Proper 22
Preaching
Lectionary Preaching Workbook
Series III
The early Christian Church could sustain its cry of "Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed!" for the fifty days of Easter and throughout the rest of the year, partly because the people believed that the return of Jesus Christ was imminent. He had promised that he would return soon and usher in the fullness of his kingdom, which he had just begun to reign through his death, resurrection, and ascension. His return did not occur according to any schedule that the faithful had created for Jesus Christ, nor has he come to the earth a second time in the nearly 2,000 years since. But the church is to expect his return - and be ever alert for it even when it seems unlikely that he will return in our time. The question today is not simply when he will return, but whether or not he will return at all. Was Jesus mistaken about his return after his death and resurrection? Is the parousia an impossibility, in the light of contemporary scientific knowledge? It all depends upon the reality of the resurrection. If God lifted him up from death on the third day, and if he actually ascended to heaven after his resurrection, then the second coming is not only possible, it will occur - in time and maybe our time - but it will happen according to God's schedule. Those who believe this must, in the interim, be about the work of the Lord, proclaiming his word, witnessing to his resurrection and expected return, and serving the living Lord by deeds of love and mercy. All of this is a matter of believing and living in faith - by the grace of God.
The Prayer of the Day
The classic collect for this Sunday speaks to the business of the church while awaiting the return of the Lord:
O almighty and merciful God, of thy bountiful goodness keep us, we beseech thee, from all things that may hurt us; that we, being ready, both in body and soul, may cheerfully accomplish those things that thou wouldst have done; through thy Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end.
The prayer in the Lutheran Book of Worship might appropriately be added to it:
Our Lord Jesus, you have endured the doubts and foolish questions of every generation. Forgive us for trying to be judge over you, and grant us the confident faith to acknowledge you as Lord.
The Psalm of the Day
Psalm 8 (E) - Just why the Book of Common Prayer has to have two psalms assigned as responsories on this day is a bit puzzling. Psalm 128 seems to be almost perfectly suited to this function, complementing both the first reading and the Gospel for the Day. Psalm 8 seems to be more suited for highlighting the Genesis story - the story in which human beings are created by God before the animals. In this case, although it coincides with the thrust of the second reading, it even uses the same words for Christ as for the creation of human beings: "You have made him but little lower than the angels." It is a psalm, however, that the faithful may sing at any time, especially when they are conscious of the beauty and majesty of God's created world, and that they have been created in God's image and given authority over the earth and all living things upon it: "you give him mastery over the works of your hands; you put all things under his feet." And so, the psalm ends on the same note that was sounded when it began: "O Lord our Lord, how exalted is your name in all the world." As a responsory, however, it says nothing about the creation of woman and the gift of marriage to man and woman.
Psalm 128 (L, E); 128:1-6 (R) - Had the responsory psalms been chosen ten years later than they were, this psalm might not have been selected to respond to the first reading. It begins on a good note: "Happy are they all who fear the Lord, and who follow in his ways," but it deteriorates theologically after that: "You shall eat the fruit of your labor, happiness and prosperity shall be yours." It sounds like a form of works righteousness, and it soon becomes chauvinistic too: "Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children like olive shoots round about your table. The man who fears the Lord shall thus indeed be blessed." But the psalm does suggest that those who, as married persons, live faithfully in the fear of the Lord are pleasing God and may hope to "live to see (their) children's children" - not because they have earned this privilege, but because God has made their marriage sound, solid, and stable and, therefore, enduring.
The Psalm Prayer (LBW)
Whoever composed this prayer took the content of the first reading and of the Gospel for the Day and used creation and marriage as a metaphor for the relationship of Jesus and his body, the church:
Lord Jesus, from your opened side your bride, the church, was formed, and sanctified in your cleansing blood. Make your church a fruitful vine, with many children who will rejoice with you at your table and celebrate your goodness now and forever.
The readings:
Genesis 2:18-24
This is one of the few times in the three-year lectionary when all four versions select exactly the same book, chapter, and verses of the Old Testament as the first reading; the reason, undoubtedly, is that it harmonizes almost perfectly with the Gospel for the Day. In this second account of the creation, man was made before the animals, who "were brought to the man to see what he would call them." This is another way of saying what was in the first story, which states that God gave "man" dominion over the earth and everything in it. The animals were not fit "helpers" and companions for "man," so God created woman from the rib of the "man." Man and woman, thereby, share a common humanity; they are meant to be "one flesh" - to be complementary to each other - and they become "one flesh" in body and spirit in the marriage relationship. There is no intention in this reading to subordinate woman to man; each needs the other in order to be full and complete - and to establish a home and rear a family in love and fidelity. Thus, the Old Testament - at the very beginning - offers people a theology of marriage, which is helpful today.
Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:9-11 (C); 2:9-11 (R); 2:9-11 (12-18) (L); 2:(1-8) 9-18 (E)
For the remaining weeks before Christ the King Sunday, the second reading comes from the Book of Hebrews. The Ordo retains the original first reading for this Sunday; the other lectionaries have had (for various reasons) additional verses added to those few verses of scripture. The writer of this book probably was addressing a group of Hebrew Christians, who could have been living in Rome, about A.D. 85. It is apparent, from the tone of the book, that they were rather stagnant in the faith; they needed a theological injection, of sorts, and the author proceeds to do just that by writing to these Jewish Christians, who as a pilgrim people were living "between the times." He reminds them of Jesus' high priesthood, suggesting that Jesus was fully qualified for this office, even though he was not born into the tribe of Levi. He is sent from God, but he also was born of a woman - fully God and fully human. This Jesus, who suffered and died, completed the work the Father had given him to do - perfectly. Because he lived out his humanity in suffering and death, he entered into our humanity, tasted the bitter and the sweet that life had to offer, and thereby qualifies, as Hebrews puts it, to be our high priest and make a case on our behalf to God the Father.
Mark 10:2-9 (E); 10:2-16 (R, L, C)
There are scholars who believe that this pericope was part of a catechism that was taught to converts before their baptism. This might be true, but, if so, why does Mark introduce his material about marriage and the family with a question put to him by the Pharisees? It could be that this was another occasion in which they attempted to "get the goods on Jesus" and find some grounds to have him arrested and taken out of the public eye. He was more than an annoyance to them; by this time, he was a definite threat to their autonomy and very existence. Whether or not they accepted his reply is not revealed. But this much is certain, Jesus went beyond Moses, who allowed divorce because of "your hardness of heart" - sin. Jesus prohibited divorce, admitting the possibility of it among his followers by what he said about women divorcing their husbands: whoever - man or woman - who divorces his/her spouse and remarries, Jesus said, is guilty of adultery. But he makes the point that the real reason that he prohibits divorce is that marriage is a sacred institution, which God himself has given - a pure gift - to human beings. It is God who "puts together" man and woman so that they are "one flesh" - complementary to one another in all ways - in this "holy estate." That human law has superceded Jesus' teaching in no way invalidates his understanding that the dissolution of marriage is a sin - and that those who are divorced from one another are in need of forgiveness.
The second part of this pericope has to do with the blessing of the little children, because, Jesus says, "for to such belongs the Kingdom of God." The childlike in faith are the ones who are received by God the Father, as the Lord taught that those who are like little children - and are born again - are the ones who will see and enter the Kingdom of God. This could, indeed, have been part of a catechesis that prepared people for baptism. Incidentally, this part of the pericope could be deleted without doing any harm to the first section of it. The Roman Catholic Ordo has done that in the short form of the pericope, 10:2-12. The Book of Common Prayer has an extra-short form, 10:2-9, which might be abbreviating the reading a bit too much, because Jesus' opposition to divorce comes out in verses 10-12.
A Sermon on the Gospel, Mark 10:2-9 (E); 10:2-16 (R, L, C) - "Jesus on Marriage and Divorce."
My wife and I took a ride on a "dinner-train" - one of those special-occasion activities - to celebrate our forty-fifth wedding anniversary. Since all the tables were for four people, and since we were going by ourselves, we were told that we would be sitting with someone else. We arrived before our dinner partners, sat down, and waited as the car filled up. Shortly before the train was about to leave, a nice-looking young couple came in and took their seats across from us. We introduced ourselves, as did they, and apologized to them for being "stuck" with a couple old enough to be their parents, maybe even their grandparents. We told them that we were celebrating an anniversary; the young man said, "We're celebrating some sort of anniversary, too. We have been going together for seven years." As we got to know them better, it was obvious that they had been living together for seven years; they were celebrating seven years of non-marital bliss. They didn't hide it, and when the "host" made announcements of birthdays and anniversaries among the 220 people on the train, to our surprise we heard him say, "Dick and Jane are celebrating their seventh anniversary" immediately before he announced that George and Doris, at table fourteen, are celebrating their forty-fifth wedding anniversary today." They were a bit embarrassed when they discovered that I was a clergyman and had been for years.
Maybe that was why the young woman confided in my wife, while her husband and I were talking about golf, that she came from a large family. She was the third child, and her father left her mother shortly after she was born. She had learned that her father was abusive, and that that was the reason for the divorce. Her mother remarried, had two more children, and something of a happy marriage. But the young woman made it clear that she herself was afraid to be married - living with a man in some type of commitment was okay - because she didn't want to run the risk of being divorced. She accepted Jesus' teaching about divorce quite easily, but the sacred quality of marriage was really only fuzzy to her -
and, apparently, to her "house partner." That they were living in an affluent style with two incomes, two cars, a home, winter trips to Florida, Arizona, and Mexico, didn't seem to enter into their thinking about marriage and divorce. For now, they believed that their relationship was fine, and they implied that they would get married when and if they decided to have a family.
1. Jesus was all for marriage because it is a sacred institution, a gracious gift of God to people, so that man and woman could be complete in a holy, God-given relationship. An older wedding ceremony began: "Forasmuch as marriage is a holy estate, ordained of God, and to be held in honor by all, it becometh those, who enter therein, to weigh, with reverent minds, what the word of God teacheth concerning it." Because God loves his creatures and made it and gave it to them, it is sacred.
2. Marriage makes "one flesh" of man and woman in every way - physically and spiritually. There is a new being created - one flesh - when people are married to each other in the name of their Lord. The man and woman live in a new relationship, one that was planned by God himself for their mutual well-being, pleasure, and fulfillment. And God established this institution for the propagation and nurturing of children. Marriage is meant to be - by God - a sacred family institution that is based on faith and love for God and each other.
3. That's why Jesus believed that breaking up a marriage by divorce is a sin. Something that God created is destroyed - the relationship of a man and woman, which is most like the relationship of people to God, and the relationship of parents and children in the home - when people are divorced. When the New Testament sayings of Jesus about marriage are studied, there is no doubt that he considered divorce a sin, the very absence of love for one another and for God. He stood with God in this matter and said, "What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder."
4. But times are different. "Adjustments" were made in the early church's theological thinking about divorce. It was granted under some circumstances (adultery, for example), and the contemporary attitudes about marriage and divorce seem to stand in that early tradition. But like it or not, Jesus would call a divorce a sin today because it breaks a commandment of God, destroys a sacred institution, and undermines the basic unit of society - the family - so that everyone in the relationship, parents and children, as well as other relatives - is hurt.
5. Christ calls for recognition of the holy character of marriage, and hints at the problems we have created by the sin against God we commit when we embrace divorce under almost any and all circumstances. And he would give us a new mind and heart so that as we live the new life in him - in love and faith - we might understand and revere this holy estate once again.
A Sermon on the First Lesson, Genesis 2:18-24 - "Marriage - An Act of Creation."
1. When God created human beings, he determined that there would have to be male and female - for completeness, fulfillment, and propagation. He declared, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make a helper fit for him."
2. And so after he had created all living things and brought them to the man to be named, he went about the business of creating woman by anesthetizing the man, taking one of his ribs, and forming woman, his companion. Man and woman are "one flesh," sharing a common humanity through the grace of God.
3. God also gave them what might be called a primitive kind of marriage based upon the "one flesh" reality: "Therefore a man leaves his father and mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh." This is the relationship which "no one should put asunder," according to our Lord. Those who enter into marriage and hope to have it last need to love one another and be faithful to each other.
4. Marriage remains as God's basic human institution - there's nothing wrong with marriage. The problem is with people, with us. And our Lord, through his Word and Holy Spirit, can do something about it if we give him a chance.
A Sermon on the Second Lesson, Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:9-11 (C); 2:(1-8) 9-18 (E); 2:9-11 (R);
2:9-11 (12-18) (L) - "Superior to the Angels."
1. Jesus Christ was born, as all human beings are, "a little lower than the angels. " In his suffering and death, he was as low and as far from the angels as people can get. He was a human being in every way.
2. But this Jesus was the very Son of God, sent into the world by the Father to reverse the course of people, who were destined to destroy themselves through sin, and to reconcile them to God by dying as their high priest on Golgotha's cross.
3. Jesus suffered and died as a human being, but God raised him up and glorified him - who had obeyed the Father perfectly in this act of submission and sacrifice. Therefore, Jesus is able to plead with God on our behalf.
4. So Jesus is above the angels who can only deliver messages from God to human beings. Christ is able to take the plight of sinful people to God himself, who hears, accepts his sacrifice and his pleas - and grants forgiveness to us all.
5. That lamb who was slain and sacrificed is our high priest - now and forever - and to him we offer our praise and thanksgiving and our very lives.
The Prayer of the Day
The classic collect for this Sunday speaks to the business of the church while awaiting the return of the Lord:
O almighty and merciful God, of thy bountiful goodness keep us, we beseech thee, from all things that may hurt us; that we, being ready, both in body and soul, may cheerfully accomplish those things that thou wouldst have done; through thy Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end.
The prayer in the Lutheran Book of Worship might appropriately be added to it:
Our Lord Jesus, you have endured the doubts and foolish questions of every generation. Forgive us for trying to be judge over you, and grant us the confident faith to acknowledge you as Lord.
The Psalm of the Day
Psalm 8 (E) - Just why the Book of Common Prayer has to have two psalms assigned as responsories on this day is a bit puzzling. Psalm 128 seems to be almost perfectly suited to this function, complementing both the first reading and the Gospel for the Day. Psalm 8 seems to be more suited for highlighting the Genesis story - the story in which human beings are created by God before the animals. In this case, although it coincides with the thrust of the second reading, it even uses the same words for Christ as for the creation of human beings: "You have made him but little lower than the angels." It is a psalm, however, that the faithful may sing at any time, especially when they are conscious of the beauty and majesty of God's created world, and that they have been created in God's image and given authority over the earth and all living things upon it: "you give him mastery over the works of your hands; you put all things under his feet." And so, the psalm ends on the same note that was sounded when it began: "O Lord our Lord, how exalted is your name in all the world." As a responsory, however, it says nothing about the creation of woman and the gift of marriage to man and woman.
Psalm 128 (L, E); 128:1-6 (R) - Had the responsory psalms been chosen ten years later than they were, this psalm might not have been selected to respond to the first reading. It begins on a good note: "Happy are they all who fear the Lord, and who follow in his ways," but it deteriorates theologically after that: "You shall eat the fruit of your labor, happiness and prosperity shall be yours." It sounds like a form of works righteousness, and it soon becomes chauvinistic too: "Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children like olive shoots round about your table. The man who fears the Lord shall thus indeed be blessed." But the psalm does suggest that those who, as married persons, live faithfully in the fear of the Lord are pleasing God and may hope to "live to see (their) children's children" - not because they have earned this privilege, but because God has made their marriage sound, solid, and stable and, therefore, enduring.
The Psalm Prayer (LBW)
Whoever composed this prayer took the content of the first reading and of the Gospel for the Day and used creation and marriage as a metaphor for the relationship of Jesus and his body, the church:
Lord Jesus, from your opened side your bride, the church, was formed, and sanctified in your cleansing blood. Make your church a fruitful vine, with many children who will rejoice with you at your table and celebrate your goodness now and forever.
The readings:
Genesis 2:18-24
This is one of the few times in the three-year lectionary when all four versions select exactly the same book, chapter, and verses of the Old Testament as the first reading; the reason, undoubtedly, is that it harmonizes almost perfectly with the Gospel for the Day. In this second account of the creation, man was made before the animals, who "were brought to the man to see what he would call them." This is another way of saying what was in the first story, which states that God gave "man" dominion over the earth and everything in it. The animals were not fit "helpers" and companions for "man," so God created woman from the rib of the "man." Man and woman, thereby, share a common humanity; they are meant to be "one flesh" - to be complementary to each other - and they become "one flesh" in body and spirit in the marriage relationship. There is no intention in this reading to subordinate woman to man; each needs the other in order to be full and complete - and to establish a home and rear a family in love and fidelity. Thus, the Old Testament - at the very beginning - offers people a theology of marriage, which is helpful today.
Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:9-11 (C); 2:9-11 (R); 2:9-11 (12-18) (L); 2:(1-8) 9-18 (E)
For the remaining weeks before Christ the King Sunday, the second reading comes from the Book of Hebrews. The Ordo retains the original first reading for this Sunday; the other lectionaries have had (for various reasons) additional verses added to those few verses of scripture. The writer of this book probably was addressing a group of Hebrew Christians, who could have been living in Rome, about A.D. 85. It is apparent, from the tone of the book, that they were rather stagnant in the faith; they needed a theological injection, of sorts, and the author proceeds to do just that by writing to these Jewish Christians, who as a pilgrim people were living "between the times." He reminds them of Jesus' high priesthood, suggesting that Jesus was fully qualified for this office, even though he was not born into the tribe of Levi. He is sent from God, but he also was born of a woman - fully God and fully human. This Jesus, who suffered and died, completed the work the Father had given him to do - perfectly. Because he lived out his humanity in suffering and death, he entered into our humanity, tasted the bitter and the sweet that life had to offer, and thereby qualifies, as Hebrews puts it, to be our high priest and make a case on our behalf to God the Father.
Mark 10:2-9 (E); 10:2-16 (R, L, C)
There are scholars who believe that this pericope was part of a catechism that was taught to converts before their baptism. This might be true, but, if so, why does Mark introduce his material about marriage and the family with a question put to him by the Pharisees? It could be that this was another occasion in which they attempted to "get the goods on Jesus" and find some grounds to have him arrested and taken out of the public eye. He was more than an annoyance to them; by this time, he was a definite threat to their autonomy and very existence. Whether or not they accepted his reply is not revealed. But this much is certain, Jesus went beyond Moses, who allowed divorce because of "your hardness of heart" - sin. Jesus prohibited divorce, admitting the possibility of it among his followers by what he said about women divorcing their husbands: whoever - man or woman - who divorces his/her spouse and remarries, Jesus said, is guilty of adultery. But he makes the point that the real reason that he prohibits divorce is that marriage is a sacred institution, which God himself has given - a pure gift - to human beings. It is God who "puts together" man and woman so that they are "one flesh" - complementary to one another in all ways - in this "holy estate." That human law has superceded Jesus' teaching in no way invalidates his understanding that the dissolution of marriage is a sin - and that those who are divorced from one another are in need of forgiveness.
The second part of this pericope has to do with the blessing of the little children, because, Jesus says, "for to such belongs the Kingdom of God." The childlike in faith are the ones who are received by God the Father, as the Lord taught that those who are like little children - and are born again - are the ones who will see and enter the Kingdom of God. This could, indeed, have been part of a catechesis that prepared people for baptism. Incidentally, this part of the pericope could be deleted without doing any harm to the first section of it. The Roman Catholic Ordo has done that in the short form of the pericope, 10:2-12. The Book of Common Prayer has an extra-short form, 10:2-9, which might be abbreviating the reading a bit too much, because Jesus' opposition to divorce comes out in verses 10-12.
A Sermon on the Gospel, Mark 10:2-9 (E); 10:2-16 (R, L, C) - "Jesus on Marriage and Divorce."
My wife and I took a ride on a "dinner-train" - one of those special-occasion activities - to celebrate our forty-fifth wedding anniversary. Since all the tables were for four people, and since we were going by ourselves, we were told that we would be sitting with someone else. We arrived before our dinner partners, sat down, and waited as the car filled up. Shortly before the train was about to leave, a nice-looking young couple came in and took their seats across from us. We introduced ourselves, as did they, and apologized to them for being "stuck" with a couple old enough to be their parents, maybe even their grandparents. We told them that we were celebrating an anniversary; the young man said, "We're celebrating some sort of anniversary, too. We have been going together for seven years." As we got to know them better, it was obvious that they had been living together for seven years; they were celebrating seven years of non-marital bliss. They didn't hide it, and when the "host" made announcements of birthdays and anniversaries among the 220 people on the train, to our surprise we heard him say, "Dick and Jane are celebrating their seventh anniversary" immediately before he announced that George and Doris, at table fourteen, are celebrating their forty-fifth wedding anniversary today." They were a bit embarrassed when they discovered that I was a clergyman and had been for years.
Maybe that was why the young woman confided in my wife, while her husband and I were talking about golf, that she came from a large family. She was the third child, and her father left her mother shortly after she was born. She had learned that her father was abusive, and that that was the reason for the divorce. Her mother remarried, had two more children, and something of a happy marriage. But the young woman made it clear that she herself was afraid to be married - living with a man in some type of commitment was okay - because she didn't want to run the risk of being divorced. She accepted Jesus' teaching about divorce quite easily, but the sacred quality of marriage was really only fuzzy to her -
and, apparently, to her "house partner." That they were living in an affluent style with two incomes, two cars, a home, winter trips to Florida, Arizona, and Mexico, didn't seem to enter into their thinking about marriage and divorce. For now, they believed that their relationship was fine, and they implied that they would get married when and if they decided to have a family.
1. Jesus was all for marriage because it is a sacred institution, a gracious gift of God to people, so that man and woman could be complete in a holy, God-given relationship. An older wedding ceremony began: "Forasmuch as marriage is a holy estate, ordained of God, and to be held in honor by all, it becometh those, who enter therein, to weigh, with reverent minds, what the word of God teacheth concerning it." Because God loves his creatures and made it and gave it to them, it is sacred.
2. Marriage makes "one flesh" of man and woman in every way - physically and spiritually. There is a new being created - one flesh - when people are married to each other in the name of their Lord. The man and woman live in a new relationship, one that was planned by God himself for their mutual well-being, pleasure, and fulfillment. And God established this institution for the propagation and nurturing of children. Marriage is meant to be - by God - a sacred family institution that is based on faith and love for God and each other.
3. That's why Jesus believed that breaking up a marriage by divorce is a sin. Something that God created is destroyed - the relationship of a man and woman, which is most like the relationship of people to God, and the relationship of parents and children in the home - when people are divorced. When the New Testament sayings of Jesus about marriage are studied, there is no doubt that he considered divorce a sin, the very absence of love for one another and for God. He stood with God in this matter and said, "What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder."
4. But times are different. "Adjustments" were made in the early church's theological thinking about divorce. It was granted under some circumstances (adultery, for example), and the contemporary attitudes about marriage and divorce seem to stand in that early tradition. But like it or not, Jesus would call a divorce a sin today because it breaks a commandment of God, destroys a sacred institution, and undermines the basic unit of society - the family - so that everyone in the relationship, parents and children, as well as other relatives - is hurt.
5. Christ calls for recognition of the holy character of marriage, and hints at the problems we have created by the sin against God we commit when we embrace divorce under almost any and all circumstances. And he would give us a new mind and heart so that as we live the new life in him - in love and faith - we might understand and revere this holy estate once again.
A Sermon on the First Lesson, Genesis 2:18-24 - "Marriage - An Act of Creation."
1. When God created human beings, he determined that there would have to be male and female - for completeness, fulfillment, and propagation. He declared, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make a helper fit for him."
2. And so after he had created all living things and brought them to the man to be named, he went about the business of creating woman by anesthetizing the man, taking one of his ribs, and forming woman, his companion. Man and woman are "one flesh," sharing a common humanity through the grace of God.
3. God also gave them what might be called a primitive kind of marriage based upon the "one flesh" reality: "Therefore a man leaves his father and mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh." This is the relationship which "no one should put asunder," according to our Lord. Those who enter into marriage and hope to have it last need to love one another and be faithful to each other.
4. Marriage remains as God's basic human institution - there's nothing wrong with marriage. The problem is with people, with us. And our Lord, through his Word and Holy Spirit, can do something about it if we give him a chance.
A Sermon on the Second Lesson, Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:9-11 (C); 2:(1-8) 9-18 (E); 2:9-11 (R);
2:9-11 (12-18) (L) - "Superior to the Angels."
1. Jesus Christ was born, as all human beings are, "a little lower than the angels. " In his suffering and death, he was as low and as far from the angels as people can get. He was a human being in every way.
2. But this Jesus was the very Son of God, sent into the world by the Father to reverse the course of people, who were destined to destroy themselves through sin, and to reconcile them to God by dying as their high priest on Golgotha's cross.
3. Jesus suffered and died as a human being, but God raised him up and glorified him - who had obeyed the Father perfectly in this act of submission and sacrifice. Therefore, Jesus is able to plead with God on our behalf.
4. So Jesus is above the angels who can only deliver messages from God to human beings. Christ is able to take the plight of sinful people to God himself, who hears, accepts his sacrifice and his pleas - and grants forgiveness to us all.
5. That lamb who was slain and sacrificed is our high priest - now and forever - and to him we offer our praise and thanksgiving and our very lives.
