Sermon 4-13-25

Pastor Ray Lorthioir

Trinity Lutheran Church

W. Hempstead, NY

Palm Sunday/Sunday of the Passion

Resist

Five Sundays ago I urged you to have your soda, pretzels and snacks ready in order to watch a large screen rerun of the greatest contest ever held. Since we already know the final score, the purpose of watching the rerun is to break down the contest play by play.

In the contest, on one side we have the kingdom of this world — the present world system in rebellion against its Creator — headed by Satan. On the other, we have the Kingdom of God — the Kingdom of the Creator of all that exists — headed up by no less than the Messiah — Yahweh, the Son. Who do you think is going to win?

But not so fast. Even though it’s already clear which side is the winner, the final quarter of the game actually hasn’t been played yet. The first three quarters have already been played and recorded so we can watch them on the large screen. But at the same time we’re still in the contest. The final quarter is still being recorded and we’re in it. Therefore, what we’re seeing on the screen will actually play out in our personal eternal destiny beyond death.

The primary purpose of the contest is the recovery of what was lost in the first minutes — the Image of God. We’ve seen that the Image of God is the righteousness — the goodness — of God reflected back to God in the creatures He’s created to bear His Image. When Yahweh created Adam and Eve, He made them equal to Him in only one thing — righteousness. Thus, they were meant to bear the Image of God.

We all need to grab onto this word: righteousness. It describes the one characteristic by which our eternal destiny will be decided. On the Day of Judgment, those with the righteousness of God will populate the Kingdom of God — under the promised new heavens, on the new earth in glorious resurrected bodies that can never die. On the same day, those without the righteousness of God will populate the promised Lake of Fire — the place where the world system of rebellion can finally and fully max out. And such people will do so in resurrected bodies that can never die.

Now, since all of us are conceived and born in Adam’s Original Sin, lacking the full Image — the full righteousness — of God, how can any of us ever enter the Kingdom of God? We will only enter with a righteousness not our own, but gifted to us by God. And the securing of that gift of righteousness is the contest we’re watching on the big screen.

Just like the Image of God was lost by a man, it must be regained by a man. But that man cannot be any ordinary man — any ordinary sinner. He has to be one born without Original Sin so He can be truly free to choose Yahweh’s righteousness alone and always. Unfortunately, those of us born in Original Sin can’t do this. We’re slaves to sin. We absolutely demonstrate this from the moment we’re old enough to dishonor our parents by disobeying. That disobedience wasn’t cute. It was deadly and the harbinger of much worse things to come.

So, this man, the Messiah, must be born without Original Sin and must never sin for His entire existence. However, this Messiah must endure temptation. For, without temptation, He cannot show His pure Love for Yahweh, the Creator God. He cannot show His undivided loyalty to Yahweh. Only by entirely resisting temptation unto His dying breath can He show Yahweh the kind of pure Love and undivided loyalty necessary to regain the Image of God for all lost sinners.

Now, because Messiah must be born without Original Sin, none of the temptations of this world common to people will affect Him. The usual sins — lust, greed, pride, sloth, dishonesty, seduction, slander and all the rest — will not affect Him in the least. Just like the original Adam, none of these will affect Him unless He can be convinced or deceived into giving up the Image of God. So, Satan didn’t bother Jesus with the usual sins he bothers us with. He only bothered Jesus with the one really important sin — grasping at equality with our Creator. This sin is the root of all other sins.

Adam only had the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil to deal with. Messiah Jesus had much more to deal with. He had the entire life-script of Messiah to deal with. And that life-script ended with the cross.

Messiah’s life-script was originally transmitted to us by Yahweh — Father, Son and Holy Spirit — through Moses and the Prophets. And it was transmitted to us for one reason — so that we could know Messiah when He appeared, so that we could know Him by His life and work and thus, be able to put our faith in Him.

In dealing with Messiah’s life-script, the task Jesus had was to stay on script. Satan was there to try to put Him off script. If Satan could do that, then Satan’s rule over Yahweh’s creation would be complete. 

Now, there was no way Yahweh was going to allow that to happen. So, the result of the contest is a foregone conclusion. However, Satan is going to get one corner of the creation over which to rule — the Lake of Fire. All creatures, including humans, who desperately want to be their own god can join Satan there. All who hate and reject Yahweh and want to be free of Him will find their desire fulfilled there.

On the other hand, through Messiah, Yahweh has had great compassion on humanity. Although we are conceived and born in Original Sin, we do not have to join Satan in the Lake of Fire. There is an escape hatch into the Kingdom of God and that escape hatch is Messiah Jesus Himself. But to become that escape hatch for us, Jesus had to resist the temptation to go off script unto His dying breath. He had to resist writing His own human script for being Messiah. He had to resist playing God — even though He is God. Figure that one out.

So, in this Lenten series of sermons, we’ve seen Jesus resist Satan first in three in-person confrontations in the wilderness. Afterwards, Satan turned to using human agents to do the tempting. Last week we saw Peter plea with Jesus not to follow Messiah’s script unto rejection and death. But, Jesus told Satan to get lost. Then, we saw Jesus’ blood family, His brothers, try to convince Him to go up to Jerusalem and show Himself as Messiah at the week-long Jewish feast of Tabernacles that occurs in the Fall. Jesus told them to go to the festival. He stayed behind. The text in John 7 tells us that Jesus waited a few days and then went to Jerusalem. He openly taught there in the temple. But it was not time for Him to reveal Himself as Messiah.

Last week, we saw that during the Exodus, Yahweh commanded Israel to observe three major harvest festivals — what we know as Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles. He commanded all Jewish males to show up for these festivals at wherever the center of Jewish worship would be established. Eventually this was Jerusalem. 

Jesus refused to go up to Jerusalem to reveal Himself as the victorious Messiah at the feast of Tabernacles. Instead, He waited until Passover to establish His claim as Messiah. And that’s what Palm Sunday is all about. That’s why the crowd that gathered around Jesus and welcomed Him into Jerusalem with shouts of Hosanna and branches cut from trees were calling Jesus, Messiah, even the Son of God. 

Thus, we read in Luke 19:37-40, “37 As he [Jesus] was drawing near — already on the way down the Mount of Olives — the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works that they had seen, 38 saying, ‘Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!’ 39 And some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, ‘Teacher, rebuke your disciples.’ 40 He answered, ‘I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.’” By saying this to the Pharisees, Jesus was establishing His claim as Messiah. He was telling them that the crowd was correct to call Him the King who comes in the name of Yahweh. And if they hadn’t done it, the very rocks He had created would have done it.

Now, if a king comes to a place riding on a horse, he comes for war. But if he rides in on a donkey, he comes for peace. To this very day rabbis reject Jesus as Messiah because they say He didn’t bring peace. Actually He did. On that donkey, King Jesus came into Jerusalem in peace to bring peace. It was the Jewish leadership that didn’t want peace. They could have had it. But didn’t want it. And so the rabbis remain at war with King Jesus to this day.

Last week, we noted that after the three temptations in the wilderness, Satan no longer appeared openly to Jesus. Instead, he used agents. In particular, we looked at how Satan used Peter and Jesus’ blood relatives. In the week after Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem, Satan continued by using the Jewish leadership as His agents to tempt Jesus with their hostility. Jesus could have given up and run from them at any point. But He didn’t.

From the Gospel texts, it’s difficult to determine what day of the week Passover began that year. Historically, the church has celebrated Thursday as the evening Jesus celebrated a meal with His disciples. Was this the Passover meal? It may have been. But, if it was the Passover meal, it means that the sacred festival of Passover began at sundown on Thursday. It would also mean that in their bitter hatred of Jesus, the Jewish leadership wildly trashed that Passover by arresting Jesus later that night and then having Him crucified during the daylight hours of Passover on Friday. Friday also would have been the day of preparation for the Sabbath — the Saturday — that fell within the Week of Unleavened bread that always follows Passover.

Whatever way the festival fell that year, we now come to the time after the final meal Jesus celebrated with His disciples. We know from Scripture that Judas Iscariot totally succumbed to Satan’s temptation that night and betrayed Jesus. Peter also succumbed to temptation and denied Jesus three times. But what about Jesus Himself?

Passover always occurs on the night of full moon. So, in the moonlight that night Jesus and the disciples went out of the city to the east. They crossed the Kidron Valley, and walked up the slope of the Mount of Olives to the Garden of Gethsemane. The text of Scripture then tells us that Jesus took Peter, James and John to a separate part of the garden. There, he walked away from them after telling them about the sorrow that was afflicting His soul. By Himself, Jesus faced a deep temptation knowing all that was going to happen to Him. And the physical suffering wasn’t necessarily the worst. He would be suffering for the sins of the whole world, past, present and future. And that’s a hideous load of evil.

So, there in the moonlight Jesus prayed three times as it says in Matthew 26:39, “. . . ‘My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.’” The fact that He prayed this at all shows the stress He was under. He was attempting to find some other way than the cross. But Jesus remained true to the Messiah life-script. He accepted the will of the Father. Jesus didn’t run away or hide where Judas would not have been able to find Him.

And then there was the moment Jesus was arrested. As those who had come to arrest Jesus laid hands on him we read in Matthew 26:51-54, “51 And behold, one of those who were with Jesus stretched out his hand and drew his sword and struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear. 52 Then Jesus said to him, ‘Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword. 53 Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels? 54 But how then should the Scriptures be fulfilled, that it must be so?’”

Did you hear that? If Jesus had cried out to the Father, more than 12,000 angels would have shown up to rescue Jesus from this mob. But, then, how would He have been able to fulfill Messiah’s life-script written in Moses and the Prophets? We can see from the very question Jesus asked that He again passed the moment of temptation and remained true to the script written for Him.

On the night of Jesus’ arrest and trial, many were tempted and succumbed — among them Judas, Peter, Pilate, Herod and the Jewish leaders. The Jewish people who showed up the next morning looking for the clemency Pilate usually granted to a prisoner on the occasion of Passover also succumbed to temptation. For, the leadership tempted them into demanding the crucifixion of their Messiah. They were all overcome by these agents of Satan and succumbed. But Jesus Himself held fast throughout the ordeal.

And so we come to the final temptation. It begins in Mark 15:16-19, “16 And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor’s headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion. 17 And they clothed him in a purple cloak, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. 18 And they began to salute him, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ 19 And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. 20 And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. And they led him out to crucify him.”

They mocked the Creator of the universe and its true King. They did this to the one who could have obliterated the entire battalion in a moment with fire falling from heaven as Elijah the prophet once did to two different battalions of soldiers sent to arrest him. (2Kings 1:5-17) But, Jesus endured it all and let them have their fun, as if there were nothing He could have done about it.

And finally we come to Jesus on the cross. Matthew 27:37-44, “37 And over his [Jesus] head they put the charge against him, which read, ‘This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.’ 38 Then two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. 39 And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads 40 and saying, ‘You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.’ 41 So also the chief priests, with the scribes and elders, mocked him, saying, 42 ‘He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. 43 He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he desires him. For he said, “I am the Son of God.”’ 44 And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way.”

We know from Luke’s Gospel that one of the robbers eventually changed his mind. We read in Luke 23:42-43, “42 And he said, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ 43 And he [Jesus] said to him, ‘Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.’”

But do you remember the words Satan used in the first three temptations — namely, “if you’re the Son of God, do this or that.” So, who were these people? Were they not agents of Satan when they used the same language? And then there’s the temptation itself — come down from the cross and we’ll believe you. Isn’t that remarkably similar to the temptation Satan used when he invited Jesus to jump off the parapet of the temple and force the angels to catch Him in mid air in the sight of everyone in the temple? Were these people agents of Satan, or what?

Now, let’s revisit the subject we dealt with two Sundays ago — faith. If Jesus had jumped off the temple parapet or come down from the cross, would it have created saving faith in the people who saw it?

Again, our answer to that question comes from the Exodus. The Israelites that Moses led out of Egypt had seen ten amazing and horrible plagues come upon Egypt from Yahweh’s hand. They had crossed the eastern arm of the Red Sea on dry ground only to see the Egyptian army destroyed in the returning flood of water. In terror, they had witnessed Yahweh come down on Sinai in thick darkness. They had heard Yahweh’s voice erupt as an enormous trumpet blast from the mountain as He spoke commandments to them. Yet . . . yet, when Moses tarried up on the mountain for forty days with Yahweh, what did they do? They forced Aaron to create an idol for them — a golden calf, of all things. They then worshiped that idol in direct disobedience of that commandment they heard from the mountain that they were to have no other gods but Yahweh.

All this demonstrates once and for all the disaster that is the sinful nature that each one of us is born with. Yeah. Maybe we’ll believe something for a while. But show me what you did today! If nothing, well then — yawn — I’m going to go off and do my own thing. The sinful nature absolutely cannot believe any Word that comes from the mouth of the Lord, no matter how many powerful miracles it has seen. That’s the massive tragedy that each one of us is because of Original Sin.

So is there anything that can cause sinful humans to believe what Yahweh tells us? Yes. It’s the faith that the new birth from water and the Spirit creates in those who receive the new birth. Faith to believe the Law and Gospel is a gift from Lord Holy Spirit Himself. Without that gift of faith, we’re all lost to hell and damnation.

And here’s the really important part. If Jesus had succumbed to the temptation to come down from the cross, He would have grasped equality with God in His hand. He would have re-written the Messiah script on His own. He would have utterly failed. There would be no new birth. There would be no Gospel to believe. The Holy Spirit would not be in the world enabling hearts to believe the Gospel. You and I would be eternally doomed in hell to the worst that the sinful nature can produce.

But the Good News is that Jesus did not fail. The one thing Adam did that doomed us all, Jesus did not do to His dying breath. And this is why the ancient hymn says in Philippians 2:5-11, “5. . . Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” 

That hymn proclaims the glorious victory over sin, death and the power of the devil that Jesus won for us at the cost of His own life. But, just remember. We’re still in the game for as long as we breathe on this earth. Daily we need the victory Jesus has won for us. For without that victory, we are just those who constantly grasp at the right to be our own gods. But in His victory Jesus won God’s mercy for all — even us. Let us come to Him, to the glory of God our Father. Amen.

All Bible quotes are from the ESV.