"Following Jesus" First Sunday in Advent Ad te Levavi Commemoration of Noah November 29, 2015 Matthew 21:1–9
It’s the same for every Christian. Jesus says, “Follow Me.” The apostles were called directly by their Lord to follow Him. They knew that this didn’t mean just following Him around. They knew this was a life thing. He was calling them to a new way of living, a break from the past. When Jesus calls upon us to follow Him it means that we no longer follow our own path, but rather the one He lays before us. This is why we do this thing called the Church Year. The Church Year is deliberate. The Church Year is focused. The Church Year takes our eyes of all that glitters in life and points us to the cross. If Palm Sunday seems out of place here at the beginning of the Church Year, it shouldn’t. Off the bat, we are shown what following Jesus is all about. It is about Him going to the cross. In a few weeks we will celebrate Christmas. Jesus was born to go to the cross. He followed the Father’s will in living a life that culminated in the cross. In the Church Year we follow the life of Jesus. In Advent we ponder as those who did before Christ came. Not jumping directly to Christmas, we pause. We know He came, but what was it like before He did? It was waiting. It was patiently entrusting the waiting to the perfect time of when He would send the Savior. Our Advent waiting impresses on us the need for repentance, as our God on high was brought low in a stable and then raised up on a cross. Once we celebrate Christmas we continue on in the Church Year to follow the life of our Lord as He made His way to the cross. That we begin the Church Year with the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem where He will be affixed to a cross shows us that following Jesus is nothing apart from the cross. Following Jesus is a life lived out in the Baptism we received. In Baptism is where we met Jesus at the crossroads. He took our sinful nature and put it death. Crucified, is the way Paul says it in Romans 6. Your life as a follower of Christ is one in which, like Christ, you have already been crucified. If you wonder at the significance of your Baptism, then consider the work of your Lord in going to the cross. He could have walked into Jerusalem, but He chose to ride in. He did not choose the path of glory and pride, however but of humility. He didn’t come in on a stallion on a donkey. He told His disciples to go to a man who had a donkey tied up. If anyone were to say anything to them, they were to respond that the Lord had need of it. Consider that a donkey, not exactly a glorious animal, was used by the Lord to bring Him into Jerusalem where He would go to the cross. Following Jesus means recognizing that this life is not one of glory but of humility. He uses simple things, such as a donkey. Such as the water poured on you in your Baptism. Follow Him and live in your Baptism every day. Wake up every day and make the sign of the cross on your forehead and on your heart to remind you that you are marked as one who is redeemed. Following Jesus is always following the one who went to the cross to redeem you. It’s not following Him around. It’s living in the Baptismal life you have been given; where you have died in a death like His and raised in a resurrection like His. Jesus knew why He was going to the cross. No one else even knew He was going to the cross. Jesus came into Jerusalem in fulfillment of Scripture. This is what Matthew tells in the Gospel reading: “This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, saying, ‘Say to the daughter of Zion, “Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.”’” Jesus does what He does to bring about the promises He has made. In coming in, He was coming humbly, because He was going to the cross. He was not coming to enter a palace, He was coming to bow His head on a cross. Those who were there did not see it coming, but we can. We have the whole story given to us in the Scriptures. Those Scriptures, as we are shown in the Gospel reading, say to rejoice, our King is coming to us. We rejoice because He went to the cross. We rejoice because He is our King who has come to save us, to forgive us. The crowds hailed Him as He rode into Jerusalem: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” Hosanna, they cried, Save us! Son of David they called Him, the one who would be their Messiah, their Savior. Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord, they shouted. Yes, He came in the name of the Lord. He was indeed the Son of David. He was most definitely coming to save them. At the end of the week, though, when He was hanging on a cross waiting to die, where were they? Where were their cries of rejoicing in their Savior saving them? They were nowhere to be heard, because they didn’t believe He came to save them by losing His life. He came in humility because it was ultimate humility that paid for the sin of the world. It was being cursed in our place. It was enduring seeming victory for Satan and utter foolishness for God. It was submitting to crushing punishment for sin for Him who had no sin. They followed Him into Jerusalem but not to the cross. It’s no matter, though. He went alone as He was the one who alone atoned for sin. Even so, by the miracle of the water and the Word, we have already been there, to the cross. In Baptism, we have already been crucified with Christ. We follow Him who died for all of our sins and calls us to live in that daily dying and rising of repentance and forgiveness, of dying to the flesh and rising to new life. No matter what day it is in the Church Year, apart from the cross it means nothing. Every single day in the Church Year revolves around the Gospel reading for the day and what it proclaims to us of the Christ who suffered, died, and rose. Following Him is nothing apart from following the one humbly who went to the cross to give us new and eternal life. Life in which we live not to ourselves but to Him in humble service to others; in faith toward Him and in fervent love toward one another. This is the way Paul speaks of following Jesus in the Epistle reading: “Let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.” Putting on the Lord Jesus is living in Baptism. Living in Baptism is making no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires. It is following Jesus, the one who went to the cross and brought you into His death and resurrection in your Baptism. That is how you have new life, you have been brought into the life of Christ in Baptism. This new life is following Jesus. Following Him is not so much a conscious effort as it is simply being who you are in Christ. If you are a new creation, then you are a new creation! You have put on Christ, you follow Him by living as one who always goes back, to the cross, the place where your salvation was accomplished. You always live out your Baptism, the place where you personally were delivered of all your sins. Following Him means that He is always going before you. Having gone to the cross, He leads you through the valley and into heaven. 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. [Henry Hamann, On Being a Christian] _______________________________________________ Sermons mailing list Sermons@cat41.org http://cat41.org/mailman/listinfo/sermons
