Christ Lutheran Church: Welcome

What is "This"? - January 20, 2008

What is "This"?

Matthew 2:1-12

January 20, 2008

Rev. Dave R. Garwick

Do you know what today is?  On this very day, January 20th, exactly one year from now, at noon Eastern Standard Time, the new President of the United States will be sworn in.  Exactly one year from today.  Everyone else is talking about the presidential campaign, so I might as well too.  After all, we've only got to listen to this for another three hundred and sixty-five days, two hours and thirty minutes.

In the meantime imagine this:  a person who has a pretty good track record for predicting things meets one of the presidential candidates this afternoon and says, "By this time next year, you are going to be hated by almost half of the American public, you will be shot by a gunman, and three days later you will be sworn in as the next President of the United States of America."

Then imagine the candidate's campaign manager saying, "No way!  This will NEVER happen to you!"

How should the candidate take that?  WHAT will never happen to him (or her)?  That she or he will never be sworn into office as the next President of the United States of America?  Is THAT what the campaign manager is meaning by that remark?

Of course not.  When the campaign manager says that "this" will never happen to the candidate, what he is obviously referring to is the ideas of the candidate getting shot.  But that was only one of three things that was predicted.  One of those things was something that anyone can expect when he's threatening the system:  that many people are going to hate him.  That's a no-brainer.

And the last thing that was predicted is that the candidate was going to survive all this and accomplish the goal.  So when one of the things predicted is an expected and accepted no-brainer, and the final thing is victory that nullifies the only bad thing, why does the campaign manager only focus on the one bad thing that's going to be reversed anyhow when he says, "No way this shall never happen to you"?

Likewise, Jesus said that three things were going to happen to HIM:

1.  He was going to suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law

2.  He must be killed and

3.  on the third day be raised to life

That is when HIS campaign manager, Peter, takes Him aside and begins to rebuke Him.  "Never, Lord!" he said.  "This shall never happen to You!"

"This" shall never happen to Jesus?  WHAT will never happen to Jesus?  That He would rise from the dead?  I doubt that this is what Peter was meaning.

My guess is that Peter's meaning was MISSING the meaning of what Jesus was saying.  Jesus was talking about the Good News that He was about to live forever...and that the way He was going to get FOREVER life, was by giving up His temporary life.

But apparently all Peter could grasp was that Jesus was going to give up His temporary life.  All Peter knew for sure was temporary life.  He totally missed the awesomeness of forever life.  I think we can excuse Peter for that:  after all he had never known that this kind of thing was even possible.  HE had never seen Jesus or anyone else come back from death.  It's like a person who has been totally blind from birth being asked to imagine something being "green".

In one sense, we have a little bit of the same problem as Peter did since, none of us has ever seen a person come back to life who has been dead and buried for three days and who has never died again.  BUT our reality is significantly different from that of Peter's...the Holy Spirit has brought to us the witness that this kind of thing can actually happen, that this kind of thing actually DID happen, that Jesus himself actually did precisely that - and not just that He rose from the dead, but that He overcame the very worst that man can do to man.

His resurrection overcame betrayal from one of His most trusted friends, His resurrection overcame the injustice of trumped up charges, His resurrection overcame torture and execution, His resurrection overcame Satan's trump card.

Because of THAT, WE have a very real hope of our own resurrection overcoming the worst in life that tries to hold us hostage = the people whom we allow to threaten us, the fears inside us that we allow to hold us down, the selfishness that we use as the excuse to ignore the needs of others...none of these things can do any more than hassle us for a while.  For anyone who depends on Jesus, none of theses things will ever have the last word.

When a voice in the back of your mind threatens that such and such might happen to you, and you are afraid that this will be the end of the world...why not add to that list, "and on the third day I will rise again."

Paul once put it this way:  Do  you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His DEATH?  Therefore we have been buried with Him by baptism into DEATH, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.  For if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we will certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His. (Rom 6:3-5, NRSV)

"If we have been united with Him in a death like His, we will certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His."

Try that.  Whatever hard road lies ahead, add this:  "...and after all that, on the third day I will rise again."  Jesus predicted it for himself and He predicts it for anyone who goes where He goes.