"Suffering and Rejoicing"
It’s
Gaudete Sunday, Rejoice Sunday, Rose Colored Candle Sunday. In fact, some congregations even have rose
colored paraments that they’re using today.
We heard it in the Old Testament text, “Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem.” We
heard it in the introit, we heard it in the Epistle text, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice!” And if you
look at the Gradual, it’s there too. “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!”
But it seems, for
John, there’s not a whole lot of rejoicing going on. The heralder of the coming Christ is now
rotting in prison for telling Herod that it’s not lawful for him to have his
sister-in-law, Herodias, for his own.
And as he sits there in prison, he can’t help but wonder, “Where did I
go wrong? Did I prepare the way for the
wrong guy? Was I wrong in pointing to
this Jesus and proclaiming Him the Lamb of God?
What happened to the Messiah who was going to enact justice and
judgment? I was faithful, so why am I
sitting here?” “And John, calling two of his disciples to him, sent them to the Lord, saying,
‘Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?’”
Doesn’t
sound much like the John the Baptist we heard last week, does it? His finger has gone from your chest in
accusation, to Jesus as the Lamb of God who bears the sins of the world, and
now to himself wondering if the guy he’s now pointing at is a fool for throwing
in his lot with this Jesus guy. He’s
thinking “Where’s the glory? Where’s the
good stuff? When is this axe that’s laid
to the root of the tree going to fall?”
Well, sorry, John, but Herod’s axe is about to fall on you.
Last
week we talked about living out the baptismal life of a Christian in repentance
and faith – confessing your sins to God in faith and trust that Christ has
removed your sin from you. We confess
daily because we sin daily, but we never need to come to God and offer our
sacrifice of a broken heart in our repentance in despair. This is what John preached last week, but
this week we see another aspect of the Christian life: in John, we see exactly
what you can expect your life to be like as a Christian; it’ a life that’s
lived under the cross.
So,
how’s your life going? Have there been
times in life when you suffered and were in anguish that caused you to raise
your voice up to God, “Are you there, Lord?
Are you the one to come or shall I wait for another?” Does it seem your life is a prison, at
times? Financial troubles? Marriage problems? Do you hurt?
Do you suffer? Have things
happened in your life that causes worry and anxiety? Will there be an empty chair this
Christmas? Most of you, I’m sure, have
heard by now of the terrible manifestation of sin that took place in
Connecticut. Twenty children are dead by
that hands of a deranged man. Though
it’s Gaudete Sunday, Rejoice Sunday, there doesn’t seem to be much rejoicing,
at times.
As
you suffer, and as John does in the text, it’s easy for us to take the John and
His disciples approach, “I’ve been faithful.
I come to church. I love Jesus. So why do bad things keep happening? Why do I suffer and the faithless
prosper? If you’re in control, Jesus,
why is this happening? Where’s the
justice? Are you the one to come, or
shall we expect another?”
We
have our own template of what we perceive to be fair and unfair. We have our own idea of what God should do,
we like to put the judge’s robe on, place God in the defendant’s chair and judge
Him according to our notion of fairness.
In this template, that we love to place over God, it’s fair for someone
who’s an unbeliever or for one of those truly horrible sinners to suffer all
manner of things, while those who have faith in Christ should get a life of
comfort. But God shatters this
template. No matter times you’ve heard
Joes Osteen say it or have seen it in his books, your best life isn’t now.
This
life is fallen, it’s sinful. And in a
fallen, sin-sick world, there are financial troubles, relationship problems, we
get sick, we hurt, children are murdered, and we, ourselves, die. It’s a life lived under the cross and
crosses, ultimately, mean death.
Why
must you endure these things? What
possible reason would God have to allow you to suffer so? What reason could there be for God to allow
such sinfulness to befall elementary school children? Well, I don’t know. It does no good to try and crawl into the mind of God and
ascertain what His holy will is. We can
say that God, at least, permitted it to snowed last week, but we can’t say
why. But, as a professor of mine once
said, “God doesn’t always give us answers, He gives us promises.”
So
what’s the promise? Well, Jesus gives us
a glimpse of it in our text. “And when the men had come to [Jesus], they
said, ‘John the Baptist has sent us to you, saying, ‘Are you the one who is to
come, or shall we look for another?’ In that hour He healed many people of
diseases and plagues and evil spirits, and on many who were blind he bestowed
sight. And He answered them, ‘Go and
tell John what you have seen and heard:
the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and
the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have good news preached to
them. And blessed is the one who is not
offended by me.”
With
the coming of Christ comes restoration; all things are made new, a new
creation. These healings of plagues and
diseases, restoring of eye sight, cleansing of lepers, and, yes, raising of the
dead are a little glimpse into nature of the New Heavens and New Earth at
Christ’s glorious coming. There are no
more diseases or pains, for your resurrected body shall be glorious. There will be no more financial woes, for you
will have received your eternal inheritance in its fullness. There will be no more relationship troubles,
for all strife and enmity will be done away with. There will be no more slaughtering of
innocence, for there is nothing but eternal life.
This
is given to you. Because Jesus made
Himself least in the Kingdom of God, so that you would be called the
greatest. The sufferings that you must
endure here have been answered for in the sufferings of Christ. We have a God who doesn’t sit in His ivory
tower from on high, looking down upon us poor humans who suffer so. But we have a God who descends from His seat
of power and authority and dives into the middle of this sin-sick world to
endure its sufferings, pains, and heartaches Himself. He knows what it’s like to lack earthly
things, for He Himself had no place to rest His head. He knows what it’s like to suffer heartache,
for His own creation turned against Him.
We have a God who knows what it is to taste death, for He was placed on
a cross, suffered in anguish, for you; but was raised from the dead! After the cross, comes glory. And so it is for you. It’s been given to you, it’s yours right now,
but not yet in its fullness.
He
has won for you a place in Paradise, where suffering has ceased to be. A good friend of mine, Pr. Christopher
Maronde of Kiron, Iowa once wrote, and I couldn’t put it better myself,
“Suffering comes before glory, and the glory that is to come is incomparable
with the suffering that preceded it.”
Advent means
“coming” and we look to the horizon for the coming of Christ, when the glimpse
of the New Creation that we get in the text, shall be given to you in its
fullest; that the sufferings that we, here, now endure shall give way to the
joys of Paradise.
Today
is Gaudete Sunday, Rejoice Sunday.
Though we must endure the sufferings of this life, rejoice. Rejoice for
you have a God who has endured suffering, pain, and death for you. Rejoice for through the crucified and living
Jesus, you have been given a place in the New Heaven and New Earth at His
coming. Rejoice for the time draws ever closer; the Day of Our Lord is closer
than it once was. Rejoice for suffering
shall end and you shall live, body and soul, in the Paradise that the Lord has
established for you, His faithful.
Rejoice, for you have been set free from the shackles of sin and death
by Christ, who has suffered, died, and was raised again all for you. He is the one who came and is coming
again. We need not look for another, for
Jesus, Himself, shall return and make all things
new. Amen.
The
peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in
Christ Jesus unto life everlasting.
Amen.
Rev. Mark Chepulis
