1.
Please
pray with me. May the words of my mouth
and the meditation of our hearts be pleasing in Your sight O Lord, our rock and
our redeemer. Amen. Today we’re going to look at the Gospel
message that was read a moment ago from Mark 11:1-10. The whole of the Church Year either moves
toward Good Friday and Easter or it flows out of the cross and resurrection of
our Lord Jesus. We see this movement
started in the Gospel for this first Sunday in Advent. The First Sunday in Advent marks the
beginning of a new Church Year and in its beginning; it points the Church
toward the Cross. In fact, the whole
season of ADVENT has to do with Jesus’ coming.
That’s why the word ADVENT means, “coming.” The message from God’s Word this morning is
entitled, “How Shall You Meet
Jesus?” Dear brothers and sisters in
Christ.
2.
“O Lord, how shall I meet You, How
welcome Thee aright?” The words to this hymn by Paul Gerhardt that
we just sang pose the question to this season of the Church Year. Advent is more than a preparation for
Christmas. It’s that time of the
Christian year that brings the question of Paul Gerhardt’s hymn home to each of
us. How shall we meet Jesus and welcome
Him aright—this Lord who comes to us in swaddling clothes? It’s not a convenient season that’s tucked
between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
We’re aware of the busyness of this season as these weeks speed away so
quickly. With preparations for holiday
celebrations, the pace of an already hectic life tends to speed up as we rush
from one thing to the next. There are
projects to complete, appointments to keep, commitments to honor. There are parties to plan, gifts to buy and
cards to send. We need Advent as
something of a liturgical speed bump to slow us down so that we don’t neglect
the questions, “O Lord, how shall I meet You,
how welcome Thee aright?”
3.
How shall you meet
Jesus? Well, hopefully not the way that
Great Britain’s biggest bakery Greggs
plans to meet Him. This
year, as it has done for many years previously, Greggs has produced an Advent
calendar. For those of you who are unacquainted with the idea of an Advent
calendar, I can share they are colorful calendars which use treats and Bible
verses to help Christian children count down the days to Christmas. Greggs' Advent calendar has various coupons
which can be taken to the store and exchanged for some kind of bakery treat. So
far there’s nothing wrong with the idea. Greggs sells some goodies, and the
company points to the Savior as being the reason for the season. Yes,
that's the way the calendar worked in the past, and it's the way it should have
worked this year.
4.
It should have,
but it didn't. You see, someone in Greggs' advertising department thought it
might be a good idea to maximize the product's placement and, at the same time,
minimize the presence of the Christ child. And so it came to pass that Greggs
put out an advertisement for its Advent calendar which showed three magi,
kneeling before a straw-filled manger which had ... no, the manger, didn't have
the baby Jesus; baby Jesus was nowhere to be found. Baby Jesus was gone and had
been replaced by a sausage roll.
5.
With all of this misinformation
about Christmas going on, I suppose it’s only appropriate that we as Christians
redouble our efforts to advertise the true purpose of Christmas. With
confidence and commitment, let us continue to share the Savior who is good news
of great joy for a sinful world. We hope
to proclaim Jesus as our Lord and Savior this Advent & Christmas seasons so
that the world and our community around us can meet the true Jesus.
6.
To
welcome Jesus, we recognize the interruption that He brings. At the time that Jesus came, Jerusalem was
ready for the celebration of the Passover.
Passover was a celebration of remembrance of God’s act of deliverance of
his children from Egypt. This time of
celebration would have swelled the streets of Jerusalem with crowds. The day of the sacrificing of Passover lambs
was fast approaching. People were
anticipating the delight of being with family for the Passover feast.
7.
But,
when King Jesus comes into Jerusalem, it interrupts the sort of celebration
people are expecting. Mark 11:1-7 says, “1Now
when they drew near to Jerusalem, to Bethphage and Bethany, at the Mount of
Olives, Jesus sent two of his disciples 2and said to them, “Go into
the village in front of you, and immediately as you enter it you will find a
colt tied, on which no one has ever sat. Untie it and bring it. 3 If
anyone says to you, ‘Why are you doing this?’ say, ‘The Lord has need of it and
will send it back here immediately.’” 4And they went away and found
a colt tied at a door outside in the street, and they untied it. 5And
some of those standing there said to them, “What are you doing, untying the
colt?” 6And they told them what Jesus had said, and they let them
go. 7And they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on
it, and he sat on it.”
8.
Luther
says of Jesus that he comes as a “beggar king,” for he comes on a borrowed
donkey. He comes in humility and
meekness, yet he’s King. In fact, all
donkeys belong to Jesus, for He’s the Lord over heaven and earth. He’s not stealing when He commissions His
disciples to take the colt. There can be
no objections when the Lord takes what is His.
Now Jesus embodies the announcement of Zechariah, “Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having
salvation.” He comes into Jerusalem,
the city of the temple, the place of sacrifice, to suffer and die as God’s
ultimate Passover Lamb. His sacrifice
interrupts the routines of sin and death. Here’s a King like no other, for this King
comes not in royal splendor or with military might but in the humility of the
Servant who embraces the cross for you.
9.
To
welcome Jesus, is to praise him as the Blessed One who brings us the kingdom of
heaven. With words of praise on their
lips and branches in their hands, Jesus is greeted as the Blessed one. In Mark 11:8-10 it says, “8And many spread their cloaks on the road, and others
spread leafy branches that they had cut from the fields. 9And those
who went before and those who followed were shouting, “Hosanna! Blessed is he
who comes in the name of the Lord! 10Blessed is the coming kingdom
of our father David! Hosanna in the highest!”
Just before His triumphal entry, Jesus was greeted by blind
Bartimaeus as the Son of David. The
blind man pleads with Jesus for mercy and after Jesus heals him of his
blindness, he follows after Jesus. Now
the people of Jerusalem behold their Messiah and bless him as, “Great David’s greater Son.”
10.
With
the words of Psalm 118:25-26, the crowds confess Jesus as Lord, even as they
cry out for him with their glad hosannas, imploring him to, “save now.”
The salvation for which they desire comes only with Jesus and the
shedding of His blood. Jesus is the
Blessed One, for in His saving death, He brings all the blessings of
heaven—forgiveness of sins and peace with God—down to earth. No wonder that in Advent we especially hear
that this Jesus is Immanuel God with us.
That reminds me of an illustration from Adolph Koeberle’s book, The Quest for Holiness. Koeberle says that religions of the LAW
suggest that man can come to God. In
fact, human beings attempt to come before God in three ways. Some people try to access God by means of
their morality—by living lives that are committed to doing good and refraining
from doing evil. Others think they can
grab God by human reason; they build for themselves a religion that conforms to
their definitions of logic. Yet others
believe that union with God can be achieved through emotional experiences. These are all what Martin Luther later called
ladder theologies. But, the whole message of ADVENT reverses
the direction. Salvation isn’t something
human beings ascend to through morality, rationality or mystical
experience. ADVENT, announces a Savior
who comes to us as Immanuel, God with us, righteous and having salvation.
11.
But,
as Immanuel, King Jesus comes to us, His KINGDOM comes also. Jesus’ kingdom isn’t a power that we
attain. It’s pure gift. So the Catechism teaches us that, “The kingdom of God certainly comes by
itself without our prayer, but we pray in this petition that it may come to us
also.”
12.
Jesus’
kingdom isn’t a past event. It was
established by his death and resurrection.
We don’t come to the kingdom, it comes to us. The words of Paul Gerhardt’s hymn capture
this truth we sang in verse 3, “I lay in
fetters, groaning; You came to set me free.
I stood, my shame bemoaning; You came to honor me. A glorious crown You give me, A treasure safe
on high That will not fail or leave me As earthly riches fly.” God has brought you into his kingdom by
the faith creating Gospel. Recall again
the words of Luther’s Small Catechism, “God’s
kingdom comes when our heavenly Father gives us His Holy Spirit, so that by His
grace we believe His Holy Word and lead godly lives here in time and there in
eternity.”
13.
So
how shall we meet our Lord and welcome him aright? We receive Him by faith, trusting His
merciful words of forgiveness and promise.
See, your King comes to you, no longer on a borrowed donkey, but with
His Word and with His body and blood under bread and wine. He comes to claim you as His very own. He comes to take away your shame and to
restore to you the joy of salvation. “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he come comes in the name of the
Lord! Amen.
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