Do you know what is the shortest verse in the Bible? It is from John 11:35 which reads: “Jesus wept”. That verse was referring to the tears shed by Jesus at the tomb of Lazarus: a friend whom He was going to raise. The Greek word used in John “to shed tears” is different from the Greek used for this morning’s Gospel text. The weeping of Jesus in our text today is loudly mourning, lamenting, really more like wailing in grief. So Jesus was bewailing, in personal pain and grief, over Jerusalem.

He looked upon the city in this way because as the Son of God, He knew the future. He knew what was to come upon that city: the harsh reality of judgment and destruction. The tearing down of walls, the terrorizing, injuring, and killing, and utter desolation that would come upon this city called Jerusalem.

The name, Jerusalem, has great meaning. A meaning that reflects its history as a capital and as the place of God’s presence in the temple. Jerusalem comes from two Hebrew Words “Yara” and “Shaloam”. Shaloam can simply mean peace but it really means more: as an action word it means: to be or make whole or complete by paying something back. As a noun it means wholeness, completeness.

“Yara” describes the bringing about of a unified whole, a coming together, a building together by means of many little movements. Like how you can make a hill with many little stones or how the plants gets watered not by one rain drop but by many raindrops.

Jerusalem means to make whole or complete, to be reconciled and to be brought together by a payment of/for many things. This describes the sacrificial system of the Jews. Jerusalem, which had contained the temple, was the place where people were to gather, acknowledge their sin, their separation from God and from each other by their injustice, greed, and breaking of the commandments. As they repented of their sin, they were to understand that their rebellion against God deserved death. The only way that they could be restored to wholeness in relation to God was if something or somebody were offered up as a sacrifice to pay for it: to make restitution. They offered up animals and their blood in ceremonial sacrifice. They paid offerings of gold, of incense, of time, of materials and grain for the building and upkeep of the temple in which these offerings were to take place. This location was to also serve to unite as a people and religious community the Israelites, the people of Promise through whom God would proclaim to the world the promise of His blessing. A blessing for all those who would repent from their sin, hope in God and His Promise of a Savior, and receive His grace and mercy.
In the name Jerusalem, and the workings of the temple, we see what Jerusalem and the people of Israel were to be. A people united in humility and confession to God and the One Messiah: A people waiting for the ultimate sacrifice even as they sacrificed. By it, true peace would be built among and in them. United in wholeness, completion in mind, heart, and body, reconciled to God to receive life eternal by the sacrifice of this Messiah.

But Jesus wept over Jerusalem because the city, its people, and many of the Jews were not repentant, they were not rightly looking to the one who was to come. They were proud of their nationality, yes but only as an earthly kingdom. As long as there was a Jerusalem and a temple, they thought they would have a hope of rising in national power again, the Messiah would be another David, a glorious military leader.

In Jesus, most saw a miracle worker to benefit from, but not much more. Many rejected Him altogether instead of receiving Him for whom they should have been waiting. They did not heed the message “Repent for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand”. Many used the temple not as a place of prayer, confession, and praise of God for the peace He gave, but a place to make money, to praise themselves. Even after the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, many Jews continued to reject Jesus and His message of salvation, even persecuting and killing followers of this Messiah. By doing this, they were bringing more guilt blood upon themselves, building up a future not of grace but of vengeance and judgment. To move them from their idolatry and wickedness to Christ, God removed their idols of the temple and the city walls in 70 A.D. He allowed the Romans to violently take away those objects of pride. The time of the sacrifices were over: no longer needed because Jesus was their fulfillment.

So Jesus lamented, He wailed over them. He wailed over the needless suffering of a people who needlessly rejected the very One in whom their completion and reconciliation with God should occur. If only they hadn’t resisted but received the work of the Holy Spirit, their overthrow may not have happened and so many innocents would not have had to suffer.

God does not desire the suffering of people, He desires that people would turn from their sin, turn to Him and live reconciled with Him. Too often it is only through the destruction and the removal of people’s idolatrous altars, when people are brought low in various forms of discipline that God allows and commands, that people then become open to repentance of their sin and then in humility receive and rejoice in His forgiveness and mercy but only when they finally recognize their need.

It grieves the Lord to see people sin. It grieves the Lord to see people take His grace for granted, and it grieves Him to have to condemn those who do not repent. So as a Father, He does sometimes discipline those whom He loves. A reluctant Father who must punish His children so that they do fall completely into the way of destruction. He will allow the rod to fall so that people may be corrected and reconciled to Him rather than be hardened to the point of eternal condemnation which is a far greater tragedy.

It is a sad thing, that it so often takes the removal of those things in which we have put our trust and value for us to finally repent and get back to what is truly important, turned to God and returned to the place where our peace is accomplished.

This is the lament of every faithful pastor of every age and time. He laments over those who have reduced their attendance at church or who have stopped all together. When brothers and sisters in Christ are not getting along or abusing each other or the grace of God. He grieves and wails inwardly and sometimes outwardly for those caught in unrepentant trespasses and sins who must receive rebuke and admonishment: when church discipline must take place, and even worse when those people refuse to repent. When we see this falling away, every good pastor and lay person should grieve. We wonder, will God allow something to come upon them that turns them? Will they continue in their sin just the same? The end of that road of spiritual sickness is not salvation, but judgment and death. Every unrepentant sin is a false worship and a step away from God and toward Hell.
Must we wait for tragedy? Must we wait for our cities, our nation, our capitals, our loved ones taken, our own health removed, for all our false idols to be toppled and ripped from us before we turn?
But here is the good news: because of God’s mercy, He did keep His promises so that we may hope. He did send Jesus His Son so that there would be an end to suffering, an end to death, and an end to sin and the demonic forces who tempt sons and daughters of Adam.

Jesus became the true Jerusalem, the true temple, the true sacrifice whose blood would drop by drop, pay and make restitution for the sins of the world. Jesus, true man and true God, in perfect humility came to save people still in their pride. He laid down His life and died on the cross to suffer and die and pay the wages of sin.

Yet people still reject Him, they still mock Him, they belittle the seriousness of the pastor and other Christians who see the value of this blood and this temple not made with human hands that brings about our peace.

Does God weep and lament over Yucaipa, Calimesa, Mentone, San Bernadino and Riverside counties, does He weep and lament over you? Yes.

Repent of your idolatry. Repent of placing yourself above the Lord. Repent of treating the Gospel as refuse and cheap.

And then, when you and I repent, when any single sheep repents, do you know what happens? God and His angels’ wailing, mourning, and grief turns into joy and rejoicing. As the Shepherd who found His sheep, as the woman who found her coin, as the father who regained His repentant son, so God and the heavenly host rejoices, their weeping of sorrow on our behalf turn into tears of joy: what was lost is now found.

Dear friends, your Jerusalem, the way that makes you, me, and the church a complete whole unified is in Jesus. He continues to come down to earth to give the gifts of His sacrificial payment to unify us in confession and faith where He promises to bring “believers” into unity with the Trinity, through His physical crucified and raised body and blood here in the Lord’s supper. This then becomes the true Jerusalem on earth, that which makes for our peace in Jesus Christ.

It will only get better in the future. Here He trains believers and prepares us for the difficulties of a sin-filled world, so that we may remain strong upon the path of righteousness by faith in Him as we return to Him again and again until the day when we are brought to eternal life: to the gathering forever of the whole body of Christ with all the saints and the company of the angels in heavenly glory forever and ever.

Let us today exalt and rejoice in our Lord who builds us up with walls that cannot be torn down by His Word. We are joined together by the true Jerusalem, Jesus Christ. In His blood and body crucified and raised we are reminded that no host can prevail against this house of prayer, this place of our peace which God brings to us and for us now through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.

Pr. Aaron Kangas