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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.)
Today’s Gospel Reading sounds like the evening news: false saviors, wars and rumors of war, nation rising up against nation, kingdom rising up against kingdom, earthquakes in various places, famines. Yet, none of that is really news. Those things arguably had happened already before Jesus’s time, as they have happened also after Jesus’s time. And, since He said that those things would happen, neither should His disciples have been, nor should we be, surprised by them, or, as He said, alarmed by them, for they are but the beginning of the birth pains; the end is not yet. In the meantime, Jesus said that we should both see that no one might lead us astray and see to ourselves, amid persecution that might result in our death. For, He said, “The one who endures to the end will be saved”.
In St. Mark’s Divinely‑inspired Gospel account, today’s Gospel Reading comes right after last Sunday’s Gospel Reading, in which, on the Tuesday of Holy Week, Jesus criticized the Jewish scribes and essentially praised a poor widow, who put into the Temple treasury all she had to live on (Mark 12:38-44). Then, as we heard today, as the Lord came out of the Temple, one of His disciples told Jesus to look at its stones and buildings, and Jesus told them to more than “see” the buildings, to get the point that not one stone would be left upon another stone. And, as He sat opposite the temple on the Mount of Olives, the end-times significance of which mountain we discussed in our Midweek Sermon series this past Lent, four of His disciples asked Him privately both when those things would be and what would be the sign that they were about to be accomplished.
We might say that, at least in the section of Mark 13 that we heard in today’s Gospel Reading, and likewise in the section of Mark 13 that we will hear in next Sunday’s Gospel Reading (Mark 13:24-37), Jesus does not really answer either of the disciples’ two questions: neither when those things would be, nor what would be the sign that they were about to be accomplished. Rather, while Jesus described things that would be going on in the world around His disciples and us, He directed His disciples’ and our attention to ourselves, essentially for us to get the point both that no one should lead us astray and that we should endure to the end in order to be saved. We are to be faithful at all times, because, whether the end of the whole world or our own individual deaths, the precise moment of judgment will come unexpectedly.
Of course, when the precise moment of judgment does come, because of our sinful nature and all of our actual sin, we deserve to be condemned to eternal torment in hell. As Pilgrim’s Elders and I were reminded this past week with our study of the Augsburg Confession and its Apology’s treatments of Original Sin, as children of our fallen parents, we are born without the fear, love, and trust in God that the First Commandment requires and that is necessary to keep all the other nine Commandments, and instead we are born with contempt for God, hatred of God’s judgment, and an instinct to flee God when He judges us (AC II:1; Ap II:8). Our Original sin is enough to damn us, but it leads us to commit actual sins that also damn us. Even we, whom the Holy Spirit has led to repentance, are, as Jesus describes, at risk of being led astray by false saviors, whether in the Oval Office, Cabinet Room, Senate Chamber, or Hall of the House of Representatives. We are at risk of being unfaithful when we face both being handed over to persecutors or having our families divided over the faith. The preaching of God’s law to all nations, or Gentiles, leads us to be sorry for our sin, and the preaching of God’s Gospel to all nations, or Gentiles, leads us to trust God to forgive us. When we so repent, then God does forgive us. God forgives our sinful nature and all of our actual sin, whatever our actual sin might be. God forgives us for Jesus’s sake.
“The one who endures to the end will be saved”. Notably, as Jesus describes, in that saving, we are passive; God is active. We cannot save ourselves, but God can and does save us. As we prayed in today’s Collect, God releases us from the bonds of our sin by His bountiful goodness. God saves us out of His love, mercy, and grace for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ. As today’s Epistle Reading said, Jesus offered for all time a single sacrifice for sin (Hebrews 10:11-25). Jesus truly says that He is the Savior, God in human flesh. Living out what we should expect to endure for His sake, Jesus was delivered over to the Sanhedrin, was beaten, and stood before the governor and a king, all for our sake. Jesus carried our sins to the cross, and there He died for us, in our place, the death that we deserved. That Jesus be so handed over, crucified, and on the third day rise was Divinely necessary for us and for our salvation (for example, Luke 24:7). In today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus likewise speaks of the Divine necessity both of the wars and rumors of war and of the preaching of the Gospel.
The reading and preaching of the Gospel to groups like this group and the application of the Gospel to individuals with water in Holy Baptism, with touch in Holy Absolution, and with bread and wine in the Holy Supper are how we are made to endure to the end and be saved. In discussing endurance, the pagan philosopher Aristotle once said wrongly that people could summon the power to endure from within themselves (Hauck, TDNT 4:582, citing EE III:1229b:31ff.), but, like our being saved initially, our enduring to the end, in order to be saved finally, comes from God. The Collect of the Day suggests that our being forgiven enables us to stand firm. Today’s Epistle Reading describes well how we, who are washed in Holy Baptism, draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith; how we meet together all the more as we see the Last Day drawing near; how we are encouraged in preaching, not by the charisma or wisdom of men but by the power of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:4-5); how we receive the Body and Blood of Christ; and how we hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He Who promised is faithful. Thus, we whom He has already perfected for all time are being sanctified, all in the Name of the Triune God, Jesus’s Name.
As we heard in today’s Gospel Reading, our association with Jesus’s Name leads to our being hated by all those outside of the true Church. Today’s Old Testament Reading warned of a time of trouble such as never had been (Daniel 12:1-3), and Jesus Himself a few verses after today’s Gospel Reading in St. Mark’s Gospel account says there will never be such Tribulation like it (Mark 13:19), and, in the Reading from Revelation on All Saints’ Day, we heard how the believers are brought through that great tribulation (Revelation 7:14). By God’s enabling us, we endure with patience and joy whatever God in His wisdom permits us to face (Colossians 1:11), including tumult in the world and division in our families, maybe even as we celebrate Thanksgiving. We certainly do not need to be handed over formally in order for us to witness, using the words of Holy Scripture, to what God has done for us in Christ. As the Church always has, we expect our Lord’s final coming in glory at any time, for He does not need and is not waiting for us to do something first. And, when He comes, as we heard in the Old Testament Reading, all those whose bodies sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, and combined with the living, the repentant believers among them will go to everlasting life, and the un‑repentant un‑believers among them to shame and everlasting contempt (confer John 5:25-29).
Despite a U-2 lyric that refers to a newspaper’s being published on that “New Year’s Day”, I do not think there will be either time to publish one or a need for one. In fact, we know the news already now. As Jesus said, “The one who endures to the end will be saved”. And, as we sang in today’s Psalm, the Lord makes known to us the path of life, and in His presence there is fullness of joy, at His right hand are pleasures forevermore (Psalm 16:1-11; antiphon: v.11b, c).
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +