"What’s With All the Blood?" Maundy Thursday Anselm of Canterbury, Theologian April 21, 2011 Hebrews 9:11-22
On Maundy Thursday we should have a solemn approach to the events of our Lord on the night He was betrayed. A sermon title of What’s With All the Blood? may not seem all that respectful. But this can be honest question. Our Lord is holy and when we’re in His presence we should be so in reverence, but He also has an intense interest in communicating with everyone of every time and every place. While He could cater to everyone’s sensibilities He chooses instead to be upfront and not pull any punches. He is serious about being God and He knows that we are serious about being human and what it means to be human. He takes us seriously as well and treats us with the respect in telling us the way it is. So when there’s all this talk of blood in the Bible and sacrifices of animals and of Christ Himself it’s natural for people to ask, What is it with all the blood? God is not offended by this. He is happy to explain what all the blood is about. Simply, it is about life. God is about life. He is the Creator, of course. He is the Living God and has brought life into existence. You have blood flowing through your veins and that is why you are alive. If you have some serious injury and you can’t stop the bleeding you will die. Blood is vitally important to you and your life. But the blood that He’s talking about so much in the Scriptures is not just for this life. The reason God makes a big deal out of the blood is not just life, it’s life restored. It’s new life, life from the dead. The writer of Hebrews in our Epistle reading says we are moved “from *dead* works to serve the *living* God.” God created life but we died in our sin. Through blood He creates new life again. When He created Adam and Eve He started the blood flowing through their veins. When they died spiritually in their sin against God that blood still flowed. But it would one day stop. They would die physically. The way God brought them from spiritual death to spiritual life was through the shedding of blood. This first began when Adam and Eve realized that they were ashamed that they were naked. God slaughtered an animal so that they could be covered with the animal’s skin. One being’s blood was shed so that the others could be covered. This animal’s sacrifice was pointing toward the greater sacrifice of the Lamb of God in which His blood was shed so that our sins are covered. God moves us from death to life through death. It would seem He would do it through life, but He does it through death. Only God would come up with a religion that is the opposite of what we would want in a religion. Our notion of religion would be that everything is glorious, death and all that business about blood would have no place in our religion. But God says, Yes, I am the living God, but I come to you in death. Specifically, in the death of His Son. It’s the person who is on the cross and His blood being shed. This is the work God looks at. Not the dead works the writer of Hebrews talks about. We are brought to life through death, in the shedding of the blood of Christ. That is how we are able to serve the living God. The priests in the Old Testament who slaughtered the animals for sacrifice had a messy job. Blood would get everywhere. It was not for the faint of heart. Why would God go about things this way? Couldn’t He have made salvation a little less messy? Did He have to offer the forgiveness of sins at the expense of an animal being cut open and its blood splattering out? An easy answer would be, Of course He didn’t have to. He’s God, He could have done it in any way He wanted. An equally easy answer would be, Of course He had to. He’s God, He knew that was the way it had to be done. Neither of these get to the point of why God chose to do it this way. It’s true that it’s gruesome that an animal had to give its life in order for the people to be saved. But it’s also true that in this our sins are seen in their stark reality. If it seems horrific to see an animal being slaughtered and its blood splattering everywhere we should gain a better understanding that there is a consequence to our sin. Our sin against God is not just that we’re not as good as we should be. Everything we do is dead. All our works are dead works. These set ourselves against the Living God. Our sin against Him is a ruined relationship. We are enemies. Restoration must be made. Restitution must be made. But how can we do that? We are unable to. In our sinful flesh we are unwilling to. A sacrifice must be made and that blood being splattered all over the place as the priest takes the knife to the animal’s throat gives us a sense that this is no light matter. This is the light in which the writer of Hebrews talks about blood. Without the blood of Christ there is no life. Your blood will course through your veins but you will not have new life. Your blood will flow freely throughout your body but it will one day stop flowing and that will commence eternal suffering in hell. We are unable to restore ourselves to God. All that we do is dead works. But He is the Living God. And He is the one who has made the Sacrifice. It was the shedding of blood. Not of an animal. Of His only-begotten Son. The writer of Hebrews says it plainly: without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. Jesus makes it clear at the Last Supper in His instituting of His Holy Supper: This is My blood, poured out for the forgiveness of sins. We don’t understand how Jesus gives us His blood in the wine of His Holy Supper. It seems a strange thing to do. To give someone a drink of wine and tell them that it’s His blood. When He gave the disciples the cup He had not yet shed His blood. But the blood He was giving them in that cup was the blood He would shed for the sins of the world; and as He said, for the forgiveness of those sins. If we think it’s amazing that Jesus gives us His blood in His Holy Supper, and we should, we should also be amazed that Jesus *has* blood. He’s God. God is spirit. God is not a physical being. But He became a man. He put on flesh. Blood flowed through the veins inside His body as He grew in Mary’s womb. The blood flowing through His body kept Him alive for thirty years in the same way our blood keeps us alive. It was that blood that was shed. That blood that was given at the Last Supper. That very blood is given to you in His Holy Supper. It is blood that was shed for you for the forgiveness of your sins. That’s what’s with all the blood. Life. Life restored. New life. Eternal life. Life for you from the shed blood of Christ on the cross. Life given you in the blood of Christ given to you to drink for the forgiveness of your sins. That’s what the blood is all about. It is about what God loves to do, give life. Restore life. Renew life and sustain you in it eternally. Your are brought from death to life. Your dead works stay dead and you are a new creation in Christ in Baptism. You are sustained by the Body and Blood of Christ in His Holy Meal. This is why He instituted it on this holy night, the night on which He was betrayed. The night before He shed His blood for the sin of the world. It is this blood given to you tonight and often, for you, for your forgiveness, for your life. Amen. SDG -- Pastor Paul L. Willweber Prince of Peace Lutheran Church [LCMS] 6801 Easton Ct., San Diego, California 92120 619.583.1436 princeofpeacesd.net three-taverns.net It is the spirit and genius of Lutheranism to be liberal in everything except where the marks of the Church are concerned. 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