Pentecost XI (Proper 13 B) [John 6:24-35] (5-Aug-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.

I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.

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.

Over the next four weeks, our Gospel readings are taken from John chapter 6, where Jesus gives a sermon in Capernaum. This sermon of Jesus has a particular theme about “bread”—he calls himself the bread of life, and the living bread that came down from heaven. Last week, we read about how Jesus fed the 5000, and so this discussion that Jesus has with the people comes about in light of this event.

And so we read: So when the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum, seeking Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you come here?”

These people are quite confused, because after Jesus had fed the 5000, the disciples headed off across the lake without Jesus. But then, as we read last week, Jesus walked out on the lake on the water to come and join them. So when they realised that the disciples weren’t there, and Jesus also wasn’t there, they went across to the other side of the lake. When they found Jesus on the other side, they were confused. How did Jesus get here? So they ask Jesus: Rabbi, when did you come here?

Jesus however doesn’t pay much attention to their question, and he says to them: Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.”

Jesus first of all says here: Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you at your fill of the loaves.

This is a saying of Jesus which really penetrates very deeply into our sinful condition. We know that Jesus is the creator of the world together with the Father and the Holy Spirit. And Jesus teaches us to pray: Give us today our daily bread. Every single thing we need for our bodies and for our lives comes from God. All the food in the world, the drink in the world, the clothes, the shoes, the houses, the homes, all the land in the world, all the animals, all the money, all the stuff, all the things in the world – every single thing that we think of belongs to God. And so rarely do we ever think of asking him for these things, and we think that if we want them, it has to come only from our own achievement. But then, there are those of us who ask God constantly for these things, for each little thing that we need, even for a parking space when we go to the shops. And then when Jesus gives us these things, we so often don’t thank him. But then there is another temptation: we start to look to Jesus as the giver of stuff, but we’re not really interested in him. For example, when we go to Woolworths or Coles, or wherever, we’re not going there so that we can meet the manager, we’re going there to buy the stuff we need. And so Jesus says to us: Do you want me, because I am your God, your Saviour? Do you want to hear what I have to say to you? Do you want to learn about what it means to believe in me and follow me? Or, on the other hand, do you just want me to give you stuff?

And so, Jesus says: You are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. It was a wonderful miracle that Jesus fed these people, but then they come to Jesus, only because they think they might be able to get another free meal out of him. And so here’s a question for us: are we only happy to talk with Jesus and learn from him when he gives us what we want him to give us? It’s easy to come to church and to listen to Jesus when our piggy banks and our pantries and our stomachs are full, but what about when they’re not? What about when we have a drought, when we hit hard times, when we have to count our pennies, when we’re hungry? Do we still thank Jesus for the abundance that he has given us? Do we love Jesus because he is Jesus, or do we just love him because he gives us stuff? Do we just want the gifts, or do we want the Giver?

And so Jesus says: Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that remains to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.

Jesus says here: Do not work for food that spoils. Now, let’s be clear here. It is a good thing to work, and it is a gift of God to have a job or an occupation and to make a living and an income. It is our duty to work, just as Jesus says: You shall love the Lord your God with all your strength. We should work hard out of thankfulness to him for all that he has given us.

However, God is the one who gives success to our labour, who provides us our daily bread, who gives us what we need. There are so many things that could have gone wrong in our work that God does put right, so that we end up with food on our table. Psalm 127: Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labour in vain. We can build and work all we like, but God is against us, every piece of bread between our teeth is nothing but a curse.

We read in Matthew where Jesus says: He makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. So if things are going well for us, and we are enjoying a good life, we need to remember than anyone, whether they are Christian or not, could have a nice life. When Jesus fed the 5000, he spoke his blessing over that food—and yet even that food Jesus calls “food that spoils”. Having a good life could be a blessing, if we thank God for it. But if we think that having a good life is all there is, then all of our good life is a curse.

So Jesus says: Do not work for food that spoils. He doesn’t say: Do not work. Work is good. Just don’t work for food that spoils. Work because Jesus is your Saviour who has given you this gift of work, and he is your master. Don’t let money, food, even family be your master. You are allowed to have a home, and money and food, but you must be master over them. You cannot let them be master over you. They are not your master: Jesus is.

 And so, Jesus says: Do not work for food that spoils, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. Jesus is the wonderful food which endures to eternal life. He is the only one who can satisfy our hunger, and so we commend ourselves and all our weakness and all our work to him. He is the one who feeds us with heavenly food – with his Word, with his forgiveness, with his gospel, with eternal life, with Baptism, with the Lord’s Supper, with all kinds of Christian encouragement – and he will continue to feed us as he promises us: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding feast of the Lamb. The whole of eternity will be a wonderful heavenly banquet.

Jesus speaks about himself as the Son of Man, who will give this eternal food to us and he says: For on him God the Father has set his seal. If God the Father has set his seal on Jesus then we can be absolutely confident in every word that he says. He will never let us down, he is completely reliable: his words are more powerful than heaven and earth, his words are completely true, and they are perfect love, love that we could never have imagined we even possible. On Jesus, God the Father has set his seal.

But also it is a wonderful thing that Jesus is actually the exact imprint of his Father. Jesus says: Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. Hebrews says: He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature. We read at the beginning of the Gospel of John: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Jesus Christ is true God together with the Father, the exact imprint of his Father, and on Jesus God has set his seal.

And so, we read in our reading that the people ask Jesus a question. Then they said to him, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”

It’s strange. When the people heard Jesus say: Work for the food that endures to eternal life, they thought that they had to earn it. They thought that they would have to so some work, and that God would then pay them at the end of the day for doing it. And so they ask: What must we do, to be doing the works of God? In other words: what do we have to do to please God and to earn his blessings? But they completely misunderstood it all. And so Jesus says: This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.

To believe in God is the work that pleases him. But in actual fact, believing in God isn’t actually our work at all. The work that pleases him isn’t our work! Believing in Jesus, believing in him whom God has sent, is actually God’s work. If you believe in Jesus, that faith didn’t come from you in any way shape of form whatsoever. That faith was created in you and was given to you by God the Father himself. It didn’t come about because of your choice, or your free-will, or your achievement, or your work, or your pious behaviour, or whatever. It was a free gift – it was God’s work, just as St Paul says in Ephesians: By grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. And so if this grace and this faith was not your own doing, whose doing was it? If it was not a result of works, then where did it come from? It was God’s doing, it was his work, as Jesus says: This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.

Then the people say to Jesus: Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’ Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.”

Here the people ask Jesus to prove himself. They say: What sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’ The people are talking about that event in the time of Moses where the people of Israel were in the wilderness, after they had been led out of Egypt through the sea, and they found themselves in the wilderness. During that time, God had fed them with manna, a kind of heavenly bread.

And so Jesus says: “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” The people come to Jesus and say, “This is what Moses did for the people, so what are you going to do?” Are you going to feed us? But there’s a great difference between what happened at the time of Moses and the people who were with Jesus on that day. The people were fed with manna because they were wandering through the wilderness, and were completely lost. If God hadn’t fed them in this heavenly, supernatural way, they would have starved to death. However, when Jesus fed the 5000 people, there was no famine on, they were not in the middle of a wilderness. It was just that on that day, the people had found themselves a long way from home, and it was the end of the day. If Jesus had sent them away, some people might have fainted on their way home. So Jesus has compassion on them, and feeds them. They all did have homes to go to, though, and they would have been able to go back home and be fed eventually. And so these people weren’t quite in the desperate situation that the Israelites were when they were wandering through the desert. It’s a bit strange to ask of Jesus to provide for them something like manna in the wilderness, when they weren’t really in the same situation.

But actually, they were in a worse situation. In fact, we are all in a worse situation. Jesus acknowledges full well that they are in a wilderness, not physically, like the children of Israel in the days of Moses. When Jesus enters the world, we see that the whole world is convicted of sin, and that Jesus is the only Saviour of the world. The whole world is a wilderness, and Jesus is the only manna, the only bread from heaven.

St Paul writes in Romans 3: All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. He also quotes from the Psalms earlier where it says: None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one. We read also in Ephesians: You were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lives in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. Do we really believe this judgment that God has spoken over us? Do we really believe that we have all sinned and completely fallen short of God’s glory? Do we really believe that all our good works are completely worthless in earning anything from God? Do we really believe that because of sin, we are completely dead, and are children of wrath? Do we believe the conclusions of our own reason, our own sinful flesh, and think that deep down we’re OK, rather than the truth of God’s word, which says: Every intention of the thoughts of their heart was only evil continually?

Yes, we are living in a complete and total spiritual wilderness. We are completely useless to save ourselves, and even our so-called “good works” are tainted and corrupted by sin. And so Jesus says: Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Jesus says to them, My father was the one who fed the people in the wilderness. But you are in a greater wilderness, and you will be walking in this wilderness not just for 40 years until the people reached the river Jordan. You are walking in a wilderness that will last your entire lifetime, and the lifetimes of your children right up until the very last day of this sinful world. From now until that day, God the Father will feed the world with bread. But what bread? Jesus says: My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.

Jesus is the true bread from heaven. The manna in the wilderness was only a little shadow by comparison. Jesus himself has come down from heaven, and he gives life to the world. And so, the people say: Sir, give us this bread always.

Jesus says: I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. And so we receive Jesus as our Saviour, purely by faith alone, without anything that we have done or contributed. And when we believe in him, and the Holy Spirit works this living faith in us, we feed on Jesus, the bread of life. He is our life, our salvation—he gives us right now the complete and total forgiveness of everyone of our sins, he gives us the wonderful promise of eternal life, and all the way through this troubled life, through this sinful, deathly wilderness of a world, he will never let us down, and he will safely lead us through it. He is our Good Shepherd, and his sheep will never be in want.

Next week, we will continue to read through this chapter, but for now, we’ll leave it there. Today, of course, we will come to receive the Lord’s Supper, where Jesus will feed us with his own body and blood, this wonderful food which he supplies for us from heaven, given and shed for us for the forgiveness of sins. He enters into our church and speaks his words of forgiveness to us and shows himself to us as our wonderful Saviour. Let’s thank him for these wonderful gifts, but let’s also thank him simply for who he is. He is the food that never spoils, he is the bread that has come down from heaven and gives life to the world, he is the bread of life. Amen.

Dear Jesus, give us this bread always. Let us always feed on you each day of our earthly pilgrimage through this wilderness. Create in us a living faith, that we may believe in you, our Saviour, whom God the Father has sent. Amen.

Pentecost X (Proper 12 B) [John 6:1-21] (29-Jul-2018)

This sermon was preached at St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, 8.15am, Biggenden Lutheran Preaching Place, St John's Anglican Church, Biggenden, 2pm, and Woodgate Lutheran Preaching Place, Woodgate Community Hall, Woodgate, 5pm.

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

There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?

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.

Today in our sermon, we’re reading from John chapter 6, which we’re going to be reading from for the next few weeks. At the beginning of this chapter, we have our reading for today, where we read about Jesus feeding the 5000, and walking on the water, and then for the rest of the chapter, we read about where Jesus goes to Capernaum and teaches the people there that he is the bread of life.

So let’s read the beginning of our reading where it says: After this Jesus went away to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, which is the Sea of Tiberias. And a large crowd was following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing on the sick. Jesus went up on the mountain, and there he sat down with his disciples. Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.

Last week, we were reading the account from the Gospel of Mark, where we read that Jesus took his apostles on a little retreat, after they had been very busy going about in pairs, preaching all over the place, preaching repentance, casting out demons and anointing the sick. At the same time, we also read that John the Baptist had been beheaded, and so Jesus and his apostles received some very sad news, which had an emotional effect on Jesus. Also, in John’s Gospel, we read that this event happened not long after Jesus had been preaching to the Jews, who were trying to kill him. What he had said to them would have angered them more.

And so, as all these events come together, Jesus calls his apostles to come across the lake with him so that they can have a rest, and recuperate, and prepare themselves for the next part of their work and ministry.

However, once Jesus and his apostles had crossed the lake, they didn’t seem to have a moment’s rest, because the crowd had followed them there. Jesus spends many hours there, healing the sick and teaching them many things.

And so we read: Lifting up his eyes, then, and seeing that a large crowd was coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to get a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?”

We see here how Jesus says to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip is an apostle that isn’t often mentioned, but he is mentioned quite a lot in the Gospel of John. We read at the beginning of the Gospel of John, that Philip brought Nathanael to come and meet Jesus. We read also that some Greeks came up to Philip later and said to him: Sir, we want to see Jesus. And then, later on, on Maundy Thursday, on the night when Jesus was betrayed, Philip says to Jesus: Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us. We read: Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? This is a very significant conversation that Jesus has with Philip here, where Jesus gently reprimands Philip for not recognising that Jesus and his Father were one. In our reading today, Jesus manifests his divine power by feeding these 5000 people, and walking on the water. And the fact that Philip is mentioned here is important, because he should have learnt from this event that Jesus was true God, together with the Father.

So we read that Jesus says to Philip: Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat? It’s funny here—Jesus is almost playing a little game with Philip. Jesus lifted up his eyes and saw the crowd. And now, Jesus wants Philip to have a look around and examine the situation. Where are we to buy bread, so that these people eat? Have a look, Philip, and tell me just how much bread there is around here! Not much! Have a look, Philip, and tell me just how close the shops are! They’re a long way away! Have a look, Philip, and tell me just how many people there are! There are thousands of people here!

This passage is a wonderful encouragement for us, especially when we find ourselves in a time of life where everything is at a crossroads—and Jesus has this wonderful way of pushing you to notice just how desperate you are at a particular time in your life. And it’s strange that when Jesus is about to work an amazing and wonderful comfort, he first sends us off to count our own provisions, and shows us just how few resources we really have. We might look at our world or our country and wonder where it’s heading—and we look at our own resources, and we see just how little we have, and we realise just how powerless we seem to be. We might look at how things are going in our own town. We might look at how things are going in our own family, or our church, or whatever. We might look at our bank account, and we wonder if we’re going to be able to survive financially if this or that happens. And it seems very much, sometimes as if Jesus says to us, “What are you going to do?” “How are you going to feed your family?” “How are you going to pay your mortgage?” “How are you going to make ends meet?” “How are you going to keep up with the cost of living?” Many young people are particularly worried about these kinds of questions today, as they begin to realise that after going to school, and getting good grades, and going to TAFE or trade school or university, or whatever they do, they are guaranteed absolutely nothing. But it’s not just money matters where people are like this—wealthy people also find themselves in desperate situations, situations which money just can’t solve. Sometimes we find ourselves in a very desperate time of our lives, where we just don’t know how things are going to work out. But Jesus has brought this information to our attention, just as he said to Philip and said: Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat? And nevertheless, as Philip starts to panic and to worry and to become anxious, trying to answer in his head the questions, “What on earth are we going to do? How are we going to fix this insurmountable problem?”—it’s almost as if there is a little smile on Jesus’ face, as John tells us, [Jesus] said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. The same goes for us, whenever we find ourselves in a particularly desperate situation in our life—Jesus knows what he will do.

Something that we often forget when we read the feeding of the 5000, is that in the Old Testament, a very similar miracle was performed by the prophet Elisha, but it was on a much smaller scale. Elisha fed 100 men with 20 barley loaves. Now Philip looks out and starts to count the number of people, and he says: Two hundred denarii worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to get a little. A denarius was the amount that a labourer would get paid in a day. So if you can imagine that Philip is talking something in the realm of two-thirds of a labourer’s yearly income. In Australian money today, that’s somewhere around $30,000. Philip is basically saying that $30,000 worth of bread would not be enough for each of them to eat a little. Now, we are told that there are 5000 men there, and that’s not counting the women and the children. So let’s say that every man who was there has a wife and at an average of 2 children: that makes at least 20,000 people, if not more, which means that each person would have less than $1.50 worth of food. We all know that $1.50 in Australia today doesn’t buy much food! A person would hardly get half a sandwich for that price.

But then along comes Andrew, and he presents the reality of the situation. Philip has tried to work out the sums, but then of course, nobody has a spare 200 denarii lying around! Philip’s arithmetic doesn’t solve the problem at all. Andrew says: There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish, but what are they for so many?

There are two things that strike me about these five barley loaves and the two fish. The first is this question that Andrew says: But what are they for so many? Andrew recognises just how insignificant these things are. They are just a drop in the ocean, and from a human point of view, it just looks useless. But the second thing is that these loaves and fishes belonged to a little boy. It was not mayor, or some important person, a prominent figure, who had this food. It was just a little boy. Maybe his mum had sent him off at the beginning of the day with a packed lunch, or maybe the little boy had caught the fish himself.

But in all of this, Jesus doesn’t just show to Philip and Andrew and the disciples how little they all have, but he also shows them the great weakness of their faith. Sure, there’s thousands of people here—sure, it would take over 200 denarii to feed them all—sure, we only have 5 loaves and 2 fish, which is a meagre amount of food to feed so many people… but, there’s something they haven’t mentioned: Jesus is there. And he makes all the difference.

We read: Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” Now there was much greass in the place. So the men sat down, about five thousand in number. Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated. So also the fish, as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, “Gather up the leftover fragments, that nothing may be lost.” So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves left by those who had eaten.

In the Gospel here, it mentions that there were 5000 men. Now, sometimes of course, when we use the word “man” it can mean either a member of the human race (like when we say, “mankind”) or a member of the male sex. Here, the evangelist is speaking of 5000 men, as in members of the male sex. In Matthew’s Gospel, he says: And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

Now, I’ve often thought it to be a little bit odd that the evangelists should record it like this. Why does the evangelist count 5000 men? Why not say, 20,000 or 30,000 people, and count all the men, women and children together? Well, there are a couple of clues to this in our reading. One is that is says that there was much green grass in the place. There was green grass because it was springtime. How do we know that? Because a few verses beforehand, it said that it was the time of the Passover, which was held in springtime, around March or April in the Northern Hemisphere.

Now, there’s a connection between this event and the Passover, because in the book of Exodus, when the people of Israel were about the leave Egypt, God says that every man must go out and get a lamb for his household. Each man has to do this, for each household, for each family. And so, in the same way, when the evangelists count the men, it is simply an old-fashioned way of counting the households, or the families. So just as at the time of the Exodus, each Jewish family in Egypt had a lamb roast dinner with bread and herbs, and painted the lamb’s blood on their doorpost, here in the reading, Jesus himself is feeding 5000 families who have come to meet him at Passover time. He is their Passover lamb, and one day he will be killed on Good Friday, at Passover time. So what we learn from all this, is that Jesus doesn’t just provide here for 5000 people, but for 5000 families. Jesus shares not just our individual concerns for ourselves, but he also shares our concerns for our families who we might worry about. In 1 Peter 5, we read that we should cast all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. Here in our reading, we read that we should cast on him not just our anxieties about ourselves, but the anxieties that we have about our families, because he cares for us, not just individually, but also for our families and loved ones.

You might also remember that the first temptation that Satan attacked Jesus was to turn stones into bread. Here, Jesus does something similar—he doesn’t turn stones into bread, but he multiplies the bread and the fish so that there everyone who is there is fed sufficiently. He performs this amazing miracle, not because he wants to feed himself or because the devil asked him to show off, but because he wants to have compassion on this crowd. He shows to us his great love and care not just for us as individual people, but also for us as part of families and crowds, when we share our sufferings and our problems with other people. Jesus is able to help us altogether, just as he is able to help us individually.

Then we read: When the people saw the sign that he had done, they said, “This is indeed the Prophet who is to come into the world!” Perceiving then that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by himself.

Here we see the great power of Jesus, but also the great weakness of sinful people again. Isn’t it strange? Jesus had performed many, many miracles. Sometimes they had accused Jesus of breaking the Sabbath, and all sorts. But now, when he performs a miracle which effects a large crowd of people, and a miracle where he feeds them and makes them nice and full and fat with food, then all of a sudden they are greatly impressed, and say: This is indeed the Prophet! And they want to come and take him by force.

You might remember in the Old Testament when Pharaoh appoints Joseph to be second-in-charge over Egypt, because Joseph interprets the Pharaoh’s dreams and comes up with a plan to save up grain so that there will be plenty in the coming time of famine. But what would have happened if Joseph had performed a miracle like the one Jesus performs here? Jesus did not propose to the people a plan to save up for the famine, but he showed to them his great power to overcome famine, and so they thought that if Jesus were their king, they would always have plenty. But then this is not why Jesus came. He did not come to this earth simply to make our bellies fat, and to give us an easy life here on this earth with no troubles. And so he escapes, and goes to a mountain by himself.

And so we must also remember this: when we find ourselves in a difficult time in life, and what we have looks so insignificant, we should commend the little we do have to Jesus, and trust in him to provide for us and for those in our care. But also, we should remember that Jesus will provide for us only as it serves to benefit his kingdom and our souls. He wants to encourage us, but he is not an earthly king. He is not simply the person we turn to for our earthly needs, when all the other earthly means let us down. He is our God: he is a Passover lamb, and then he shows us in our reading too, that he is the Lord of heaven earth, who is even able to walk across to sea to meet us in our needs. But as soon as we want to snatch him, and just have him as our earthly king, who just gives us stuff and food and things that we want so that we can be comfortable in this life, he will run away and hide, and let us fend for ourselves for a while. We are not the gods that he worships, but it is the other way around. He is the Lord of heaven and earth, and he even plants his footsteps on the sea. He is our Good Shepherd, who leads his sheep, and provides for their every need, who has died on the cross, and laid down his life. And he has risen from the dead, and gives the forgiveness of sins, and promises the wonderful gift of eternal life. And so we commend ourselves to him, and all the little that we have, and all the great needs that seem to be in front of us that we just don’t know how to solve by ourselves.

But this is Jesus—and he knows exactly what he will do. Amen.

Dear Jesus, we thank you for providing us with all the daily bread that we need, and you have never let us be in want. We commend our worries and our anxieties to you, knowing that you care for us, and our loved ones, and we ask that you would encourage us and lead us along the path to our heavenly home with you. Amen.

Lent I B [Mark 1:12-13] (18-Feb-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.

The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and angels were ministering to him.

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 we are celebrating the First Sunday of Lent. And for many centuries, it has always been a custom of the church to read about Jesus’ fasting and temptation in the wilderness. Our Gospel reading today is from the Gospel of Mark. Mark actually doesn’t tell us very much about Jesus’ temptation. He simply says: The Spirit immediately drove [Jesus] out into the wilderness. And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and angels were ministering to him. That’s it. In the Gospel of Matthew and Luke we find much more detail of the exact conversations that Satan and Jesus, and what the specific temptations were. So in our sermon today we’re also going to look into those passages in Matthew and Luke.

Jesus temptation happened immediately after his baptism, when the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove. Even though Jesus was true God and always lived in unity with the Holy Spirit, the same Holy Spirit now comes upon Jesus for a special purpose: to show that Jesus is the true Son of God, and to anoint Jesus for his work of preaching, healing, comforting, suffering and dying. We read that this same Holy Spirit then immediately drives Jesus out into the wilderness. John says in his first letter that the reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. As soon as Jesus is baptised, he is driven by the Holy Spirit to confront the devil, and destroy him, and to show us for all time how he is defeated.

In Hebrews 4 we read that Jesus has been tempted as we are in every respect, yet without sin. Today we see Jesus being tempted, and tempted just as we are. However, Jesus does not fall into sin, but fights off the temptation, and overcomes it. Jesus has a real fight with Satan—the temptations were real and sharp and cruel. And yet there is no doubt who is going to win. Sometimes, people think that if Jesus were a real human, it must have been possible for him to fall. But that’s not true, because Jesus is not just a human being like us, but also true God. And yet, the temptation was real. The devil can only fight battles that he is going to lose, and yet he fights them anyway.

Now during these 40 days, Jesus fasted and ate nothing. During the season of Lent, Christians have often fasted too: maybe they eat less, or give up some favourite food, or some habit. But the fasting of Jesus is a miracle. When the bible speaks about fasting for us, we don’t need to copy Jesus here! Jesus performs a special miracle in his fasting, and shows us his power as true God. Moses and Elijah also fasted for 40 days, being strengthened by God’s special supernatural power. However, after Jesus shows his divine power and fasted for 40 days, then we read he was hungry. He is true God, but also wants to sympathise with us. He has a special task, and he shows us that he feels the same kinds of normal pains as us.

The amazing thing about this is that Jesus didn’t have to suffer, or feel weakness, or hunger, or experience temptation, if he didn’t want to. When he was arrested Jesus said to Peter: Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels? Jesus also said: No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. And so, even though Jesus is true God, he experiences hunger, feels pain and endures temptation because he wants to encourage us and sympathise with us. He wants us to trust him, not just as our God above us, but as our brother alongside us.

And so, this reading teaches us something very confronting: you are not immune to Satan’s attacks. The devil didn’t hold back from seducing Adam and Eve, even though they were sinless, and we are not. After the last Supper, Jesus said to Peter that Satan wanted to have him to sift him like wheat. The apostles weren’t immune to Satan, and he destroyed Judas. Even at Jesus himself—who is both man and God—the devil didn’t hold back from firing his darts. And so, this reading today is very important, because if want to get the devil off our back and win, we can’t do it by ourselves. We need to have Jesus our army General on our side, and we need his weapons. Then we can win, because we are saved by the winner.

So let’s now read about the first temptation of Jesus, and how Jesus fights this temptation off.

I.                   The first temptation.

So we read: [Jesus] was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” Satan wants Jesus to prove himself. But Jesus doesn’t need to prove himself to him! And you too never have to prove to Satan that you are true Christian. The devil wants to sow doubt: If you are the Son of God. If you are really God’s Son, then do what I tell you. Jesus is hungry, and Satan tempts him to eat. But instead of Jesus just going home and eating some bread, Satan wants him to use magic powers, to change many stones into a banquet of bread, so that Jesus will not just eat, but pig out and make a proper fool of himself.

Now here’s what’s amazing: Jesus doesn’t silence the devil with supernatural power. He fights him off with something that all of us have access to: the clear word of God, a simple little bible verse. He says: It is written, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. This is a quote from Deuteronomy 8:3. And one little bible verse like this skewers the devil in his tracks. You see, God’s word has power. It has divine authority, and the bible requires the same obedience as we would give to God himself, because this is God’s word. Jesus says: If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples. And so Jesus shows us that all the power against Satan is contained in God’s Word.

Jesus says: It is written. Jesus shows us here just how highly He views the Scripture, the bible, God’s Word. Even though Deuteronomy was written by Moses long before this event, it was not simply Moses that Jesus was quoting, but the Holy Spirit himself, because the Holy Spirit inspired Moses. 2 Timothy 3:16 says: All Scripture is inspired by God. It could also be translated: breathed out by God, or breathed out by God’s Holy Spirit. Jesus also said once that the Scripture cannot be broken. When Jesus was praying to his Father, he prayed for his disciples and said: Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. And so, because the Scripture has all this power behind it, Jesus doesn’t need to use supernatural power against Satan—all he needs is the Word.

Now it has always been a practice in the church until recently for Christians to learn bible quotes from memory. In Deuteronomy 6, it says: These words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You can see from our reading today how useful it is for us to learn bible verses and to commit them to memory, not just to be intellectual, but to be equipped and armed and to have weapons against the devil in our hearts and minds. Jesus doesn’t have a theological argument with Satan; he just quotes the Scripture. He says: It is written.

Jesus quotes the words: Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. This passage from Deuteronomy talks about when God sent manna—heavenly bread—to the Israelites in the desert. God wanted to teach them that their daily bread comes from him. But God also provides us with bakers, and with flour, and wheat, and so on. But when those means are taken away, and there is no one to make bread, then we can start to think: God has abandoned me! Now I need to use the devil’s tricks—and lie and cheat—to get bread and money and stuff. No—God provides for us, his word says it, and we can ask him for what we need. He is faithful and will provide everything.

Now, let’s come to the second temptation, and how Jesus fights off this one.

II.                 The second temptation.

We read: Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple. Sometimes we look back on something that happened to us and we think that the devil must have orchestrated the whole thing. Notice here in our reading that the devil takes Jesus up on the top of the temple. The devil seems to have even physical power over people’s bodies. But we learn also from the book of Job that Satan only causes mischief as God allows it, and if God allows it, then it is not for evil, but for good. At the end of the book of Genesis, Joseph says to his brothers: You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good. In the same way, Satan takes Jesus up on top of the temple for evil, but God allows it for good, to win a victory over Satan.

Now also it says that the devil set him on the pinnacle of the temple. The temple was the holy place which God had told his people to build so that they could have access into his sacred presence. But Satan doesn’t take him inside where the holy ceremonies and sacrifices are going on, but puts him on top. The temple may as well be a big-top or a circus tent, and devil turns this holy building and this holy place into a play-thing, into a jungle-gym, into a trapeze-show. This is a temptation that the devil often sends: to get people to despise and profane holy things from God, and treat them like they are nothing.

Now what does Satan say to Jesus? He says: If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, “’He will command his angels concerning you,’ and “’On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’” Satan wants Jesus to give up his mission to save the world from sin by dying on the cross and to go “splat” on the pavement below. Then everyone would say, not “Behold, the Lamb of God”, but, “Tsk, tsk. What a tragic, silly early death of a promising young life!” Or Satan wants Jesus to prove just how powerful his prayers have been, so that when he jumps, the angels will catch him and provide a safety net. If Jesus is the Son of God, then surely the angels must come.

Now to add to the temptation, Satan quotes the bible. Just like Jesus before, Satan says: It is written. And he quotes from Psalm 91: He will command his angels concerning you. Actually, this is a misquote. Satan leaves out some words. The psalm says: He will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. Now, Jesus has been anointed by the Holy Spirit to be our Saviour. That is the way he is to follow. And as long as he continues in that path, God will send his mighty armies of angels for his protection. And the same for us: God doesn’t promise angelic protection whatever we do, but he does promise to send the angels to guard us in all our ways, as we walk with God.

Sometimes people think the bible isn’t reliable, because even “Satan can quote the bible”. The devil only twists the bible, and turns thing around to make it says what it doesn’t say. Jesus doesn’t argue with the devil, but just quotes the Scripture: Again it is written, “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.” God gave Jesus a calling: to be the Saviour of the world. And God has called you to follow Jesus wherever you are in life: to be a faithful spouse, or a parent or grandparent, or a child, or a citizen, or whatever. God sends angels to protect you daily as you trust and follow him wherever he has called you. He won’t prove that he looks after you by you jumping off buildings; He has promised it.

Now, let’s come to

III.              The third temptation.

We read: Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you fall down and worship me.” Now the devil pulls out a particularly nasty trick. He pretends to be God, he pretends to be an angel of light. St Paul says that Satan even manifests himself as an angel of light. He shows Jesus a beautiful view, the wonder of God’s creation, great forests and lakes, great cities and beautiful things. And Satan makes himself into an inspirational speaker. He says: All these I will give you. Do you like it? You can have it! You can have it all: riches, fame, glory. Ask what you want and it’s yours.

But there’s always a catch with old Nick… He says: All these I will give you, if… He’s like one of those slick salesmen who says: “Absolutely free!” But then in the footnote there’s this fee, and that fee, and every other fee. When the devil gives something to someone it always comes at the expense of their soul. He says: All these I will give you, if you fall down and worship me. Every false God demands a sacrifice. Jesus says: What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? And even in the church, the devil always tries to make falling away from the faith into the most holy Christian work. He makes apostacy and denying Christ into a beautiful work of Christian piety and worship.

And so Jesus once again quotes the Scripture. He says: Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’” Here the devil comes straight out, and tempts Jesus to worship him. But Jesus also shows us here that worship belongs to God and to him alone. Many people won’t go all out and worship Satan, and become Satanists. But then they’ll pray to angels or people who have died or even saints or their ancestors. And because they’re not worshipping the devil, they think it’s OK. But behind anything that is not the worship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the devil is hiding. And so Jesus calls us all back to the First Commandment: You shall have no other gods. 

Now Jesus also says: Begone, Satan! Somewhere else Jesus also says: Get behind me, Satan! You don’t argue with the devil. Sometimes we can sit around for hours, days, weeks, months, being harassed by Satan. We didn’t need to argue with him, we didn’t need to reason with him, we didn’t need to think everything through. All we needed was to tell him to rack off! (Or whatever colourful language you prefer!) Jesus says: Be gone, Satan! Clear out, get out of my face, hit the road! This is a very important thing in what we call “spiritual warfare”. James says: Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Here Jesus takes the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, like a fly-swat, and smacks him. The job is done. That’s all it takes.

At the end of our reading, it says that Jesus was…being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and the angels were ministering to him. In Luke it says: When the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time. This opportune time was when Satan put it into the minds of different people to work to have Jesus crucified. But Jesus’ death was not Satan’s victory, but Jesus’ victory over Satan. And so Jesus was out in the wilderness there with wild animals. Since the devil had been silenced, the wild animals couldn’t be used by the devil to attack Jesus. So they were silenced too. Even a den of lions couldn’t harm the prophet Daniel, and Jesus could quietly sit with any wild animal that came along.

Also, it says: And the angels were ministering to him. There are only two places where the angels come and help or assist Jesus: here, and when Jesus sweat blood during his bitter prayers in the Garden of Gethsemane. It seems as though the devil’s attacks “took it out of” Jesus, and took its toll. Sometimes the devil attacks us as Christians, and through Jesus and his word, we are able to win the victory. But it can leave us exhausted. And so we see in our reading that even Jesus was assisted by the angels. Likewise, when we are feeling weak and exhausted and beaten about by the evil one, we can rest in the wonderful truth that Jesus has won the victory, and he surrounds us with the mighty protection of the heavenly hosts.

So let’s thank Jesus for that victory, and sing to him: Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts! Heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest! Amen.

Dear Jesus, the old prince may still scowl fierce as he will. He can harm us none; he’s judged forever undone. One little word can fell him. Amen.