Trinity
10 – August 19th and 20th, 2017 – Luke
19:41-48
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit +
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit +
It
should have been the high point of Jesus' earthly ministry. What we
see in our Gospel text today my friends is, once again, Palm Sunday.
Every 4 months or so our readings throw us back to Palm Sunday –
because it's a great day. We love Palm Sunday – so we don't just
get it on Palm Sunday – we get it at the start of Advent where we
talk about our King coming to us humbly. And we also get it today,
in the dog days of summer – but we get Palm Sunday with a twist.
There is Jesus, on the donkey, the crowds calling out Hosanna... and
he rounds a bend and there is Jerusalem standing before Him.
Jerusalem – the city of God's own chosen people. Jerusalem is so
wondrous that at the end of Revelation we hear: “And I saw
the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,
prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”
This should be the high point... and what is Jesus doing? He's
weeping. Not tears of joy, not tears of just how absolutely
beautiful all this is, but tears of sorrow.
Our
Gospel lesson gives us wondrous insight into Christ Jesus – a look
at how He thinks, how He approaches life. Even at the height of His
earthly glory – He weeps. Why? “Would that
you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace.
But now they are hidden from your eyes.”
Jesus looks upon Jerusalem, and He is heart broken. There He is,
the Prince of Peace, coming to win salvation for His people – and
they don't see, they don't understand. Things are hidden from them.
That is Scriptural talk for idolatry – they are so caught up in
idolatry, in fearing and loving and trusting in something other than
God that they don't recognize what a wondrous thing is going on.
Jesus is right there – the Scriptures pointing to the salvation of
the world are being fulfilled – but that's not what they see.
That's hidden from them. What do they see, what is their idolatry?
Well,
Jesus points to it with what He says next. “For
the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a
barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side
and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you.
And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you
did not know the time of your visitation.” Jersualem's
idolatry was this: they worshipped false dreams of their own
political glory. They wanted power and might and independence from
Rome – they wanted a son of David who wouldn't be a Prince of Peace
but a mighty man of war who would drive the Romans out. And so, they
end up ignoring Christ. Kill Him and wish to be done with Him before
the week's out. And instead they keep looking for great political
leaders who would lead the glorious revolution. And in 66AD, around
30 someodd years down the road – they rebel against Rome. And it
is horrific. Rome besieges the city, starves her out for years, and
the people become weaker and weaker... and then in 70 AD Rome finally
attacks and utterly destroys Jerusalem. Obliterates it. They blow
up the temple – it was made of limestone so they set fires all
around it, superheated the water in the stone and blew it up. It is
one of the more horrific sieges of the ancient world – all because
Jerusalem wanted power, not peace.
As
He rides around the bend and sees Jerusalem – that is what Jesus
sees. And He weeps. Not for Himself, not because of His upcoming
crucifixion – those tears will be on Maundy Thursday and Good
Friday – but Jesus weeps because these people whom He loves just
are hell-bent on stupidity and folly, and it will wreck them. It
will wreck them because they didn't see, didn't want to see a loving
and merciful Savior who came to visit them, to be with them – they
wanted their own glory and other people to get the shaft. If you
live by the sword... you die by the sword. He even had to tell that
to the disciples on Maundy Thursday.
It
gets worse. Jesus enters Jerusalem, and He does what you would
expect Him to. He goes to the temple. Earlier in Luke was the story
of boy Jesus in the temple, where all the old guys are discussing
Scripture with Jesus – and they love it. Of course Jesus is going
to be found in His Father's house! But that was after the feast,
after Passover. Jesus comes in before Passover this time, and what
He sees – well: And He entered the temple and
began to drive out those who sold, saying to them, “It is written,
'My house shall be a house of prayer,' but you have made it a den of
robbers.”
Jesus weeps over Jersualem; the abuse in the temple makes Him angry.
This isn't a calm kicking people out. Other Gospels note that He
overturns tables, that he makes a whip out of cords of rope and whips
people out – drives them like cattle. Why this righteous anger?
Remember
who Jesus is. Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the
world. This is Passover week, the preparation for celebrating the
greatest feast of them all, where God delivered Israel from Egypt –
where blood of the Lamb upon the wooden lintel ensured that the angel
of death would passover – where there was the holy meal done every
year so that the children of God would remember not only that
delieverance – but more importantly that one day God would send the
Messiah to be the true Passover Lamb, whose blood would be shed to
eternally deliver all mankind from death. And that day is here –
behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! Indeed,
at Sundown Friday He would be sacrificed, His blood would be upon the
wooden beams of the Cross and death would be destroyed forever! And
yet – what's going on in the temple, the place that should be most
focused on God. The lambs there aren't so that people would remember
their coming salvation – they are there with giant mark ups so
folks can profit off of people's piety. The Temple was no longer
pointing folks to God, no longer a place of prayer and God's Word –
it was all about money. Here is part of the reason why the day of
Jerusalem's visitation is hidden! And Jesus is ticked off royally.
And He drives them out.
Two
incredibly strong emotions from Jesus in our text – the weeping
sorrow, the righteous anger. But did you notice, these have nothing
to do with with what's happening to Him. He's not sorrowful over
what will happen to Him, He's not angry because of what will happen
to Him come Good Friday. He's sorrowful, He's angry because of what
is being done to the people He loves, the very people He is going to
die for. He sees them trapped, sees them messed with – and He
can't stand it. His focus, this thoughts are upon them, and that is
what drives Jesus.
Now,
the hard questions. If Jesus were to round the corner and see
Trinity here, what would be the things that would make Him weep?
What are the idols that we are so focused on that we don't pay the
attention to the things that make for peace like we ought? I don't
think any of you are wanting a glorious revolution to over throw the
country – but what gets in the way of peace in your life? Are you
focused on personal respect? Are you more worried about what your
neighbor thinks of you than of how you can serve them and show them
love? Does a lust for wealth drive you; or even just simple lust?
Are there people that you'd rather just keep hating, keep grousing
about and complaining about instead of forgiving? Or maybe even just
being too busy to be bothered with love and peace when you go out
those doors – I put my hour in of being a good little Christian for
this week and that is enough. Those and so many more, too many to
count – all things that undercut peace. All things that take the
good gifts of life and body and neighbors and house and home and mess
with them, make them places of dischord rather than peace. Those are
the things Jesus would weep over.
And
as for what would make Jesus angry if he were to walk in here –
well, that would be whenever we would shift the focus of this place
off of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world and make
the focus ourselves – money driving the discussion would be one
way, or if the preaching going off on my personal hobby horses
instead of being Christ and Him Crucified. Treating this place as
though it's where the good people of town gather rather than a place
where sinners come to receive Jesus. Because this place is to be a
place where our eyes and all the eyes of this community are focused
upon Jesus – not to be a place where we tell folks out there that
they aren't good enough, aren't rich enough, aren't “us” enough.
That's the sort of stuff that makes Jesus angry.
Like
I said, hard questions. And ones that we should ponder for
ourselves, routinely – throughout the week. What is it this week
that is popping up in me that is trying to make me not see Jesus and
His love – His love for me, His love for my neighbor. But even as
we ponder these questions – we can't stop just there – because
Jesus doesn't just stop there. When Jesus weeps over Jerusalem, He
don't say, “that's it, there's no point in going on” and turn the
donkey around. When Jesus drives folks out of the temple, He doesn't
say, “Forget this, I'm going back to Nazareth and making tables and
chairs.” No – He doesn't give into sin, He doesn't let His ego
run wild, He doesn't pout or take His ball and go home. He spends
the rest of Holy Week preaching in the temple, pointing to God's plan
of salvation – and then He very simply goes to the Cross and wins
salvation. For the people of Jerusalem. For the folks in the
temple. For you. Jesus' response to your sin isn't perpetual
disdain; His response is to deal with it. It is to go to the Cross
and die for it and to rise from the dead so as to pull you through it
by giving you His own life. This is why we ask ourselves these hard
questions, why the Word of God shows us our sin – not so that we
try to make it up to God – but so that we would see Jesus all the
more clearly – so that we would know what sins He is forgiving, so
that we wouldn't be lulled away from Him but rather see just how
diligently and determinedly He loves us. Yeah, your heart often
doesn't want to be about peace – so over and over Jesus comes to
you and says Peace be with you – I am giving you My peace and
forgiveness right now; because you are Mine I'll see to it that you
know the things that make for peace, that you know that you are
baptized into Me and are dead to sin and alive in Me – that you
live not by bread alone but by My Word, indeed by My own Body and
Blood given for you for the forgiveness of all, all of your sin –
even those difficult hard ones that keep sticking around and are so
hard to fight. Yes, those sins – those are precisely the ones
Jesus died for. And He pours his Word and Spirit upon us, so that as
His forgiven children we would live with Him forever. The Jesus who
weeps over Jerusalem has promised to wipe every tear from your eye
and to bring you unto Himself with joy and peace even forever. So,
even after our text, after the week we've just had – He goes to the
Cross for you, He rises for you, and He will come again for you.
Because that is just who Jesus is, He is the God is will let nothing
– not sin, not Satan, not death – Jesus will let nothing stop Him
from loving you. In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Spirit + Amen.
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