The Church Season of Trinity
The Third Sunday
after Trinity
The Nativity of
St. John the Baptist
Our Savior
Lutheran Church, Midland, MI (June 24, 2012)
Readings: Psalm 85:1-13
Isaiah 40:1-5
Acts 13:13-26
Luke 1:57-80
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Grace, mercy and
peace be to you from the Father
and the Son and
the Holy Spirit, Amen
The text for
today is as recorded in the Gospel Lesson from the 1st chapter of
St. Luke, especially the following verses:
Luke 1:57–80, ESV
“Now
the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. And her
neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and
they rejoiced with her. And on the eighth day they came to circumcise the
child. And they would have called him Zechariah after his father, but his mother
answered, “No; he shall be called John.” And they said to her, “None of your
relatives is called by this name.” And they made signs to his father, inquiring
what he wanted him to be called. And he asked for a writing tablet and wrote,
“His name is John.” And they all wondered. And immediately his mouth was opened
and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God. And fear came on all their
neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country
of Judea, and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, “What
then will this child be?” For the hand of the Lord was with him. And his father
Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, saying, “Blessed be
the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people and has
raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David, as he
spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, that we should be saved
from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us; to show the mercy
promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath that he
swore to our father Abraham, to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand
of our enemies, might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness
before him all our days. And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most
High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of
salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender
mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light
to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into
the way of peace.” And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was
in the wilderness until the day of his public appearance to Israel.”
In
the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit
Today we proclaim the
nativity of St. John the Baptist. St. Luke tells us that Elizabeth, John's
mother, was sixth months along in her pregnancy when the Christ child was
conceived in the womb of Mary. Dec 24th, the birth of Jesus, minus six months
equals…so today, the birthday of John the Baptist.
John the Baptist’s birth is the fulfillment of prophecy.
Here in the birth of John the Baptist we see that God is keeping His Word to
save His people from their sin. "But pastor…Jesus is the One who saves the
people from their sin, not John! You just said that!" You're right, but
how is one saved? Through faith alone in God's grace alone which He bestows
upon us because Christ alone. And how does one get this sort of saving faith?
Through hearing; hearing the Word of Christ. This is precisely what God was
doing through John the Baptist. Through a simple man like John, God was
pointing to and proclaiming and announcing the arrival of His salvation plan in
the flesh for all to hear and see and cleave to in faith. Here in the life and
ministry of John we get a glimpse of profound faithfulness to God's call to
serve Christ and make Him known. This is why we honor John today—his example.
Of course, at this point many of you may be wondering how
we could possibly emulate such a profound example. There is no doubt about it:
This guy was truly special. His miraculous conception to a couple of fossil
parents is proof that right from the get-go God had something very special in
mind with John. In fact, his father, Zechariah, picks up on these great
expectations in his psalm of praise, the Benedictus; a psalm that burst forth
from his lips at the circumcision and naming of his son months after his tongue
had been stopped because of his doubt over the angel's message that he and his
wife would conceive and bear a son and call his name John. Zechariah faithfully
proclaims, "You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High;
for you will go before the Lord to prepare His ways." You think dad had
high hopes for his son? No pressure, right?
And here's the thing: John lived up to these great
expectations. He did boldly proclaim and point to the Lamb of God who takes
away the sin of the world. He did boldly and faithfully stand firm and call
people to repentance; calling them to turn and return to the light and life
that is found only in the Christ. He did all this from the midst of the
loneliness and separation that is the wilderness. He wasn't living the posh
lifestyle in the big city. He wasn't rich. He wore nasty old camel hair
outfits. He lived on honey and locusts. He wasn't well-liked by everyone. In
fact, he was so disliked by some because of his propensity to tell it like it
is that he literally lost his head because he dared to call a sin a sin. Oh…if
only we could be so bold and follow his example.
Well…here's the thing: Sometimes good examples also have a
way of teaching us what not to do. Remember: Before John met his fate with the
chopping block, he languished in a Roman prison cell for a while. It was during
this time of imprisonment that he sent messengers to Jesus to ask Him if He
truly was the Messiah, or if they should be looking for someone else. Think
about that for a moment. John, as a prophet—a foreseer and foreteller of the
Christ—knew the victorious, Judgment Day ending to the Christ story. "Here
is the Christ, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Here is the
One whose sandal I'm not fit to untie. Here is the One who will baptize you
with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in His hand, to clear His
threshing floor; to gather the wheat into His heavenly storehouses, and to cast
all the sinful chaff into the eternal, unquenchable fire."
And yet…in the middle of this glorious, miraculous
birth/baptism with water and this triumphant, glorious return on Judgment Day
was all this pain and suffering. Here in between these two bookends of divine
glory was a cross. This is what John didn't get. This is where he struggled in
his faith…perhaps even doubted. "Are you really the Christ? I'm dying
here! Life in Christ is not supposed to be this way. Where's all the fire and
brimstone and victory that I saw and heard and was told to proclaim? If you are
the Christ, then how about breaking out that winnowing fork and winnowing away
some of this chaff that put me into prison?"
This is when our Lord sends those messengers back to John,
saying, "You go tell John what you have witnessed and beheld here today.
The blind have had their sight restored. The lame have walked. The lepers have
been cleansed. The deaf have had their hearing restored, and the dead have been
resurrected." Basically, Jesus sent these men back to John to remind him
of the very prophecies John (and Isaiah) had proclaimed about the Christ.
"This is what the Christ will do and accomplish." This is what Jesus,
the Christ, was doing. He was the Christ. He was the promise in the flesh. He
just wasn't matching John's idea of how things should be progressing. Jesus'
timeline and methods weren't syncing up with John's. In a very real way, Jesus
sent these men back to John with the message to turn around and return back to
the Word and Promise of God; a Word and Promise that John was forgetting
because of the crosses he was bearing.
And that's really the key thing out of all of
this—Remembrance. Yes—we all have a way of forgetting the words and promises of
God, sometimes when things get tough in life, and sometimes when things are
going along really good. We forget that Christ is with us always. He will never
forsake us or forget us. We forget to give thanks in all circumstances. We
forget that we are but mere stewards of God's gifts and resources. We forget
that we have no rights, except for the right to present and eternal punishment.
Everything else is a blessing and a gift from God.
We forget…but God doesn't. God never forgets. He is always faithful. He
remembers His oath to save His people; a holy covenant that He made to our
father Abraham. And that word choice itself in this psalm of praise is very
interesting and telling. You see, that word "covenant" (diatheke in
the Greek) is used in only two places in all the Gospels—here in the Benedictus
in verse 72, which reminds us of God's faithfulness to His people and His
remembrance of His promise to save His people from their sin, and again at the
end of the Gospels, where Christ Himself refers to the consecrated elements of
bread and wine as His very body and blood—a new covenant for the complete
forgiveness of all sin. Again, here is God's faithfulness coming through loud
and clear. "I haven't forgotten you or forsaken you. I am with you always,
even to the end of the age." Here is your salvation. Here is your
forgiveness. Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
John the Baptist was a great example of what it means to
be faithful to God. His life was also a great and profound example of the fact
that anyone can be shaken and battered in that faith. Anyone can and will
suffer and struggle when cross-bearing comes into play. That's where Christ's
call and reminder to return back to God and His Word and Promise still rings
true for us today. Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!
Behold, God's plan and promise of salvation in the flesh, for you, for me, and
for the entire world!
I pray the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ strengthen
you in your spirit so that you, like John, may be bold and courageous and
faithful in pointing to and proclaiming and trusting in the faithfulness and
mercy and love of your God and Father—faithfulness, mercy, and love made flesh
and hung on a cross for the forgiveness of all your sin. Amen
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