Listen to the sermon with the player below, or, download the audio.
+ + + 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.)
Again this Lenten season, in our five Midweek Lenten Vespers Services, we hear St. Matthew’s account of Jesus’s Passion. You may know that, more than any other Gospel account, St. Matthew’s account seems to emphasize how Old Testament prophecies of the Messiah are fulfilled by the New Testament ministry and Passion of Jesus, the Christ, our Savior. So, we should not be surprised to find an arguable example of prophecy’s being fulfilled in each of the five “location” portions of the Passion that we hear over these five weeks, although you may be surprised by some of the details of the prophecy and its fulfillment. Of course, in the end, each prophecy and its fulfillment reiterate for us God’s will and work to save us sinners who are sorry for our sins and trust God to forgive us by grace for Jesus’s sake. Tonight, we consider how, in the Upper Room, Jesus seems to speak about His, in some sense, actively fulfilling Psalm 41 verse 9 (confer Psalm 55:12-14).
As we heard in the Reading, Jesus said that the one who had dipped his hand in the dish with Him would betray Him (confer and compare Mark 14:18). Jesus’s reference apparently is to dipping a morsel of bread in the bowl of bitter herbs—fruit, nuts, ginger or cinnamon, and wine or vinegar—that was part of the Passover meal (Davies and Allison, ad loc Matthew 26:23, III:462; confer Exodus 12:8; Numbers 9:11), which bitter herbs first recalled the haste with which the Passover meal was prepared and later reminded the Jews of their bitter treatment as slaves in Egypt (Hamilton, #1248e, TWOT, 529). Then, as we heard in the Reading, Jesus said that He is going as it is written of Him, written once in the past and still presently standing written presumably in the Holy Scriptures of the Old Testament, written in this case, although not all Bible commentators agree, apparently by the Psalmist David (confer John 3:18, 26), who said that even his close friend in whom he trusted, who ate his bread had lifted up his heel against him—that is, had thrust with the heel, given a good swing of the foot or a great kick, even if a figurative great kick (Keil‑Delitzsch, ad loc Psalm 41:8-10, p.48). That Psalm verse apparently refers to David’s trusted advisor Ahithophel, who joined David’s son Absolom in his rebellion against David, and, when Ahithophel’s advice was not taken, who ended his life by hanging himself (2 Samuel 15:12, 31-34; 16:15-17:23; confer Lenski, ad loc Matthew 26:23, p.1019). The Psalm verse’s reference to Ahithophel’s turning on David prophesies of Judas’s betraying Jesus, and, as we heard in the Reading, Jesus essentially speaks of His and Judas’s fulfilling that prophecy.
Jesus pronounced a “woe” upon that betrayer, in the process emphasizing the figurative distance between them, and Jesus said that the betrayer’s not having been born would have been better than his experiencing eternal damnation. There is no fatalistic so-called Calvinistic or Reformed “double predestination” here (confer Luke 22:22)! Especially as the Holy Spirit had at least at one time enabled Judas to be sorry for His sin and to trust God to forgive His sin for Jesus’s sake, Judas was free both to not betray Jesus and to repent of his betrayal and so be forgiven, but Judas did betray Jesus and did not repent and so was not forgiven (Apology of the Augsburg Confession XII:8, 36). We should hear Jesus’s “woe” upon Judas as a general statement of judgment upon all betrayal and apostasy (Davies and Allison, ad loc Matthew 23:24, p.464), including our own betrayal and apostasy. While we before our conversion by nature are not free to not sin and to repent, the Holy Spirit enables us to repent and so to be forgiven and then to do God‑pleasing good‑works. Yet, afterwards, we still sin, and so, to avoid the eternal damnation that we otherwise deserve, we live in sorrow over our sin and with trust in God to forgive us for Jesus’s sake.
As we heard in the Reading, Jesus says that He is going as it is written of Him. Jesus had come, was there, and continued to go do all that God had prophesied: not like a “To-Do List” that had to be checked off simply because God through the prophets had fore‑told that it would happen, but rather God through the prophets had forth‑told it would happen because it flowed out of His eternal plan to save sinners. God in human flesh, Jesus had a perfectly free will that was perfectly aligned with the Father’s loving will to save us. So, Jesus freely went all the way to the cross in order to die for us: to die the death that we otherwise deserve, to die as our substitute. Tonight’s arguable example of prophecy fulfilled is the only one of the five examples where Jesus is actively doing something, in this case “going”. Perhaps, because the betrayal was still in the future as Jesus spoke the words in the Reading, Jesus did not yet explicitly describe the prophecy of His betrayal as completely fulfilled, but it was completely fulfilled soon enough, as were all the other prophecies about the Messiah, the Christ, our Savior, including those prophecies about His resurrection from the dead. So, when we are sorry for our sins and trust God to forgive us for Jesus’s sake, then God does just that: God forgives us our sinful nature and all of our actual sins, whatever our actual sins might be. God forgives us through His Word and Sacraments.
Tonight’s arguable example of prophecy fulfilled is also the only one of the five examples and the only place in St. Matthew’s Gospel account where something is described as being done “as it is written” (Davies and Allison, ad loc Matthew 26:24, p.462 n.52; confer Mk 14:21). But, whether the expression is “as it is written”, or “for it is written”, or so that something “might be fulfilled” there is no essential difference in the various expressions’ use of and regard for Holy Scripture, verbally inspired by God through human writers. Still today that same Word has authority, clarity, saving power, and sufficiency both as it is read and preached to groups such as this group and as it is applied to individuals with water in Holy Baptism, with a pastor’s touch in Holy Absolution, and with bread and wine that are Christ’s Body and Blood in the Holy Supper. We who repent and confess the same faith receive all of these Means of Grace for the forgiveness of sins and so also for life and salvation. Mindful of the close relationship between the fellowship meal and Judas’s betrayal, we practice Closed Communion both for the integrity of our proclamation of Jesus’s death and in order to protect those who might not discern the sacramental and ecclesial bodies of Christ from communing unworthily (1 Corinthians 11:17‑34), as apparently Judas communed unworthily (Formula of Concord, Solid Declaration, VII:33, 60), not that his example is a valid argument against our trying to practice Closed Communion.
Forgiven by God through His Word and Sacraments, we are transformed, and we also go, in some sense, as it is written of us. We try to do the good works of God’s Commandments in keeping with our various callings in life, our vocational relationships both to God and to one another: first with our parents, spouse, children, and extended families; and then with others in our church community; and finally at school or work and in society as a whole. In the process, we may suffer betrayal as David and Jesus did, and, if we do suffer betrayal, then we pray for and forgive our enemies of their sin against us, even if we do not ever trust the betrayers the same way again. To be sure, with daily contrition and faith, we live in God’s forgiveness of sins for our betrayals and occasional unbelief.
Tonight, we have considered St. Matthew’s account of Jesus’s Passion’s fulfilling specifically the prophecy of Psalm 41 verse 9. Four other examples will come in turn the next four weeks. As Jesus generalized elsewhere, what is written in the Scriptures that must be fulfilled is both that He should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in His Name to all nations (Luke 24:44-47). So repentance and forgiveness has been proclaimed to us; may God use us likewise to proclaim to others.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. (Amen.)
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +