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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. (Amen.)
“Trouble in paradise”, the headline read, drawing attention to a story about three apparently-tortured dead bodies’ that washed up last weekend on the beaches of Acapulco. The dead bodies, apparently from the Mexican drug cartels, certainly indicated “trouble”, but whether or not Acapulco, a city in the Mexican state of Guerrero, is “paradise” is another matter! In the Gospel Reading for today, the Last Sunday of the Church Year, we heard Jesus promise the so‑called “penitent thief” on the cross that, that very day, the man would be with Jesus in Paradise (and Jesus did not mean Acapulco). And so, on this day that sometimes instead is variously regarded as either “The Sunday of the Fulfillment” or “Christ the King Sunday”, we consider that not only that “penitent thief” but all “Repentant believers will be with Jesus in Paradise”.
The English word “paradise”, like its Greek predecessor used in the Gospel Reading, is essentially a transliterated form of an old Persian word that referred to a preserve or park, shady and well‑watered. In the Bible, the Greek word most often refers to the Garden of Eden, which in the beginning God created on earth and included the Tree of Life (Genesis 2:8-9), and which in the end seems to come down out of heaven from God as the new Jerusalem, which includes the Tree of Life (Revelation 21:2, 10; 22:2). Presumably at some point in between the beginning and the end, perhaps in connection with the flood, the Garden of Eden was translated from earth to heaven, and the term “paradise” referring to the Garden of Eden—along with other terms, such as “the bosom of Abraham” and “heaven” itself—was used to refer to the place where the souls of repentant believers who had departed this life already were with God, at least until the resurrection of the body at the end.
In recent conversations and other communications, a Baptist friend of mine has repeatedly confessed his belief that the paradise to which Jesus and the penitent thief went was not the same thing as heaven but a sort of “protective custody” or “minimum security prison” elsewhere, much like the Roman Catholics believe that the souls of all the departed repentant believers before Jesus’s ascension were held in an outer‑chamber of hell called “the limbo of the fathers”. We may misunderstand paradise in different ways. Maybe we wrongly think that everyone will get to Paradise, at least eventually, or that we get to Paradise because of something that we do. Maybe we wrongly think that we could not be truly happy in Paradise without the presence of beloved pets or unbelieving family or friends. Maybe we wrongly think that we will spend all of our time in Paradise doing whatever would make us happiest, whether fishing, gardening, golfing, playing guitar, or whatever else we might want to do. Maybe we wrongly look forward more to the happy reunion in Paradise with those who have gone before us in the faith than to being in God’s nearer presence. We sin in those and in countless other, sometimes unspeakable, ways, for we are sinful by nature.
We might not agree with all of the content of seventeenth-century English poet John Milton’s masterpiece, but most would agree at least with its title, Paradise Lost. For, in the first man and woman’s temptation and sin, not only they but also all of us their descendants lost access to paradise and to its tree of life (Genesis 3:22-24). We deserve both temporal death and eternal torment apart from God’s presence, unless, like the penitent thief, enabled by God, we confess our sins and faith in Jesus. The penitent thief feared God; confessed both the justness of his condemnation and Jesus’s innocence; and he sought mercy and grace from Jesus. And, Jesus told him that, that very day, he would be with Jesus in paradise. When we repent and believe, then God forgives us, our sinful nature and all of our actual sin, whatever the sin might be. And, all “Repentant believers will be with Jesus in Paradise”.
On the Last Sunday of the Church Year with its sometime focuses on the fulfillment of all things and on Christ the King, we might expect to hear about some worldly triumph, but what the Gospel Reading gives us is the paradoxical triumph of the cross, on which the Son of God in human flesh is crucified as the King of the Jews, indicates the character of His reign as that of the forgiveness of sins, and gives access to paradise that comes with that forgiveness (Stuckwisch, LSB:CttS, 262). We may hardly hear of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion without shudders and pangs of deepest grief (Arndt, ad loc Luke 23:33-43, p.466). For, He was pierced for our transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities; upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with His wounds we are healed (Isaiah 53:5). By God’s grace for Christ’s sake, all people can be saved through faith: whether those who repented with faith in the Messiah, the Christ, the Savior Who was to come, or those who repent with faith in the Messiah, the Christ, the Savior Who has come. Either way, that Messiah, that Christ, that Savior forgives us through His Word in all of its forms.
The penitent thief usually comes up for discussion in regards to God’s Means of Grace, as we do not know that he ever heard Jesus’s preaching or was baptized, much less partook of the Sacrament of the Altar. As the Divinely‑inspired St. Luke tells it, the Holy Spirit created repentance and faith in what the thief heard and saw while hanging on the cross, and, after the thief quite publicly confessed his sins, Jesus essentially individually absolved him. Under normal circumstances, we are born from above of water and the Spirit in Holy Baptism, which Jesus says is “necessary” to see and enter the Kingdom of God (John 3:3, 5), and we eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood in the Sacrament of the Altar, which Jesus similarly says is “necessary” to have life in us. The water of life and the bread of life both are closely associated with the paradise of God. Those who receive God’s forgiveness with repentance and faith through these Means will be there. All “Repentant believers will be with Jesus in Paradise”.
The penitent thief asked Jesus to remember him at some indefinite future time, but Jesus’s reply to the thief quite definitely and specifically emphasized that, that very day, the man would be with Jesus in paradise. For all of us who repent and believe, such a specific day is also coming, whether the day of our deaths or the day of the Lord’s coming in glory, whichever comes first. That such a day is coming is a great comfort, for it means that now, even when our bodies are racked with indescribable pain, our souls can be at peace (Arndt, ad loc Luke 23:43, p.471). As the Divinely‑inspired St. Paul wrote both to the Philippians and to us, to live is Christ and to die is gain; to depart and be with Christ is far better, though to remain in the flesh may be necessary still for a time (Philippians 1:21, 23). Even those already in paradise are in some ways waiting (Revelation 6:9-11): for paradise to be fully restored to earth, for the resurrection of their bodies, and so for the full enjoyment of that paradise. Yet, even then, the greatest blessing of that paradise is full fellowship with God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
The phrase “trouble in paradise” was not original to that headline that I saw last week about the bodies on the Acapulco beaches, nor was the phrase original to the 19-32 movie named Trouble in Paradise (though the movie is sometimes given credit for popularizing the phrase), but the phrase is reportedly found in several printed sources from the late 18-hundreds. And, I would say that at least conceptually the phrase goes back to the beginning, with the first trouble in the first paradise! But, now that trouble is undone. Today’s Gospel Reading makes clear that there is a future life, that for believers that future life is one of blessedness, and that that future life of blessedness is entered upon one’s death. In short, all “Repentant believers will be with Jesus in Paradise”.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +