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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
The day after the U-S House of Representatives this past week passed two articles of impeachment, an online editorial from Christianity Today called President Trump’s underlying alleged action “profoundly immoral”; the editorial described his character as “grossly immoral”, and it said that he should be removed from office. Years ago, the monthly magazine originally founded by Billy Graham had published a similar editorial in connection with President Clinton’s impeachment, and it had called for the Constitution’s process to be followed in the case of President Nixon, who resigned before his almost‑certain impeachment. Of course, no president or any other ordinary human being is without sin, not even Jesus’s guardian Joseph, whom St. Matthew in today’s Gospel Reading called, as the E‑S‑V translated it, a “just” man. Considering that Gospel Reading this morning, we realize that, in the midst of our fallen thoughts, words, and actions, “Jesus saves His people from their sins”.
Just before the Gospel Reading in St. Matthew’s Divinely‑inspired account, Jesus’s descent from Abraham and David was traced. In that genealogy, Joseph was named as the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born (Matthew 1:16). Today’s Gospel Reading explains, as it were, that unusual wording, giving some detail about both Jesus’s virgin birth and how Joseph came to be Jesus’s legal guardian, acknowledging Jesus as his legal Son, and providing Jesus a link to David’s line, if He did not already have one through Mary, His mother (Schweizer, TDNT 8:363; Lohse, TDNT 8:486).
In the process of giving some detail about Jesus’s virgin birth and legal guardianship, the Gospel Reading also contrasts fallen human thoughts, words, and actions with the unexpected way that God puts His plan of salvation into action (Gibbs, ad loc Matthew 1:18‑25, p.104). For example, when Mary, Joseph’s betrothed, was found to be with child, we are told that Joseph, being a “just” man and unwilling to shame her publicly, resolved to divorce her quietly and was still considering these things when an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream.
The Gospel Reading raises a number of unanswered questions. When and how did Joseph find out that Mary was with child? What, if anything, did Mary tell him about the origin of the pregnancy and to what extent, if at all, did Joseph believe her? In what sense is Joseph “just”, if he was not going to do what God’s law said to do in the case of betrothed virgins who end up pregnant before their marriage is finalized (Deuteronomy 22:23-27) but instead was going to go against God’s law in divorcing her? Did forgiving what might have seemed to be her unfaithfulness, following Old Testament examples of forgiving adulterous wives and people, even enter into his mind? Clearly the Holy Spirit did not think that we needed answers to those questions!
One commentator says that before the angel stopped Joseph, for the right reasons he was about to do the wrong thing (Gibbs, ad loc Matthew 1:18-25, p.105). However, good motives never change the nature of sinful action! Perhaps with equally incomplete information and unclear motives we consider what to say and do: in our own lives; in our familial relationships with parents and siblings and spouses and children; in our roles at church; and in our capacities in society such as employers and employees and the like. Some options might seem to be equally valid choices, but our motives and decisions can still be tainted with sin. Other things that we say and actions that we take might be more clearly wrong, as “profoundly immoral” as Christianity Today said President Trump’s actions were, but we all are equally, to use the magazine’s term, “grossly immoral” by nature. We deserve present and eternal punishment, apart from repentance and faith in Jesus Christ.
Jesus’s birth uniquely fulfilled the prophecy that the Lord had spoken through the prophet Isaiah, as we heard in today’s Old Testament Reading (Isaiah 7:10-17), prophecy spoken in the context of inviting belief and warning against unbelief. Perhaps if Joseph had known that prophecy better, the way that God put His plan of salvation into action would not have been so unexpected or surprised him so much! A virgin before, during, and after conception and birth, Mary bore not Joseph’s son but God the Father’s Son, by the power of the Holy Spirit. That Son was and is “Immanu‑el”, God with us, also called “Jesus”, for He saves us from our sins, dying on the cross in our place. His Resurrection showed that God the Father accepted the sacrifice He made on our behalf, and, as we heard in the Epistle Reading (Romans 1:1-7), His resurrection also declared Him to be the Son of God. True God in human flesh He could leave both His mother’s womb and the borrowed tomb in a supernatural way (Formula of Concord, Solid Declaration VII:100; VIII:24). There is no other Name under heaven given among people by which we can be saved (Acts 4:12). When, by the Holy Spirit’s leading, we repent of our sin and trust God to forgive our sin for Jesus’s sake, then God does just that: God forgives our sin, all our sin, whatever our sin might be.
“Jesus saves His people from their sins” with His death on the cross, but we receive the benefits of His death on the cross through His Word and Sacraments. We are baptized into the Name of the Triune God involved in Jesus’s conception and birth. At the Font God gives birth to us by water and the Spirit, adopting us as His children, and we who receive Christ’s righteousness there by grace through faith enter the Kingdom of God (John 3:5). In private confession and individual Absolution, Jesus Himself is present, forgiving the sins that we know and feel in our hearts (Matthew 18:20; confer Smalcald Articles III:iv). And, in the Sacrament of the Altar, bread is Christ’s Body given for us and wine is Christ’s Blood of the covenant poured out for the forgiveness of sins (Matthew 26:28). And, Jesus can be supernaturally present there, as He promises to be, because He is true God in human flesh.
Forgiven through God’s Word and Sacraments, we at least try to live our lives more as God would have us live them. At least trying to live our lives in keeping with God’s moral law, according to our various vocations, is our response of faith. When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife and called her Son’s name “Jesus”, for that Son would save His people from their sins. We will not likely receive such Divine revelations to resolve our ethical quandaries, and, even if we did, in every case we may not like it. But, God’s moral law is clear, and spiritual direction can help us apply it to our specific circumstances. We try to make the right choice, in cases where there is a right choice and a wrong choice, and in every case we can be at peace in God’s forgiveness of sins, both knowing that God can and does work good out of what might otherwise might be or appear to be “bad” decisions, and receiving the grace to live lives of contentment no matter our circumstances, as God would have enabled Mary and Joseph to do, no matter their sexual relationship or lack thereof after Jesus was born (Matthew 19:11-12).
Even as President Trump’s critics sometimes go too far in speaking against him, so also his supporters sometimes go too far in speaking for him, at times using religious language that we more‑properly reserve for our Lord. Even in the midst of our fallen thoughts, words, and actions, “Jesus saves His people from their sins”. The way that we think that things should work may seldom if ever be the way God chooses to put His plan of salvation into action. Thank Him that He is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us; to Him be the glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever (Ephesians 3:20-21).
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +