Easter VI B [John 15:9-17] (6-May-2018)

This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, 8.15am, and Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, 10.30am.

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

No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.

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

Today our Gospel reading comes from John chapter 15, and this particular chapter is part of a sermon that Jesus gives to his disciples on Maundy Thursday evening, on the night when Jesus was betrayed. Maundy Thursday is a very special day in the church calendar, and it is the day before Jesus died, which is Good Friday. So Jesus had had the Lord’s Supper with his disciples, he had washed his disciples feet, and then in chapters 14, 15 and 16 of John, we read where Jesus gives a powerful sermon, a farewell speech, before he goes out to the Garden of Gethsemane. Also he gives this sermon to his disciples after Judas had left the room to go to the high priests to organise Jesus’ arrest later that night. This message was not for Judas, but for the other eleven disciples.

So at the beginning of chapter 13 of John we read about where Jesus washes his disciples’ feet, and he prophesies and predicts that Judas is going to betray him, and Judas leaves. We also read where Jesus says: A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. This is a very well-known verse. Jesus also foretells that Peter will deny him three times. And then in chapters 14, 15 and 16 we read this sermon of Jesus, where he says: In my Father’s house are many rooms… I am the way, the truth and the life…Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you… There are so many memorable verses in this sermon. Also in chapter 17, Jesus prays a wonderful prayer, often called the “High Priestly Prayer.”

Our reading from today comes from chapter 15, in the middle of this Maundy Thursday sermon. Jesus says: I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. We see God the Father here cutting off and removing the dead wood on the vine, but also he prunes the good branches so that they bear more fruit. But also we see that Jesus is the vine. All the members of Christ’s church, his family, his bride, are so intimately connected to him that the same juices that flow through him flow through his disciples. And sometimes as Christians we suffer tremendously, and we ask God why this is happening. But God is not cutting us off, but pruning us.

Jesus says: Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. Here Jesus is speaking to his disciples about the way that he will be with them, and dwell with them and in them, and will be so intimately connected with them in everything that they do. It is not just Jesus’ teaching or his doctrine or his power that is with them, but himself! He says: Apart from me you can do nothing. Jesus will be with them all the way.

Then Jesus says: If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. Everything that turns away from this vine is thrown away. Everything comes from remaining in Christ and his word. Jesus says: If you abide in me, and my words abide in you. Jesus and his words go together. When we have Christ and his word, then our prayers are wonderfully answered. Ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. But none of this is for our glory, but for the Father’s glory. Jesus says: By this my Father is glorified.

Now we come to our reading for today, which says: As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. Jesus speaks here about Christian love. This wonderful love reaches from the Father to the Son, and from the Son to us. And Jesus says: Abide in my love. Jesus has been talking about how we are connected to him like branches on a vine. Love is a fruit of faith. St Paul even calls love a fruit of the Spirit, in fact, he lists it as the first of many fruits. So when we saved by faith, and this faith then looks to Christ and our neighbours, faith produces the fruit of love, friendship, and fellowship.

Now if love is produced from faith, it’s also very important that faith is right. When we speak about faith, we don’t put our trust in ourselves or in the things in our sinful human hearts; we put our trust in the pure, clear word of God. Faith clings to the word, just as Jesus says: If you abide in me and my words abide in you… So when we turn our backs on the truth of God’s word, love also dries up, and we end up with tremendous fighting in the church. St Paul wrote a wonderful chapter on love in 1 Corinthians 13, where it says: Love is patient and kind, and all that kind of thing. We often read this passage at weddings. But in the middle of that chapter it says: Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Also, there’s another wonderful passage about love in 1 John 4, where it says: God is love. Perfect love casts our fear. But at the beginning of the chapter it says: Test the spirits to see whether they are from God. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us; whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error. Do you see how John here talks about truth and then he goes on to talk about love? Also St Paul says in Ephesians, not simply to speak with love, but to speak the truth in love. I mention these things because today often when we talk about love, people often say that speaking the truth even when people don’t want to hear it is loveless. No—it’s not loveless at all! As Christians we should strive to believe the same thing, live the same way, and help each other in doing this—all on the basis of God’s word. We see all throughout the New Testament about how the apostles stood very firmly together, in unity and peace, being of one mind and one heart, speaking the truth with the very voice of the Holy Spirit. It is the same oneness and unity of mind and heart around the word of Christ that we should also strive together for, which draws us together in love.

And so we read in our reading how Jesus says: If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. By faith we are grafted on and united to Christ, like branches on a vine. And branches bear fruit. Each day we learn what it means to love. Jesus tells us to keep his commandments, and to do good works, not because the good works save us, but because this is simply what branches on a vine do. A wheel doesn’t spin so that it can become round. The fact that it is round is the reason why it spins. So we don’t love in order to be grafted into the vine, but because we are grafted in, we then start to bear the fruit of love.

Jesus then says: These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. Jesus is the bringer of joy. Now many people in the world seem happy enough, and don’t look to Jesus at all for joy. Sometimes these people are even happier than most Christians. But it is short-lived. Something happens in their life that they don’t expect, and everything is wrecked, and they don’t understand why. Jesus was sometimes very sorrowful and sad, especially when he went to the cross. But he had sadness first and joy later. So like Jesus, we have sadness and suffering first, and then eternal joy which Jesus promises us comes afterwards. Jesus shares with his people not just any joy, but his own joy: that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

So Jesus says: This is my commandment, that you love another as I have loved you. Jesus has loved us, by dying on the cross, and saving us completely freely, without any contribution from us. And we see here that Jesus commandment to love one another comes from the wonderful way in which he has loved us. He loves us even though we don’t deserve it and we have really treated him terribly, and so also even when we hurt each other and treat each other badly, Jesus calls us to love one another, to model and picture that love which he has shown us. Sometimes this love is very difficult for us, but it is this kind of love that Jesus shows to us all the time, and which is continually pumped into us because we are his branches connected to him, the vine.

Now, Jesus goes on to show exactly what this kind of love looks like. He says: Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. Jesus’ love is not just a sentimental, emotional, soppy love, like from a love story on some kind of soap opera. Jesus is not a man of feelings and sentiments and warm fuzzies, but he is a man of action. He speaks the truth, and then he acts upon it. And what is this wonderful act of love that he has done for us? He laid down his life for us. Jesus says: The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. Here he says: Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. Jesus sees what needs to be done for us, and he does it.

But Jesus doesn’t die for his friends, for people who already love him. St Paul says: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. When Jesus dies, then he makes us his friends, even though we were his enemies. So he says: You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. In ancient times, a friend of a king was like a member of his cabinet, or inner circle. A servant is just told to do something without thinking. But Jesus tells his apostles everything, and the apostles then preached and wrote it out for our benefit.

Jesus’ friends are the people to whom he has told everything. All that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. When the apostle Paul was preaching once, he said: I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God. Jesus didn’t shrink from telling everything to the apostles, and Paul and the other apostles didn’t shrink from passing everything on from Jesus. Even in the church, we continually pass everything on. Jesus says: teach them to observe everything I have commanded you. In the church, we pass on everything—the law and the gospel—the things we should do and not do, and the things we should believe. We are Jesus’ friends, and we learn his teaching and his doctrine, we grow in love, and we tell it to others. And this is how Christian friendship grows: we talk about everything there is to know in the Scriptures, just as Jesus told his disciples everything from God the Father’s own heart and mouth.

Jesus says: You are my friends if you do what I command you. We often hear this as meaning that we are only Jesus’ friends when we do good works. If our good works are not perfect as Jesus commands us, then we are not his friends. But Jesus has also commanded us to pray: Forgive us our sins. We also do his commandments not when we simply follow his laws, but also when in all of our failures we continually bring our sins to him and receive his forgiveness. Jesus also commands us to believe the good news, and we are his friends when in all our sinfulness, we believe these pure words of forgiveness which he speaks to us.

And so Jesus says: You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give to you. When we think about making friends, we often think about choosing friends. Some Christians often think that they became a Christian by choosing to follow Jesus. There’s even an old song: “I have decided to follow Jesus”! But it is not us who have chosen to follow Jesus, it is Jesus who chose us to follow him. Even with the apostles, we read about how Jesus went to them and said: Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men! He chose them, and so also through his word and holy baptism, Jesus also chose you to be his disciple and to follow him.

As Jesus’ friends, we learn and talk about all his words in the Scripture—he has hidden no secrets from us. Jesus chose and appointed these disciples, and he has chosen and appointed you, not to accomplish nothing, but to bear fruit, and fruit that will last, that will remain, that will abide. As soon as you and I are taken out of the picture, the living words of Jesus and the Holy Spirit will continue. The Holy Spirit will continue to work long after we have died. We human beings won’t last, but the fruit that has been produced from Jesus the vine will continue to abide until the very last days of this world.

Jesus says: So that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give to you. As we learn Christ’s word and grow in Christian love, we also grow in prayer. Prayer is also a fruit of faith—when we in faith see our own need and look to God, then our faith produces the fruit of prayer. Jesus says: Whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give to you. We might look at many prayers we have asked, and they seem to be unanswered, even some of those prayers that we have asked from such a state of desperation and helplessness and despair. God was our only help, and even then he didn’t seem to help.

But Jesus and the Father know what we need so much better than we do. Little children ask their parents for such ridiculous things like trains and aeroplanes and pet ponies. We are such little children when it comes to prayer. We stumble and stammer, and God knows what we need. And he will give us whatever we need to serve him in his kingdom. His ways are often above our ways, and we don’t understand why he gives someone something and doesn’t give someone something else. But we simply ask in Jesus’ name, and if it glorifies that holy name of Jesus, God will give it to us. He gives us so much that we so often don’t notice or even thank him for. The most wonderful thing he gives us is the precious gift of making us friends of his own son, and grafting us onto this vine, so that we may produce wonderful rich fruit.

And so let’s thank Jesus for this wonderful message that he gives us today. Let’s thank him for the wonderful words of forgiveness that he continually speaks to us, because of his death on the cross. We thank you for the way in which he comes and dwells with us and in us, and connects us so intimately to himself like branches on a vine. And we pray in his name that we may continually learn his word, learn his perfect sacrificial love, and ask him to use us in his kingdom in whatever way he sees fit. Jesus says: By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. Amen.

Dear Jesus, our true vine, use us, your branches, to bear fruit, and fruit that will abide. Let your Father be glorified in us, so that we may bear much fruit not to our glory, but to his glory. Into your hands, dear Jesus, we commend our bodies, our souls, our minds and our spirits. Amen.

Maundy Thursday [1 Corinthians 11:23-26] (29-Mar-2018)

This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, 7.30pm, and Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, on Wed 28 March, 7pm.

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

For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”

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

At the end of the book of Genesis, we read about where the old man, Jacob, goes down to Egypt. He has been reunited with his long-lost son, Joseph, who was sold by his brothers as a slave, and now became a prince in Egypt. But then comes to time for Jacob to die—and in Genesis 49, we read about how he gathers all his sons together, and blesses them one by one. And not long after this wonderful blessing, we read: When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew up his feet into the bed and breathed his last and was gathered to his people.

And as we come to celebrate Maundy Thursday tonight, we also see a similar thing – Jesus knows he’s about to die, and so just like Jacob gathering his twelve sons, he gathers his twelve disciples and he blesses them. But Jesus’ blessing is quite a different kind of blessing—Jacob gives all his sons individual blessings which are suitable to each one, but Jesus gives them the same blessing. Jesus blesses each of the disciples with the words: Take and eat, this is my body given for you. This is my blood shed for you for the forgiveness of sins. Do this in remembrance of me. And instead of resting his hands on each of the disciples, like we might imagine Jacob doing with each of his sons, Jesus by means of simple bread puts his body in their mouths, and by means of simple wine puts his blood upon their lips. What a wonderful blessing Jesus gives them! This reminds me of those wonderful words of John, who often called himself the disciple whom Jesus loved, who was actually there at the Last Supper: Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.

We come to church to hear the words of Jesus, and each word he speaks to us is such a wonderful, loving word. And what Jesus says is not just talk, but it does things: Jesus loves us in deed and in truth. And at the Last Supper, he says: This is my body, and he actually gives the disciples his body to eat. He says: This is my blood, and he actually gives the disciples his blood to drink. It’s just like when Jesus, together with his Father and the Holy Spirit, said at the beginning of creation: Let there be light, and there was light. And just as we still have light in the world today because of those words, so also in the church, we still have Christ’s body and blood to eat and drink, because his words and still powerful. And so Jesus fulfils those words: Let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.

Let us love. At the beginning of our Gospel reading tonight we read the words: Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of the world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. Do you see how Maundy Thursday is a night that is stamped with love? Not just some lovey-dovey soppy love, like in some Hollywood movie. This is pure love, divine love, love which we can’t begin to comprehend, and we will never completely understand in our lifetime. But Jesus shows us this love, and demonstrates it to us in his words and actions. This is what Maundy Thursday is about. And so Jesus washes his disciples’ feet to show them what sort of a love he has for them.

Peter doesn’t fully understand. He says: You will never wash my feet. Jesus says: What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand. We can never fully understand the depth and the power of the love which Jesus is showing to us at any given time. So often we look back on our lives and realise that Jesus was with us powerfully in times when we thought he might have given up on us. But what a wonderful love it is that Jesus shows us! We read in Romans: I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, not height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

And so Jesus washes his disciples’ feet. And he says: For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.

Jesus is not giving his disciples a sacrament of foot-washing. We will have a foot-washing ceremony later in our service, but this is a re-enactment, not a sacrament. But through this foot-washing, Jesus wants to teach the disciples: I’m going to send you out into the world to bring the gospel to all nations. And you need to know that you are not to go out and get people to serve and wait on you, and to rub oil on your bunions, and pour you refreshments. You are to go and wait on those I have called out of the world, you are to serve them, to wash their feet just like a household slave. This is the kind of love that Jesus teaches the disciples on Maundy Thursday night.

And so he says to them: A new commandment I give to you that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

Jesus says: I am going to be with you always until the end of the age. I’m going to walk with you, and work with you, and I’m going to breathe my Holy Spirit on you to comfort you. But that’s not to say that Jesus will work through us whatever we do. I read recently where someone said that Jesus does his mission in us and sends the Holy Spirit through us wherever we go and whatever we do. That’s not true – when we sin, when we hurt people, when we hate people, when we let our temper get the better of us, when we curse them instead of blessing them, no—Jesus is not working through us in whatever we do. It’s not in doing whatever we like that people will know that we are his disciples, but it’s by this[that] people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

And then we go to Jesus, and we say: Look, Jesus, I’m just not as loving as I know I should be. I’m always giving you a bad name. I get frustrated with people, and I don’t love them. I get to that crazy intersection of Gawler Street and Hutchinson Street, and some nincompoop turns right in front of me when he shouldn’t have, so I honk my horn and give him the finger. And to top it off I’ve got this fish sticker on the back of my car advertising that I’m a Christian. Well, so much for the line: By this all people will know that you are my disciples.

So, Jesus, what do I do? How do I learn this love? How do I get this love?

Jesus knows very well that you need this love, that you need to study it, that you need to receive it constantly from him.

In the Small Catechism, Martin Luther, in his Questions and Answers for those who intend to go to the Sacrament, writes this question:

Finally, why do you wish to go to the sacrament, [the Lord’s Supper]?

Answer: That I may learn to believe that Christ, out of great love, (did you hear that word?) died for my sin, and also learn from Him to love (there it is again!) God and my neighbour.

The Lord’s Supper is a Supper of Christian love. Even the apostle Jude, in his letter, the second last book in the bible, calls the Lord’s Supper, a love feast. A feast of love. (Actually, the love feast probably also included not just the Lord’s Supper but also a further meal together.)

But when St Paul writes to the Corinthians, the Lord’s Supper is not one of love at all. He says: When you come together it is not for the better but for the worse. For in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you. He even says: When you come together it is not the Lord’s Supper that you eat. For in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal. One goes hungry, another gets drunk. Shall I commend you in this? No, I will not!

Those are very strong words from the apostle Paul. And we can see that even the early churches didn’t get everything right, as if this was some kind of golden era, where all these happy smiling Christians were all sitting around in a circle, holding hands and singing, Kumbaya.

No – they also, just like us, had to learn how to love.

And so St Paul says: Let me teach you how to love. I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”

So Jesus loves his disciples by speaking his word. He says: This is my body, given for you. This is my blood of the new covenant, the new testament in my blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.Jesus through the power of his clear and pure word, makes the bread and wine something that it wasn’t before. Jesus had done this kind of miracle before, where he took a sick person, spoke his word, and made them well. So, it’s no ordinary bread and wine anymore: it’s the body and blood of Christ. It’s still bread and it’s still wine—but the bread is united to the body of Christ and the wine to this blood. This is what we call the consecration. So that if someone were to ask us: what is that food on the table there? We would say: It’s the body and blood of Christ. And Jesus doesn’t tell lies. Every word of God proves true. St Paul says: The blessing cup that we bless, is it not a participation of the blood of Christ?

But it’s not enough for Jesus simply to consecrate his body and blood. He loves his disciples by giving his body and blood to them. We read in Mark: After blessing it, he broke it and gave it to them. He broke the bread so that they could all have a piece. This is what we call the distribution. Even in the New Testament, the Lord’s Supper is called the breaking of the bread. This means, not that Jesus broke it as some great symbolic ritual, but he broke it so that they could have some.

But it’s not enough for Jesus simply to give it to them to do whatever they like with it. He doesn’t want them to put his body in their pockets and take it home. Jesus loves his disciples by telling them to eat it and drink it. This is what we call the reception of the Lord’s Supper. He wants to put his body in their mouths, and he wants to put his blood on their lips.

And all of this, Jesus says: Do this in remembrance of me. Remembrance doesn’t mean that it’s not his body, and that the Lord’s Supper is a memorial meal of bread and wine without his body. Otherwise, Jesus didn’t mean what he said, when he said: This is my body. No – the Lord’s Supper is the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ under the bread and wine, instituted by Christ himself for us Christians to eat and to drink. He says: I want you to eat my body and drink my blood in remembrance of me. That’s what I want you to do, when I say: do this.

What wonderful love Jesus shows to us! Not only does he die on the cross, and rise again from the dead, but he stays with his church and feeds his own church himself, with himself, with his body and blood, all throughout Christian history!

So this Supper that we are going to share together, is the supper where Jesus teaches us his great divine love. It is here, on our knees, around the altar of God, where Jesus shapes and forms us in his character, in his mind, in his heart and works in us that pure love, the love which he shows completely undeserved to us. It’s especially here in the Lord’s Supper where these words are taught and begin to come true and take shape: By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. All this he does by giving us such a precious gift: His body and his blood.

May God bless you with his Holy Spirit as we come to receive this gift tonight, and to be comforted and strengthened with his precious words!

Amen.

Lord Jesus Christ, we can’t begin to imagine how you bring about this great miracle in the Lord’s Supper. But we trust in your words in all their truth and purity: This is my body given for you. This is my blood shed for your for the forgiveness of sins. Amen, amen, it shall be so!

Lent IV B [John 3:14-21] (11-Mar-2018)

This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough (8.15am, lay-reading), and Grace Lutheran Church, Childers (9am).

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

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

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

Our Gospel today is very well-known, and contains the most famous bible verse, John 3:16. Our reading speaks about faith, but then also it speaks why faith is actually needed. It says: Whoever believes in him should have eternal life. And also: Whoever believes in him is not condemned. We have here a positive thing: the gift of eternal life. But also, we are saved from eternal death, from condemnation, from judgment.

Our text today begins where Jesus says: As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. In the book of Numbers, there are many different occasions where the people of Israel were grumbling against God and complained. On this occasion, God sent to them fiery serpents which bit them, and many people died. When the people repented, God told Moses: Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live. All they needed for being healed was not to crawl up to the serpent, but simply to look at the serpent. Now Jesus compares himself to this bronze serpent: As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up. The serpent was put up on a pole, and also Jesus was put up on a cross. The serpents were the people’s punishment, and a serpent just like the one that bit them was put on that pole. When Jesus was nailed to the cross, he took our punishment with him, so that when we think about Jesus on the cross, we should remember that it is both him and our punishment that was nailed there. In Colossians, it says that God set aside the whole record of our sin by nailing it to the cross.

Jesus says: Whoever believes in him may have eternal life. The Israelites only looked at the bronze serpent and they were healed. As long as they looked at their wounds, they would die. Now we have been bitten by Satan, who has led us into sin, and now our whole thinking has been corrupted and tainted by sin. When we are convicted by the Holy Spirit, we see that we have a mortal wound inside killing us from the inside out. But if we look to ourselves to be saved and our own wounds, we die. But when we look to Jesus, we live, trusting that he has borne our sins for us. The Israelites simply looked and were healed for this life. But when we hear God’s perfect word about his only Son Jesus, and trust that word, we are healed for the whole of eternity.

And so Jesus says: For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. It’s an amazing thing that God not only created the world, but he also loves the world. And his love is not just a feeling, but he actually did something and acted upon that love: he actually gave his only Son. The human race had fallen into sin and separated itself from God. But God was not content to leave it like that, because he loved the world. It is so much a part of God’s character and being that he should love us, because as John writes, God is love.

Now we might imagine many ways that we might show love to the world. But we are not God, but God is. God knows the best way to show it: He gave his only Son. All of that wonderful, pure love of God is tied up in this one person: his only Son. If you want to find God’s love, you must find his only Son. St Paul even describes Jesus’ life as that time when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Saviour appeared. Now why only one Son? Because God doesn’t want to split up his love. He pours it all out in full into this one Jesus, and then offers him up as the one perfect sacrifice.

Now at the beginning of the bible, God said to Adam: You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die. This doesn’t seem like a great moral issue, whether or not to eat a piece of fruit. But it’s important simply because God himself commanded it—that’s it! And in advance God said what would happen if they disobeyed it: you shall surely die. But they did disobey, so they did die. We have also broken God’s law, and so we are also worthy of death, and will die.

Paul says in Romans: The wages of sin is death. Death is the payment we get for our sin. Just as a worker gets his wages at the end of a day’s work, so also the wages at the end of a life full of sin is death. And we also read in Romans: We have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God. But then, it says: but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. We are justified by his grace as a gift. Whoever believes in him will not die but have eternal life. God’s gift is life that extends beyond this life and into his wonderful presence for ever.

And everything simply depends of faith. It says: Whoever believes in him. It doesn’t depend on your works at all, because none of your works are perfect. Even your good works are corrupt. It doesn’t depend on your choice. Choosing is still something that you do. Faith is simply receiving the gift that God gives you. Faith says: God’s word says that he so loved the world that he gave his only Son. This word is true, and God never lies. He said it, and that’s it. If he says he loves “the world”, then I know he loves me, because I am part of the world, and he gave his only Son for me, because he gave his only Son for sinners like me. That’s faith.

Now so far in our reading, Jesus teaches us about things in pairs: he teaches one thing over here, and one thing over there. He says: Whoever believes in him should not die, but have eternal life. He talks here about death, and then about eternal life. Now we come to the next part of our reading, where Jesus says: For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order than the world might be saved through him. Here he talks about judgment or condemnation, but on the other hand salvation. God did not send his Son into the word to condemn the world (on one hand), but (on the other hand) that the world might be saved through him.

And so we read here that there is death (and eternal death) and there is also eternal life. God condemns and he saves. Later Jesus speaks about whoever believes in him and whoever does not believe. He talks about light and darkness. When Jesus talks about death, he is speaking about hell. When he speaks about eternal life, he is speaking about heaven and the resurrection. There is no half-half. There is no half-death, half-life. There’s no half-light, half-darkness. There’s no half-heaven, half-hell. There’s no purgatory or half-way place. There is only death or life, condemnation or salvation, believing or not believing, light or darkness, heaven or hell. Shakespeare wrote: To be or not to be, that is the question. Jesus says: To believe or not to believe, that is the question.

One thing that many Christians today talk about is whether everyone will be saved. If God so loved the world, why isn’t the whole world automatically saved? Why did God need to send his Son into the world? Why can’t he just forgive us without Jesus needing to die? These are important questions.

One of the things that God speaks to us is his law, or his commandments. He says: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind… and You shall love your neighbour as yourself. This is God’s standard, and on the basis of this standard he promises to reward those who obey that standard.

But God also threatens to punish those who break his law. We read in 2 Thessalonians: God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you…when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.

However, in our culture, we have a lot of difficulty with this. Many people almost don’t really believe in justice. If a criminal commits a crime, he or she is often imprisoned not so as to punish them, but to rehabilitate them, and make them better people. Many people think that the purpose of prison is to fix people, not punish people. We even call it “correctional services”. However, “justice” means that a person is punished in proportion to their crime. A murderer gets a heavier punishment than someone who steals a loaf of bread. And God threatens punishment, because his law is holy and he cares about his law. James says: Whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.

So God is a strict judge, not because he is a mad tyrant, but because his law is a good and beautiful thing and it should be kept. The book of Exodus shows us what God’s justice is: a life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. But doesn’t Jesus say that we shouldn’t demand justice? Doesn’t he say turn the other cheek? Yes, and yes! But that’s because Jesus has now taken all of the justice against sin on himself, and when something isn’t done justly, we don’t need to sue people and demand justice. Jesus says: You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil.

So God is a strict, just judge, but he is also a loving Father. Our reading today teaches both: God so loved the world. And it also says: He gave his only Son. He gave his only Son, because of his love, and because he wants to show to us his justice which has been dealt with. On the cross, we see God enacting his justice: an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. We deserved curses, punishment, death. But God puts all of his righteous curse, his righteous punishment, and the righteous death penalty on his Son. And when Jesus took all of this, and was about to die, he said: It is finished.

And so we read: Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. For our sake [God] made [Jesus] to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. When we look at God’s law and we realise that we haven’t kept it, and that we deserve punishment and justice to be carried out on us, we can still go to our heavenly Father, knowing that he has loved us so much that he even sent to us his only Son. And the sentence that was carried out upon Jesus is completely sufficient to pay the price of all the sin in the world. All that is required of us is that we look up from our snake-bites to Jesus and all our wounds, our sin, our guilt is completely healed for all eternity.

So the reading says: For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but so that might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. We learn that God threatens to punish sin because he cares about his law. His good and perfect law matters. But also, God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, because he cares about sinners. Sinful human beings like you and I matter to God and he wants to save us. But why does it matter whether or not we have faith?

We might think: If God so loved the world, and those who don’t believe in Jesus will be condemned, why does he condemn those who don’t believe in Jesus? Paul wrote to Timothy: God desires all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. Why doesn’t he just save everyone automatically? Because he cares about his Son, and his Son matters. God’s law matters, we sinners matter, and also Jesus matters. And so we read: And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world. (This is talking about Jesus! He is the light who has come into the world). And people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.

We Christians know what a wonderful Saviour Jesus is! And if only everyone knew, and if only everyone believed. Our faith shouldn’t make us proud, but should fill us with compassion for those who don’t believe, and for a desire to pray for them and share the Gospel with them as we have the opportunity. But many people harden their hearts to God’s word, and to the Gospel. Jesus is the light of the world, but they prefer darkness instead. Because of our sinful nature, and our corrupt hearts, many people refuse to listen to Jesus and to bask in his light. They are afraid of being found out and exposed for who they really are.

But Jesus knows who we really are. He knows our sin, he knows our shame, and our corruption. And it is a shameful thing for someone to know our deepest, darkest secrets. Imagine if all your thoughts were projected for everyone to read on a screen! And yet, when we are with Jesus in his kingdom, he covers over everything. He has died for everything, he has rescued you from darkness and brought you into his light.

We read: But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God. We might think: “but my works aren’t true! Many of them are evil! I’ve done no better than the next person!” And you’re right! But there is something that God has worked in you that is better. Jesus says: This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom you have sent. God has revealed Jesus to you in his word. And when Jesus covers over all you sin and forgives it, as he has promised, then there is nothing to be afraid of when we come into the light. It will be revealed that God has sent you his Holy Spirit and worked his gift of faith in you.

And so we read: God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. God loves the world, and that he means he loves you. He shows you that your debt has been paid for and your account has been cancelled by giving his only Son. Jesus has died on the cross, and he has offered his life for you, and shed his blood for you. And this word is true, and God does not lie. Whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. We are spared from death, judgment, and darkness and are given the free gift of eternal life, not because of any good thing that we have done, but because of what Jesus has done. He is our Saviour, and so we put our trust in him. Amen.

Heavenly Father, thank you for your great love, for the wonderful gift of your Son, and for your promise of eternal life. Amen.