Sermon: 17 May 2020 (Sixth Sunday of Easter) - John 14:1-15, "Just a Little While”
“I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.
Yet a little while and the world will see me no more,
but you will see me.
Because I live, you also will live.”
John 14:18-19
Brothers & Sisters in Christ,
“Because I live…” Those are the Words at the center of who we are as God’s people. We are “Easter People”, people of the Resurrection. Who we are, what we hope for and how we will receive that all depend on Jesus’ resurrection. Jesus resurrection from the dead therefore, is the grounding and basis for who we are. Because Jesus lives, having risen from the dead, we can be certain He will raise us, too, to be with Him for eternity.
But in our text today, Jesus goes even further with what He shares with His disciples.
Loving Christ, We Live Knowing His Presence
Jesus promise is to be with us at all times, sending His Spirit to be with us through this life. Remember the “Great Commission” in Matthew 28:19-20, “…and behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” We are not being left alone and will not be left alone, that’s Jesus promise. We have what we need with the Spirit present.
A few years ago I was asked to conduct a funeral for a man who had been raised in a Lutheran orphanage. After the Great Depression his parents didn’t have the means to care for him so they sent to a Lutheran orphanage. While his parents visited from time to time he was mostly alone at the orphanage, separated from his parents and their loving care. Jesus says that won’t happen to us. He will come to us. He will care for us. He won’t leave us alone to fend for ourselves or to live in the care of another. We are His.
We become His children at our Baptism. Here He comes to us through the Water and the Word. As the water is poured and the Words are spoken, “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” He claims us as His very own, He makes His dwelling place in our hearts and gives us His forgiving Word of life. That’s power and hope for each of us. All this He does purely out of love. That was the motivation for His suffering and death to pay for our sins. And knowing all that and the life we now have we want to keep His commandments.
Loving Jesus, We Keep His Commandments
Out of love for Jesus for all of His loving gifts to us, we love Him back, desiring to keep His commandments. Those commandments are summarized in Luke 10:27, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength and all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.” And Jesus touched on our motivation to live them out when He says, “We love because He first loved us.” (1 John 4:19)
Here we have the response of faith. God claims us as His own children. He makes His dwelling in our hearts and promises to be with us forever. In response to that we love Him and desire to live for Him, keeping His commandments and living that out in our daily lives. In the Church we refer to much of this as the “Third Use of the Law,” where we see God’s Law as a guide for daily living. Forgiven of our sin and assured of life everlasting we want to live a God pleasing life and God’s Law tells us what pleases Him.
So, desiring to do that we look at the Law. We see what He desires of us and we try, to the best of our ability and with the help of the Holy Spirit to do that. That kind of living pleases God. It shows obedience to Him. It reflects His love. It shows His impact on us and our desire to respond in a way that pleases Him.
However, the fact remains that, this side of heaven, as sinful human beings, we cannot keep God’s Law perfectly. We cannot and will not be perfectly obedient, no matter how hard we try, no matter how much we want to. It remains a struggle for us throughout this earthly life. St. Paul sums that struggle up in these words, “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” (Rom. 7:15) As a sinner, with our very nature corrupted by Original Sin, we will continue to sin this side of heave. Sin will continue to deceive us and we will give in to it. While this side of heaven, believing in and being Baptized into Christ Jesus, our Lord, we live as both sinners and saints. Thus our rhythm of daily life is one of repentance and faith.
Loving Christ, We Live A Life of Repentance, Faith & Hope
Knowing we fail to keep God’s commandments perfectly and being fully aware that our salvation is not in our doing but totally in Jesus work we come back to Him with a repentant heart, desiring His forgiveness and the life that His forgiveness offers us.
That’s how Luther saw it as he put it as he discussed Confession and Absolution. There are really three parts to that. First, we, hearing God’s Law, are led to contrition and sorrow over our sins. We know how our sins have hurt God, ourselves and others. We know it’s not how God would have us to live and we are truly sorry for that. You know the words we often speak in our Confession, “I a poor miserable sinner confess unto You all my sins…” Simply put, we acknowledge before God the deplorable things we have done, either willingly or, as St. Paul indicates in Rom. 7, unwillingly.
Secondly, we know God’s Word of promise to forgive our sins. That’s the Gospel. Knowing what Jesus has earned for us and that He intends it for me, a sinner, I desired to receive it. God wants us to desire it, to receive it in our lives and have it. It is necessary for our salvation. Apart from God’s forgiveness we are dead in our sins. We can’t make up for them ourselves. We can’t earn acceptance by God. It was earned for us in Jesus’ suffering, death and resurrection. So we desire, undeserving to receive what Jesus has prepared for us and wants to give to us, His forgiveness. And, as our Catechism states, “Where there is forgiveness of sins there is also life.”
And finally, knowing our great need and His even greater gifts of forgiveness and life, we desire to respond. We do that first with thanksgiving and praise, the very sacrifices we offer in Worship. They are really all that we have to offer. God blesses us richly and we offer back our thanksgiving and praise. But we also have a desire to honor God for all He has done for us. For we know we are simply passing this short life and we look forward to life eternal with Him. We look forward to that time when sin no longer plagues us and we no longer commit sin. That day will be in eternity. In the meantime, we take in God’s Law and use it to guide our daily living. We try our best to please God in daily living, knowing it is imperfect, yet acceptable to God as the sacrifice of our heart.
Thus, in the short time we live in this world we live for Jesus. We live in His daily forgiveness, being renewed for life, being assured of life eternal. In “just a little while” He will return in power and glory to take us to be with Him, that where He is we may be also. That’s God’s promise to all who believe and trust in His promises.
“Just a little while.” What a wonderful promise and assurance as we pass through this life and its many challenges. Continue to live a life of repentance and faith. Remember your Baptism. Cling to the Cross. Know that Christ has given His life for you and wants you with Him in eternity. Living our life in Christ we can be assured that soon we will be with Him in that place He has prepared for us in eternity. In Jesus Name, Amen.
Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!