Sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Advent: December 19, 2021 jj
Rev’d Mark B. Stirdivant, Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Yucaipa, California
✝ sdg ✝

It is now the week of Christmas and the Church would have us consider the question: “Who are you?” John the Baptist would teach us how to answer. It is not: “I am John, son of Zechariah and Elizabeth, prophet in the power of Elijah and forerunner of the Lord.” That answer is not sufficient. The names by which we are called, the jobs in which we toil, the people whom we love and who love us, even the offices to which God has called us are secondary. None of these define us so much as the Baby who was born from Mary’s virgin womb.

Who are you? Frantic last-minute gift-shopper, baker, decorator, and party-goer? Grandmother, freeway driver, and dishwasher? Sinner? On the last day none of that will matter. Here is what matters, and John gave the proper answer: I am not the Christ. You are not the Christ. But – but, but!!! There is a Christ! There is a Messiah, One prophesied by the prophets, anointed by the Father in the Jordan’s dirty, sin-soaked water, the Promised Coming One. There is a Christ! He felt the sting of Pilate’s lash. He bore a crown of thorns. He had the flesh of His hands and feet violently pierced by nails. They held Him to the accursed tree made into the Tree of Life, the blessed cross from whence comes all our joy, o fruited wood that delivers the healing medicine of Life.

There is a Christ! He is the One in David’s line who made adulterous Bathsheba into a virgin bride and the prostitute Rahab into a pillar of the community. He made deceiving Jacob’s sons into twelve noble tribes, a people who were no people, and brought them through the sea on dry ground. He is the Christ, our Messiah. He is Jesus of Nazareth, the Lamb of God that takest away the sins of the world. Because He is, and always has been, you have come to be, and you will continue to be—in and through and thanks to–Him.

Who are you? You are not Him. You are not the Christ. But –you are Christians. You wear His Name. You’ve been washed in His Blood. You eat His flesh, hear His Word, pray His prayers, die His death, and live His life. He was born, so are you from above. He died, so have you, a watery, drowning death. He was raised, so are you, in faith and grace and He calls you by His own Name. You are His. Who are you? You are Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. That is the Name that was placed upon you. You are not the Christ. You are not God. But God’s Name was given to you. That holy Name opens wide heaven’s gates to you. It drives away the demons that want to attack you. It banishes your guilt, fear, and shame to Hell’s deepest pit, and those enemies no longer have control over you.

Hell now hath no fury—at all— because of this holy Name, because God now has hands and feet that can be pierced, and they were, because God has a brow on which He will wear the thorny crown, because God has eyes to weep. Hell hath no fury. The holy Life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ has taken care of that. So it is true that Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. But neither then does it have a fury like a king tricked by wisemen with gifts from the East. It has no fury either like Caiaphas pretending to be outraged at an imagined blasphemy. Hell hath no fury, none at all, not the slightest bit, not even fury like that which you feel when you get attacked on Facebook for having a unique opinion, or even when the gas price goes up yet another nickel or dime overnight! For Hell has no fury, none at all. It has not even a minor annoyance or disappointment. Hell’s fires, Hell’s demands, Hell’s accusations have all been met. The Savior of the Nations has crushed the devil’s head with His bruised heel. And this Hollywood gets right. The cross actually drives off the vampires. The cross of Jesus Christ, that innocent suffering for the sins of the world has satisfied all that Justice demanded. Neither the devil, nor vampires, nor werewolves, nor ghosts or monsters of any form or depraved imagination, nor demons, nor governments, nor synods have a claim on us. There is no one to accuse you. Jesus has saved you. In Him, you are safe. His cross has driven off death. You are not the Christ. But, thanks be to God, there is a Christ.

It is true, of course, that Our Lord Jesus Christ grew up. He is no longer a baby. Nor does He now sleep in a manger. He is risen from the dead and lives. He ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of His Father. He rules the Universe as a Man, advocating and mediating for us. And yet, come Christmas time, we still place little statues of a baby in the nativity scenes. Empty mangers just wouldn’t do. But putting a baby in a manger doesn’t mean we think that Jesus is still a baby. Still, we want to remember that He was a baby, that He came down to earth and entered our world, that He took up our flesh and suffered all we suffer and worse, that He was weak and lowly for us, in order to redeem us. It’s not required, but still a good thing to remember to bow when we say in the Creed: “and was Incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary and was made man.” It is the same reason we put babies into mangers. This is the highest mystery and the most concrete manifestation of God’s love. Because God loved the world He sent His Son. That is what the word “for” means at the beginning of John 3:16, because. Because He loved the world He sent His Son, and this is how He loved the world: He sent His Son. He took up our flesh. He became one of us to be our substitute, to pay our penalty, to rescue us by a payment made, a Divine exchange.

So if we don’t have mangers without a Baby Jesus, we should also have crosses with Jesus pictured as crucified on them. We want the baby there to remind us of God’s humanity in the Christ and the greatest gift we’ve ever been given. To take the baby out of the manger merely because Jesus isn’t a baby anymore would be as ridiculous as insisting that we only have empty crosses. The cross is a symbol of the Sacrifice Jesus made. We preach Christ crucified. Even an empty cross still represents the crucifixion or it has no place in Christian worship or homes. Of course we prefer to see a body on the cross, even as we prefer a baby in the manger. It is not necessary for worship, but the baby in the manger and the body on the cross reminds us of God’s humanity, that God Himself has suffered for us in our skin, as one of us, in weakness and humility, to make us His and set us free, and that we can approach Him through that very same human flesh and blood of His.

So who are you? You are not the Christ. Neither is John. But there is a Christ. He is your Christ. For you are Baptized. You have been called by the name of the Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. You wear His cross around your neck. You are One with Him. You are the Temple of His Holy Spirit. Heaven’s gates are open wide to you. There is a Christ! It is Jesus, the Son of Mary, as we will remember again this week He was born in Bethlehem, and you are His forever.

In the Name of the Father and of the ✝ Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Readings:
Deut. 18:15–19 a Prophet like me from your midst … Him you shall hear
Psalm 111 The works of the LORD are great, studied by all who have pleasure in them
Phil. 4:4–7 Let your gentleness be known to all men
John 1:19–28 this is the testimony of John