Sermons

Prepare The Way

December 8, 2024 Speaker: Ray Lorthioir Series: Sermons 2024

Passage: Malachi 3:1–7b, Luke 3:1–20

 

Sermon 12-8-24

Pastor Ray Lorthioir

Trinity Lutheran Church

W. Hempstead, NY

Based on the First Lesson and Gospel for the Second Sunday in Advent: Malachi 3:1-7b; and Luke 3:1-20.

  

Prepare The Way

It’s been a while since I’ve said this, but Christianity can be reduced to three statements: Number 1: There is a Creator God. We exist because He exists. Number 2: Absolutely everything in the universe revolves around His absolute righteousness and goodness. Even evil revolves around His righteousness. For we would have no idea what evil is if we did not know what the good is. Number 3: This life is not the main event in life. Rigorous scientific examination of Near Death Experiences has shown that the human soul survives the death of our present bodies. And if so, what then?

Now, because Yahweh is the totally righteous Creator God, He created all creatures made in His Image to be as Righteous as He is. However, since Yahweh is also Love, He also created all creatures made in His Image to Love. Love is total and complete commitment. It cannot be forced or manipulated. The primary expression of Love is between Yahweh and His creatures. Yahweh’s Love toward us is completely voluntary on His part. His Love is an absolute commitment to us beyond anything we can imagine or understand.

Our love toward our Creator God must be of the same character. Yahweh commands that we love Him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. But He will not force us to Love Him. That would be slavery, not Love. Love for Yahweh must come from within.

And that’s the problem. Scripture tells us that we are born haters of God. That’s what the sinful nature is all about. It hates God. It’s terrified by God. It wants to hide from God. It hates His righteousness. It desperately wants to be its own god. The sinful nature insists on defining good and evil for itself as if it were God. It wants to ignore God. The sinful nature is the crippling leech that drags us all down into unrighteousness and rebellion against our Creator. Because of the sinful nature we cannot love our Creator with all our heart, soul and mind. Adam’s Original Sin has forced this situation on all of us. And if this is so, what will happen when we finally arrive at the main event in life — the Resurrection of the Dead? Our eternal destiny on the Day of Resurrection will be determined by the righteous Judgment of our Creator. The desire to be with our Creator fully clothed in His righteousness will determine everything.

I think everyone understands that what we call hell is justice and punishment for the evil and wicked. What most people don’t understand is that hell is also the promised land for all supposedly “good” people who hate, despise are indifferent toward or ignore their Creator. Don’t want to have anything to do with your Creator? Want to be your own god? Want to define the “good” for yourself without His input? He’s got just the place for you. You can do this forever and ever. The downside is that the place has a terrible climate. And without Yahweh and His righteousness present, you and all there will be evil to the core. But, that’s what our sinful nature craves.

Yahweh is no tyrant. He doesn’t run concentration camps where anyone is forced to love Big Brother. This earth is an example. We’re free to despise, hate or ignore Him while alive here.

Therefore, ironically, “heaven” would be a concentration camp for all those who despise, hate or ignore Yahweh. They would have to Love Yahweh forever. If they hated Him here, why would they want to love Him in the resurrection? Such love would be torture for them. Therefore, “hell” is Yahweh’s perfect accommodation for all who hate, despise or ignore their Creator. Emptied of their Creator’s righteousness, they will have to make their own way. That’s why it will be hell.

Again, this earth is an example of what happens when we make our own way. And Marxism is the best example of that. For Marxists say there is no God and no afterlife. Therefore, if there is to be any “heaven”, we must make it for ourselves here on earth.

About 100 million deaths in persecutions and concentration camps have been attributed to Marxists around the globe during the 20th century. Torture and death was the fate of all those the Marxists deemed unworthy of their “heaven” on earth.

Here on this present earth, Yahweh is present. He restrains evil. Evil geniuses like Stalin, Mao, Hitler, Castro and the rest are only permitted to go so far in their evil. But, what will happen in hell when Yahweh removes His presence and restrains nothing in deference to those who hate, despise or ignore Him?

Now, since we are all born haters of God, is there any way to escape this destiny? Is there any way to be saved from this fate? Is there any way to finally become a lover of Yahweh? The Good News of the Gospel says Yes. Jesus is the way. So, Jesus, come to earth, conceived in the womb of a virgin and born of the Virgin, Mary is the way. Messiah Jesus, in full maturity, giving His life for the sins of the world, is the way. Jesus coming on the clouds of heaven from the right hand of the Father to redeem His own on the Day of Resurrection is the way.

Just before mature Jesus began His earthly ministry, a messenger was sent to prepare His way. That was John the Baptist. Before Jesus returns on the clouds of heaven a messenger is being sent to prepare His way. That’s the Church. Therefore, preparing the way of the Lord is the basic theme of the Advent season.

Today is the John the Baptist Sunday of Advent. And when we look at the ministry that the Baptist was given, we see several things. First, John’s ministry was prophesied by the prophet Malachi centuries earlier.

As we read in today’s first lesson, Yahweh says in Malachi 3:1 “‘Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me.’” The word translated “messenger” is the same Hebrew word that can be translated “angel.” Did you know that the term “angel” simply means messenger? It can refer to any one of the different kinds of spiritual creatures God created that He sends to earth as messengers to the human race. It can also refer to any human messenger that Yahweh sends to the human race. So, John was a human messenger that Yahweh sent to prepare the way for Jesus.

The rest of the Malachi prophecy is actually about Jesus. Malachi 3:1-3, “1 . . . ‘And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. 2 But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. 3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the LORD.’”

Who is the Lord that Israel sought? It’s Messiah. And Jesus came to His temple and laid claim to it by driving out the concessionaires that had been permitted to set up shop within it. He then sat and taught the people in His temple. As we saw last week, He did miracles in His temple, even healing the blind and the lame. And the truth was that the Jewish leadership could not endure the day of his coming. They put Him to death. Nevertheless, some leaders were eventually purified after Jesus was resurrected. For, we read in Acts 6:7 “And the word of God continued to increase, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.” So the Word of the Lord given to Malachi was fulfilled. John fulfilled the very beginning of the prophecy.

Second, Jesus said of John in Luke 7:26-28, “26 ‘What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. 27 This is he of whom it is written, “Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.”

28 I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.’”

By saying this, Jesus indicated that John was the last of the Old Testament prophets. Moses and the prophets were sent to Israel for a particular purpose. Moses brought Israel into covenant with Yahweh and proclaimed Yahweh’s Law to them. The chief commandment in the Law was that Israel was to have no other God than Yahweh. They were to love Yahweh with everything they had. And this was precisely the commandment that Israel broke right from the very beginning with the golden calf episode.

After Israel was in the Promised Land, Yahweh sent prophets to Israel for the next thousand years to call them back into covenant and obedience to the Law. Sometimes Israel repented and turned to Yahweh. But inevitably, they went astray again, lusting after other gods and goddesses. Finally, Yahweh sent the armies of the Chaldean king, Nebuchadnezzar against disobedient Israel. The Babylonians captured and destroyed Jerusalem in 587B.C. They razed Solomon’s temple to the ground. And so a small remnant of Israel went into captivity in Babylon for seventy years.

Babylon was a city filled with ancient gods and goddesses. One would think that Israel would have fit right in and disappeared. But something strange happened in Babylon. Israel finally got it. They forsook all other gods and became obedient to Yahweh. Thus a prophecy given to Ezekiel was fulfilled. Ezekiel 6:8, “8 ‘But I will spare some, for some of you will escape the sword when you are scattered among the lands and nations. 9 Then in the nations where they have been carried captive, those who escape will remember me — how I have been grieved by their adulterous hearts, which have turned away from me, and by their eyes, which have lusted after their idols. They will loathe themselves for the evil they have done and for all their detestable practices. 10 And they will know that I am the LORD; I did not threaten in vain to bring this calamity on them.’” (NIV)

Therefore, in the book of Daniel we see the first evidence that this prophecy was fulfilled and Israel had finally gotten it. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego preferred to be thrown into a fiery furnace rather than worship any other god but Yahweh. And Daniel preferred to be thrown into a lions den than pray to any other god but Yahweh. This was also confirmed in the intertestamental period when Israel preferred to rebel against King Antiochus rather than allow him to set up idols in the Jerusalem temple.

Once Israel got it, Old Testament prophecy ceased. Yahweh Himself had done something about Israel’s unfaithfulness. It was cured. Therefore, what’s interesting about Malachi is that this prophet didn’t speak against the unfaithfulness of Israel with other gods. That was over. Rather, he was given prophecy against Israel for improperly interpreting and living under Yahweh’s Law. 

Now, for nearly five hundred years after Malachi, there was no further Word from the Lord. There was no need. Israel had finally gotten it. But then, John the Baptist appeared. And Yahweh used John to pick up where Malachi had left off. For, again, Yahweh was about to act on behalf of His people.

The subject Lord Holy Spirit gave to John was righteousness. For both Law and Gospel have their origin in Yahweh’s righteousness. The Law defines righteousness. The Gospel gives us a righteousness not our own. It gives us Yahweh’s righteousness. It gives us Jesus. Therefore, keeping this in mind, let’s look at John’s preaching.

Luke 3:7-9, “7 He [John] said therefore to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, ‘You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our father.” For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. 9 Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.’”

Throughout the Bible “fruit” is a metaphor for righteousness. Just as Yahweh created plants to bear fruit, human beings were created to bear righteousness — Yahweh’s righteousness. And as we’ve seen, the sinful nature prevents us from doing so. But we can only know this by faith in God’s Word that it is so. 

The Israelites of Jesus’ time believed that it was enough that they didn’t worship idols like all the rest of the world did at that time. They believed it was enough that they fulfilled the Law through temple worship, sacrifices and the keeping of the appointed festivals. All this was good — but it wasn’t Yahweh’s kind of perfect goodness.

Therefore, John preached the Law that the Law might crush Israel under its mighty and unreachable righteousness. John preached the Law that Israelites might despair of their actual level of disobedience and carelessness. John preached the Law so that they might be terrified of the real evil in their own hearts.

Does such preaching also apply to Christians? Here’s a quote from 19th century Lutheran theologian, C. F. W. Walther, a founder of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. “There are people who regard themselves as good Christians although they are spiritually dead. They have never felt a real anguish on account of their sins; they have never been filled with terror on account of them, have never been appalled by the thought of the hell which they have deserved, have never been on their knees before God, bewailing with bitter tears their awful, damnable condition under sin. Much less have they wept sweet tears of joy and glorified God for His mercy. They read and hear the Word of God without being specially impressed by it. They go to church and receive absolution without feeling refreshed; they attend Holy Communion without any inward sensation and remain as cold as ice.

Occasionally, when they become inwardly agitated because of their indifference in matters concerning their salvation and because of their lack of appreciation of God’s Word, they try to quiet their heart with the reflection that the Lutheran Church teaches that the lack of spiritual feeling is of no moment. They reason that this lack cannot harm them and that they can be good Christians notwithstanding, because they consider themselves believers.

However, they labor under a grievous self-delusion. People in that condition have nothing but the dead faith of the intellect, a specious faith, or, to express it still more drastically, a lip faith. They may say with their mouths, “I believe,” but their heart is not conscious of it. No, indeed; a person who cannot say in accordance with Psalm 34:8 that he has tasted and seen that the Lord is good must not regard himself as being in a state of true faith.” Yes. The Law is terrifying. It reveals the awesome power of the sinful nature.

But John the Baptist also preached the gospel. Here’s the section of text that immediately follows today’s Gospel reading. Luke 3:15-18, “15 As the people were in expectation, and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ, 16 John answered them all, saying, ‘I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.’ 18 So with many other exhortations he preached good news to the people.”

In this passage there’s good news in the midst of terrible news — wheat gathered into the barn. The parable of the wheat means that some who have been born enemies of God will be gathered to Yahweh for eternity in peace as His friends. This is because they will have been made friends by Yahweh’s direct divine intervention in Messiah Jesus. By the gracious will of God, they will be baptized with Lord Holy Spirit. And because of that, they will have tasted and seen that the Lord is good in the very depths of their being. They will know the joy of Psalm 34:8. They will understand that they have been given the state of true faith under the gracious hand of God. They will understand what is written in Isaiah 1:18, “‘Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.’” They will understand the cross and all its power — the incredible forgiveness of sins. And so they will desire to be with their Creator in His righteousness forever. Love will triumph. Therefore, prepare the way of the Lord. Amen.

All Bible quotes are from the ESV unless otherwise noted.

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