Grace, mercy and peace be to you
from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Our sermon
text today was inspired by the Holy Spirit by the apostle St Luke. And we read from
his gospel where it says:
And at the
end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given
by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.
Prayer: Dear Lord Jesus, send to
all of us today your Holy Spirit, to me that I may preach well, and to all of
us that we may hear well. Amen.
New Year’s
Day is exactly eight days after Christmas, and it has long been the custom in
the church to celebrate on this day an event which took place exactly eight
days after Christmas, which is when Jesus was circumcised. But it was also the
custom that when a baby boy was circumcised, he would also be given his name on
the same occasion.
This was the
same occasion that we read about when John the Baptist was born, when we read: On
the eighth day they came to circumcise the child. And they would have called
him Zechariah after his father, but his mother answered, “No; he shall be
called John.” And then, they go and ask Zechariah his father about the
question, who can’t talk, and he writes down for them that his name will be
John. Then Zechariah regains his speech. Anyway, this event also happened on
the occasion when John the Baptist was circumcised.
Circumcision
was commanded first of all to Abraham. In fact, on that occasion God also gave
Abraham a new name. Beforehand he was called Abram (which means exalted
father), and now he is called Abraham (father of a multitude). And then
we read: As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring
after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall
keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you
shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins,
and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. He who is eight days
old among you shall be circumcised.
So, right up
until when Jesus was born, this was still practised, and if it was not
practised, it meant that you would not be part of the Jewish faith.
The Jewish
faith is not the only religion that has practised circumcision. Other cultures
all throughout the world also practised it, for example, some parts of Africa
and Asia, and also Aboriginal people, but there was something very unusual
about the Jewish practice. Most other cultures would perform circumcision when
a boy was entering puberty, and it was used to initiate a boy into manhood.
Before the ceremony, he was a boy, and after the ceremony he was a man.
But in the
Jewish religion, it was practised when the boy was only eight days old. This
was very significant, because it meant that when the boy was only eight days
old he was considered a full member of the Jewish faith. If a man wanted to
convert to Judaism, then he would be treated like a baby and given the same
treatment. So all the boys were treated like men, and all the men were treated
like boys.
After Jesus
rose from the dead, circumcision was no longer practiced, since circumcision
was for the Jewish people, but now the Gospel was going out to both Jews and
Gentiles. In fact, whether or not Gentiles should be circumcised was one of the
first disputes in the earliest times in the church. You can read about that in
the book of Acts.
But in the
Christian faith, baptism replaces circumcision. A person becomes a Christian
through baptism. And also, we know that baptism is given not just to men, but
to women. In the Jewish faith, people are part of God’s family through their
family line. But in the Christian faith, we become part of God’s family through
being grafted into Jesus, through baptism, and through the gift of the Holy
Spirit. And when we are baptised, the babies are treated like adults, and if a
person converts to Christianity later in life, then adults are treated like
babies.
There’s a
lot written about this in the New Testament, and I won’t go into it all in
detail today. But I’d like to read something from Colossians about baptism and
circumcision: We read: In Christ the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily,
and you have bene filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority. In
him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by
putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been
buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through
faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. And you,
who were dead in your trespasses and uncircumcision of your flesh, God made
alive together with him, having forgiven all our trespasses, by cancelling the
record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside,
nailing it to the cross.
You can see
here that baptism is now the thing which unites us to Christ. In fact, here St Paul calls baptism a
circumcision made without hands. And the mark that is made on us in baptism
isn’t seen by the human eye—but it’s seen by God. God marks us with his word
and with his name: I baptise you in the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit. He stamps them onto us, and we receive these things
not by sight, but by faith. Faith comes not from sight, but from hearing—God is
the one who has spoken his word and his name onto us in baptism. And then we
say: God said it, I believe it, and that settles it.
So this
brings us to the second thing that we commemorate today, and that is that on
the same occasion, Jesus was given his name. In the reading today it says: At
the end of eight days, when we was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name
given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb.
How many of
us would ever say that our mothers and fathers named us our particular names
because before we were conceived an angel came and gave the name to them? What
amazing thing this is! Now in the Gospel of Luke, it is said that when the
angel Gabriel went to visit Mary, he says: Do not be afraid, Mary, for you
have found favour with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear
a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.
But also in
the Gospel of Matthew, we read about how an angel spoke to Joseph in a dream
and said: Joseph, son of David, do not
fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the
Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he
will save his people from their sins.
Here from Matthew we learn the meaning of Jesus’ name. Jesus is the Greek
version of his name. In Hebrew, we would call him Yeshua. It’s almost the same
as the name “Joshua”. It’s often the case, all throughout the bible, that
children are given names that have a certain meaning. And Yeshua in Hebrew
means “He saves”. And so the angel says: You shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from
their sins.
If we go to the beginning of the Gospel of Matthew, we’ll see there a
genealogy of Jesus. And one thing that we notice from this family tree is that
there’s so many sinners there. Some people among Jesus’ ancestors were complete
idol worshippers. Solomon, for example, had so many wives, that in his old age
he was dragged away from God to worship idols. And also, David, his father,
also had an affair with Bathsheba, who was married to Uriah the Hittite. Then
David sent Uriah off to battle, and put him at the front line, so that he would
be exposed in battle and killed.
This is Jesus’ family. And it says: He will save his people from their sins.
But you know, it’s not just for the circumcised that Jesus came to die
for, it’s for the whole world. The Jews are not the only sinners—Gentiles are
sinners too. In Romans, St Paul says: For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy
on all.
This is such a wonderful passage. The only people that Jesus will save is
sinners. The only people God will have mercy on is the disobedient. The
so-called perfect won’t want him, and the obedient don’t need him.
Sometimes, we look at our own hearts, and all we can see there is sin.
God for you—that means that God has consigned you to disobedience. But there is
a purpose, a reason, why he has done this. It says: For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy
on all.
So when the devil comes along and wants to rub your face in it and say,
You’re a sinner, and you’re no good, and God doesn’t love you anymore, and
you’re not worthy of God anymore, then you can say: Yes, devil, you’re right—I
am a sinner, and I am no good, but I have a Jesus, who was circumcised on the
eighth day of his life, and given the name Jesus, which means that he will save
his people from their sins. The only people Jesus is going to save are sinners.
There are so many passages then in the bible which speak so highly of
Jesus’ name. There are so many treasures contained in his name, and the more we
learn this, the more it will be such a joy to call on it.
Do you know, after Jesus rose from the dead, and after the day of
Pentecost, when the apostles were going out and preaching, the first problem
they encountered was that they were forbidden to preach in the name of Jesus.
The first thing that the Jewish high priests tried to do to thwart the
Christian faith was to silence the name of Jesus. The apostles had said: This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by
you, the builders which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in
no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which
we must be saved.
Do you hear how important the name of Jesus is here?
Also, there’s the wonderful passage in Philippians, where it says: He humbled himself by becoming obedient to
the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him
and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of
Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and
every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Do you see here how important Jesus’ name is? Do you see the wonderful
power and the wonderful blessings that come simply from Jesus name?
Just one more thing: Often in early Christianity, people often saw in the
circumcision of Jesus, a foretaste of the cross, because this was not just the
time when his name would be given, but also the first time when Jesus would
shed his blood.
But then also, when we look forward to the cross, when Christ shed his
blood for us in his most wonderful sacrifice for the sins of the whole world,
what do we notice nailed to the cross above Jesus’ head? His name—Jesus of
Nazareth, King of the Jews.
And this teaches us that every time we enter into God’s presence in
worship, and in prayer, and also when we enter in heaven when we die, we enter
not without our name written over our head, not with the name of a sinner over
our head, but with Christ’s name over our head. And not just with his name, but
with his blood which was poured out for us on the cross. And it’s Christ’s name
and Christ’s blood that is applied to us in baptism. And in the Lord’s Supper,
it’s Christ’s name and Christ’s body and blood that is given and shed for us
for the forgiveness of sins. It’s not just anyone’s body and blood, but Christ
is the one who attaches his name to it—It’s our Lord Jesus Christ who on the night
he was betrayed took bread.
There’s a lovely story about Martin Luther, where he says, that the devil
came knocking on his door, and said: Does Martin Luther live here? And Martin
Luther said, “No, Martin Luther died long ago. Only Jesus lives here.”
This is a story about baptism—through baptism, Martin Luther has been put
to death. And he has been raised from the dead with Jesus.
But the devil wants to accuse him by name. And the devil also comes to
want to accuse us by name. But we are given a name that is so perfect, that the
devil can’t accuse it—and that is the name of Jesus. And so we say, “I died
long ago—only Jesus lives here.”
What a wonderful gift is the name of Jesus!
Amen.
Dear Jesus, we thank you for the gift of your name, given to you when you
were eight days old, but also given to your parents by the angel before you
were conceived. What a wonderful heavenly name you have! Come Lord Jesus, and
be with us, and save us from our sins! Hallowed be your name! Amen.
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