"HIS"
Twenty-Seventh Sunday after Pentecost (Proper 29)
November 20, 2016
Bethel Evangelical Lutheran Church
Glenshaw, Pennsylvania
TEXT:
"They shall be Mine, says the Lord of hosts, in the day when I make up My treasured possession, and I will spare them, as a man spares his son who serves him."
Malachi 3:17 (ESV)
There are many things in life that frighten us: some of them understandable and some not. In his first letter John the evangelist gives us a hint as to what the solution to fear might be when he writes: "There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment" (1 John 4:18). When I was a small child my parents, unlike a lot of other parents, always took my brother and me with them when they had to visit a funeral home. They didn't believe in sheltering us from this unpleasant but inevitable reality of life. I can’t say that I was ever really afraid when I went but I have to admit that when I heard that some funeral home proprietors lived upstairs or that in former times viewings were held in homes, I do remember thinking that I could never bring myself to actually spend a night sleeping in the same house with a dead body. But all of that changed for me years later when my father died. It was then that I began to understand John's words about fear and love. I remember looking down into Dad's casket and thinking: “This was my Dad. If he did somehow come back to life in the middle of the night, what would he do? Come chasing after me to choke me to death like they do in the horror movies?” The very thought would be ridiculous. Because I knew that my father loved me, I knew that I had no reason to be afraid of him, no matter what the circumstances might be.
One thing that a lot of people in our world are afraid of is the end--the judgment--the final coming of Christ. They are afraid because they know that He is the perfect Judge and that they are far from perfect. Sometimes they express it in a humorous vein. I remember seeing a bumper sticker once that read: "Jesus is coming--and boy, is He mad!" (and, just in case you’re wondering, yes, I did clean that up a little for this audience!). That kind of "gallows" humor should not be thought of as being all that unusual when you bear in mind that, as Gary Swanson can probably tell you, we often joke about the things that we are afraid to confront on a serious level. But be that as it may, if any misgivings that I might have had about the dead could be dispelled by my confidence in my father’s love for me, certainly any uncertainty that we might have about judgment day ought to disappear in view of our Savior's love for us. As we consider the final judgment on this final Sunday of the church year, let's review who it is that is coming on the last day and why He is coming.
According to our text, the One who is coming is none other than "the Lord of hosts." It is God (specifically Jesus Christ) who "will come again in glory to judge both the living and the dead" (Nicene Creed, Article II). Since you and I live on other side of Jesus' life and ministry, we are privileged to know as a reality what Malachi (who wrote the words of our text) only hoped for. We know that "the Lord of hosts" has taken on human flesh in Christ to become One of us. He has expressed His infinite love for His fallen creation in the most intimate way possible: by literally becoming a Part of it. What this says, above all else, is that He has not given up on us, no matter how much reason we may have given Him to do so. He "became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14) because He knew that we were redeemable--not because of who we are or anything that we might do but solely because of who He is and what He is able to do.
And this is not merely an academic exercise either. The Lord Almighty not only knew that He could redeem us; He has actually done it. And it wasn't an easy task either. It required the perfect and complete keeping and fulfilling of the Law of God as well as the atonement for sin made by the Innocent in place of the guilty. All of this happened when Jesus lived a perfect life under God's Law for us and then suffered and died on the cross in our place under the righteous wrath of God. Because He did all of this for us we are free: free from liability for not living the perfect life that the Law of God requires of us, free to serve God willingly rather than under compulsion, free from the fear of death and judgment, free to rejoice in the return of our Savior. All of this is possible for us because we can have full confidence in the One who is coming back--the One in whose hands our future rests.
Confidence in the face of judgment is possible for us also if we take note of why the incarnate God--the Lord Jesus Christ--is coming back. Speaking through His prophet Malachi, the Lord says that He is coming to "make up [His] treasured possession." The Lord became human and accomplished the salvation of sinners for a reason: so that those sinners might live in fellowship with Him forever--as He intended it to be from the very beginning. Contrary to what some people may think and totally against human logic, God values us even though we have in many ways rebelled against Him and rejected Him. That's why He went to such great lengths in order to redeem us from the devil to whom we had enslaved ourselves by our sin. He is coming back to claim us as His own and to bring to fruition everything that He has promised us--everything that He has purchased for us by His perfect life and innocent death and made sure by His glorious resurrection from the dead.
Because He comes to claim us as His own, He comes also to spare us from the judgment that we so richly deserve--the judgment that is surely coming upon all of the fallen and corrupted creation. The divine wrath and punishment generated by our sin cannot in any way be glossed over or minimized. Because God is holy and cannot tolerate sin, His judgment against sin must be visited upon the earth. It's not a maybe--not something that might happen--not an idle speculation. It is something that will definitely happen. No doubt about it. Because the judgment of the ungodly and the punishment of sinners is certain, we cling in faith to the One who suffered and died for us--the One who comes to spare us from what we have earned by our sin, confident in His mercy and grace--and that One is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
The difference between those who look forward to the Lord's coming and those who dread it is the difference between fear and love--and that difference is determined by whether or not the people in question are His. Christ suffered and died for all but only those who belong to Him can receive the benefits of what He did for them. That's why He has commissioned His Church--you and me--to share with all people everywhere the Good News of His redeeming grace so that, by the power of His Holy Spirit, working through Word and Sacrament, He might gather together those redeemed by His blood and called to be His "treasured possession" so that they might welcome Him with willing, joyful, and confident service when He returns in glory. Because of His abiding love for His own, we can know for sure that, even in the face of judgment, we have nothing to fear because, by the grace and power of the Holy Spirit, we are His.
Amen.
May the Lord bless your hearing of His Word, using it to accomplish in you those things for which He gave it. May you be enriched and strengthened in faith that you may leave here today to go out into our world armed with the whole armor of God, prepared to be able ambassadors of your Savior Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful, and He will do it. Amen.