Trinity X [Luke 19:41-48] (8-Aug-2021)

 

St Peter’s Evangelical-Lutheran Church, Public Schools Club, Adelaide, 9am

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

And when Jesus drew near and saw the city, he wept over it.

Prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen. 

Our Gospel reading today has four parts to it: the first part we read about Jesus weeping over the city. The second part, we see him making a prophecy about the city of Jerusalem. The third part, we read about Jesus cleansing the temple. And the fourth part we read about Jesus teaching in the temple.

Our reading today comes at the end of Luke, chapter 19, and this chapter is a very rich chapter. We first read about the little man, the rich man, who is called Zacchaeus, who climbs up into a high tree, to get a glimpse of Jesus as he goes by, and Jesus invites himself to his house.  Next, we read about the parable of the Ten Minas, a mina being a sum of money. In the old times, this was often called the parable of ten pounds. Then, following this, we read in Luke 19 about Jesus riding into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. And then we come to our reading today, about where Jesus weeps over the city, cleanses the temple, and teaches there.

So, you can see that the events of our reading today take place in the week of Passover and Easter. The church has always celebrated Palm Sunday on the week before Easter, because if you count up the days in the Gospels about when these things took place, it works out to be a week before Easter. And so, throughout the centuries, the church has called this week Holy Week, because it is the week when Jesus was there in Jerusalem, having been welcomed by the crowd on Palm Sunday, it is the week when Jesus celebrates his Last Supper with his disciples, it is the week when Jesus offers his life as an atonement and sacrifice on the cross on Good Friday, and it is also it is the week when Jesus rose from the dead. We should never underestimate what God can do in a week!

So let’s read from our Gospel reading, and see what it says. First, it says: And when [Jesus] drew near and saw the city, he wept over it.

There are a few of times in the New Testament, where we read about Jesus weeping. The most well-known passage is where Jesus visits Mary and Martha, after their brother Lazarus had died. As they are walking to the tomb, we read, very simply: Jesus wept. These two words are the shortest verse in the entire bible. But there’s a little comment immediately afterwards. We read: So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying?”

On one hand, some people who see Jesus weep, recognise his love and his compassion. Some people think that this is a sign of Jesus’ helplessness and weakness, and think that all Jesus can do in the face of death is cry. Also, they are a little bit angry with Jesus, thinking that he was too late. Mary and Martha both had said to Jesus: Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. The people who saw Jesus weep, thought much the same thing, and were critical of Jesus, and his timing, and now, of his weakness. Well, in actual fact, a few verses later, we read about how Jesus wonderfully raised Lazarus from the dead. So, it’s very easy to criticise Jesus and to think that in our eyes he did something that we are not happy about, but we often think like this because we don’t know what Jesus is going to do next.

So we see here in John’s gospel how Jesus wept. We do see his weakness, actually. The weakness which he willingly took on when he, as true God, the Lord of heaven and earth, who is equal with the Father and the Holy Spirit, descended from heaven, and became a man, a true human being like one of us. We see the wonderful weakness which Jesus took on in his earthly life, for example, when he became a baby, his fasting in the wilderness for 40 days when he became hungry. Of course, we also see his weakness when he offered his life on the cross, and suffered a terrible death.

But also, we need to remember that whatever Jesus does, and however he presents himself to us, he always does it as both man and God together. You see, Jesus is not two different people: he doesn’t switch his divinity or his humanity off, according to what he is doing. So for example, when he touches a person and heals them, it’s not just a man who touches the person, but it’s God who touches them, because Jesus is our Lord and our God.

Imagine the problem when you have the butter in the fridge and you want to cut it. If you put the butter in the oven, or the microwave, it just melts and goes everywhere. If you try and cut it with a knife, the butter it too hard. So you have to heat up the knife, and make the knife hot, by putting the knife in the fire on the stove, and then the knife cuts and melts at the same time.

So, we could think of Jesus’ human body like a knife that is connected to fire. It’s like his humanity is the knife, and his divinity is the fire. So, as I said, when Jesus touches a person, it is touch of a man and God together. Also, when Jesus was in his mother’s womb, it was not simply a man who was in his mother’s womb, but God who was there. And so, in the history of the church, Mary has been called “the Mother of God”, and rightly so, not because she is the mother of God the Father, but because the person she had in her womb and whom she gave birth to was God.

So, also, when we think of Jesus dying on the cross, it was not simply a man who died, but God who died, and we say this, not because God can actually die, but because in the person of Christ, because he is both man and God, God dies, and experiences death and goes through it.

Also, in the opposite way, we see some amazing things that Jesus does in the Gospels. For example, he walks on water. Now normally a human being can’t do this, but because he is God, his human body is able to do this. It’s not just the foot of God on the water, it’s a real human foot. When Jesus is on the mount of Transfiguration and his face and his clothes shine, this is not just the light of God, but this is Jesus’ actual human body that is shining.

Also, in the Lord’s Supper, there are many Christians who say that this is just bread and wine, because it is impossible that Jesus body can be in heaven and in the Lord’s Supper in all kinds of different church gatherings all throughout the world at the same time. But you see: because Jesus is both man and God, his human body is able to take on divine qualities, and do things that normally a human body can’t do. So, we simply believe Jesus’ words as they read plainly: This is my body, and this is my blood. It is the body and blood of Christ, who is both true man and true God.

Now, let’s come back to our reading. Why am I making a big point about this? Because when Jesus weeps, we have to realise that because Jesus is both true man and God, that this is not just a man who weeps, but it is God who weeps, because Jesus is God. Even though we would normally say that God doesn’t experience emotions and cry and weep like us, here in the person of Christ, our human weakness is taken on by God, and God experiences our human weaknesses and emotions, because Jesus is God.

And why does he weep? He weeps over the city. When he wept over Lazarus, the people said: See how he loved him! In the same way, we can look at Jesus weeping over the city, and say: See how he loves this city! And he does.

What I am teaching here is very offensive in some ways to our human flesh. We think, if God is God, how can he weep? How can God be so weak? If I feel weak, of what comfort is it to me if God is weak too? No: actually, God is strong, but he entered into our human weakness, in order to make us strong like him. He wants you to realise that your tears are precious, because he also shed tears. He entered into our weakness, suffered and died, so that he could for us that wonderful salvation, and bring us to the new Jerusalem, where there will no more tears.

So what does Jesus say about the city? He says: Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.

The people had just welcomed Jesus to Jerusalem with great praise and fanfare. We read: 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. But at the same time, we also read that some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples.” He answered, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out.”

They welcomed Jesus, but they didn’t recognise what kind of a king he was. Many people saw him as a political figure, who was to come into Jerusalem, kick the Romans out, and rule as an earthly king. But Jesus’ rules as a different kind of king. He is crowned instead with a crown of thorns, and enthroned on the cross. Those that mocked Jesus thought they were pretending, but in actual fact, they were giving Jesus his real coronation on this earth. Although Christ even now rules from heaven, seated at the right hand of God, on this earth, we see his kingdom as one of the cross.

And so, many people don’t recognise the kingdom of Christ. They don’t know the things that make for peace. They don’t recognise the time of their visitation. They see God who rides on a simple donkey and sheds tears, and they say: I want something much more glorious that that. But what they don’t realise is that in this person, Jesus Christ, and in his words, in the glory of God, the glory of the only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth, whose glory is above heaven and earth, and everything that we could possibly imagine or comprehend.

And so, in our reading, Jesus prophesies about the city of Jerusalem, that it will be destroyed. It says: For the says will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.

Right at the heart of this message of Jesus, is the fact that Jesus’ greatest failure in the eyes of the world—his suffering, his death—is actually his victory, his wonderful atonement for the sin of the world, and the time of God’s great visitation upon the world. This word “visit” is a very loaded word in the Scripture. Sometimes, we read that God visits his people in wrath and anger, but also in grace. On the cross, we see both. God visits the world in his wrath and anger, and he pours it out upon Jesus, who is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. All of God’s justice, and judgment, and anger against sin is poured out on Jesus, and laid upon his shoulders. But also, we see here God visiting the earth in showing his grace, because when we look to this Saviour of ours, and we recognise in him his atoning work for our sin, God bestows upon us the forgiveness of our sin, and shows his grace. This cross, this Jesus, this Saviour is his grace upon us.

So, Jesus makes it very clear, that when God visits us, when we hear the word of God, no matter how humble it seems, it is important that we recognise it. The preaching of the cross is the visitation of God. The absolution, the bestowal of the forgiveness of sins in the church by the pastor, is the visitation of God. The sacrament of Holy Baptism, which you have received, the new birth by water and the Word, by water and the Spirit, is the visitation of God. The sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, the gift of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins, this is the visitation of God. So recognise it for what it is. Let these things not be hidden from your eyes. Don’t look for something more glorious that what God in his glory gives to you.

In the year 70 AD, there was a great fulfilment of this prophecy, where the Romans came and invaded Jerusalem, and tore down the temple. Even, I heard somewhere from an archaeological study, that when the Romans burnt down the temple, the fire was so hot, that it melted the gold, which got into the cracks in the floor. Because the Romans wanted the gold, they pulled up the floor as well, just as Jesus says here: They will not leave one stone upon another in you.

For us too in the church today, there is a great urgency and a great need for us to hold on to the word of God, and not let any of it go. If we don’t recognise the time of the Lord’s visitation, then God can always take his gifts away from us and give them to some other people who want them. Even today in the church, governments around the world, including our own here in Australia, are pressuring the church to do what they want, rather than what God wants. As Jesus says: The days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side. We should not be afraid of the pressure, if they want to hem us in. Jesus knows how to lead us forward, and he knows how to look after us, and he knows the names of each and every single one of his sheep. So, it’s a good thing to despair of ourselves, to despair of our world, to despair of our country and our people, because these things are all tainted by sin, and it has been like that for a very long time. However, in God, in Jesus, in the Holy Spirit, there is no despair. There is only hope, because in Christ, and in his cross, and in his blood, and in his sacrifice, and in his person, is all the glory of God, all the fulness of the majesty of God, all the joy of heaven, all the promises of eternal life.

In the last part of our reading, we see Jesus enter the temple and cleanse it. We read: He entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold, saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of robbers.” I’ll just talk briefly about this. We see here that in the place of prayer, in the place of the devotion to God, in the place of worship, comes the world of business, and trade, and commerce, and money, and bargains, and everything like that. This worldly stuff is not what the temple is about. Jesus is very sharp about this, that he simply drives these people out without questioning them and talking to them.

But then afterwards we read something that we can so easily miss. On one hand, Jesus throws these people out of the temple. But then it says: And he was teaching daily in the temple. This is what belongs in the temple, and also in our churches: the teaching of Jesus. If you knew that you were going to die at the end of the week, what would you do? For Jesus, he teaches, and he teaches daily. This is the wonderful visitation of God: he cleanses us out of what is evil and does not belong, and then he teaches us.

And this teaching continues according to the blessing of God, and according to his arrangement. We read: The chief priests and the scribes and the principal men of the people were seeking to destroy him, but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were hanging on his words.

You can see here that despite the plans of the chief priests and the scribes, they couldn’t do anything. God was the one who was miraculously preserving this preaching and this worship, no matter who wanted to close it down. This should also be of great encouragement to us, and we should pray to God that he would continue to visit us, continue to cleanse us out and lead us forward, and continue to teach us the words of his Son Jesus Christ, that we would learn it and be constantly sharpened in it, and that he would preserve us and protect us from all harm, and not just us personally, but also protect and preserve the word of God and the sacraments in our midst, as his living and wonderful visitation upon this earth.

So let’s commend ourselves to our heavenly Father, to Jesus Christ, to the Holy Spirit. Let’s remember the loving and compassionate tears of our Saviour Jesus, and his plea to us as his children. Let’s also submit ourselves to his cleansing, just as cleansed the temple, and also to his wonderful teaching, and the great message of Gospel, which brings us salvation and life and every blessing from the throne of God in heaven. Amen.

 

And the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.