. And
they burned the house of God and broke down the wall of Jerusalem and burned
all its palaces with fire and destroyed all its precious vessels.”
And it’s not as if God hadn’t warned
his people that such a punishment was coming if they persisted in their
disobedience.
“He took into exile in Babylon those
who had escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and to his sons
until the establishment of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the LORD by
the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its Sabbaths. All the
days that it lay desolate it kept Sabbath, to fulfill seventy years.”
So great was the disobedience of the
people that the land had been defiled and had to be purified—and that meant it
had to be left desolate for seventy years. Yet, in that desolation, were being
planted the seeds of restoration.
“All the days that it lay desolate it
kept Sabbath.”
The land was given rest in order that
it might be prepared for the return of purified people.
And, as he had foretold the downfall,
so he had foreseen the restoration.
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Cyrus of Persia |
“Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and also put it in writing: ‘Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, “The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. Whoever is among you of all his people, may the LORD his God be with him. Let him go up.”’”
And who were those “among his people,”
God’s people, the LORD’s chosen ones? They were the ones who were exiles in the
land, who wept by the waters of Babylon as they remembered Zion. They were down
and out in a foreign land. To them came the call: “Let him go up.”
These are not merely the words of Cyrus
king of Persia. They are the very word of “the LORD, the God of heaven.”
To those who are down, it is time to go
up. It is time to go home.
A tragedy that ends on a high note.
A tale of despair that ends with a word
of hope.
A story of death that ends with the
promise of life.
Don’t tell me that God didn’t have a
hand in writing all of this.
In fact, don’t tell me that God didn’t
write the whole thing.
From its beginning, he knew its end;
from its end, he knew its beginning. Everything in between came as no surprise.
All that will come after, he will know
in advance, as well. The people will return, rebuild the temple, resettle the
land, and start messing up all over again. Only this time, he won’t send a
succession of prophets. He will send his own Son.
They won’t just refuse to listen to
him.
They won’t just reject him.
They will nail him to a cross.
They will bury him in a tomb.
The light of the world slain, so it
appears, by the powers of darkness.
But, on the first day of the week,
early in the morning following the day of Sabbath rest, the true return from
exile—of which all others before had only been pale shadows—bursts forth in
glorious, everlasting day.
Up from the grave, he arose!
A tragedy that ends on a high note.
A tale of despair that ends with a word
of hope.
A story of death that ends with the
promise of life.
Don’t tell me that God didn’t write
this whole thing.
Don’t tell me that God is not the Author
of life everlasting.
“But God, being rich in mercy, because
of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses,
made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raise us up
with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”
“For by grace you have been saved
through faith. And this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God.”
To anyone in the grip of despair, flailing
away in the dark as sin pushes you down, hear the word of the LORD, the word of
him who sent his Son to take your punishment upon himself:
“Let him go up.”
+IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER, AND OF THE
SON, AND OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. AMEN.
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