Grace and Peace to you from God our
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ and may our Lord and Savior sanctify you in
the truth; for His word is truth. Amen
Twenty-Fifth
Sunday after Pentecost (2010)
Fear Not, the
Lord has Redeemed You
Luke 21:25-28 (ESV)
"And there will be signs
in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity
because of the roaring of the sea and the waves, [26] people fainting with fear and with
foreboding of what is coming on the world. For the powers of the heavens will
be shaken. [27] And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with
power and great glory. [28] Now when these things begin to take place,
straighten up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing
near."
Although
today is designated as the Twenty-Fifth Sunday after Pentecost, it is also the second
to the last Sunday in the church year. The church year is drawing to a close; there
is but one more Sunday before we begin a new church year with the season of
Advent. Thus, we are reminded that with each passing year our Lord brings us
closer and closer to the end of our journey in His kingdom of grace and we ask
what the New Year will bring. Will the year be one of joy and happiness or will
it be filled with sorrow and tribulation? We wonder where we will be at this
time next year. Will we be here, in God’s kingdom of grace or will we be in His
kingdom of glory? Yet all these questions concerning the uncertainties of life
gain us nothing because so much can happen, most over which we have no control.
Yet we are comforted knowing that there is One who is in control; One who
commands all things, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Therefore, we always
turn to Him knowing that He alone grants us life to live another year and He
alone guides us through every year that He gives us.
The Gospel
Reading for today places us with our Lord Jesus in the temple. There He hears
speakers stressing the beauty of the noble stones which make up the temple and the
wonderful offerings from the people and He tells them, “As for these things that you
see, the days will come when there will not be left here one stone upon another
that will not be thrown down” (v. 6). Those who heard Him predict the
destruction of the temple had to be horrified at the thought and so they ask, “Teacher,
when will these things be, and what will be the sign when these things are
about to take place?” (v. 7). Our Lord knew that this would happen in
70AD, but He refuses to answer their question concerning when this would happen and what sign
would be given to warn them else they would begin to calculate the time till
the coming disaster. Instead, He uses this occasion to warn His disciples
against false teachers who would come filling the people with the false hope of
a resurrection of the
All disasters, those which have been and those
yet to occur, are part of God’s plan. Our Lord Jesus says they, “must
first take place, but the end will not be at once” (v. 9). Even the
suffering of the church is no accident. Jesus tells His disciples that they
will be arrested and persecuted; they will be put into prisons and brought
before kings and courts to stand trial; all for His name’s sake. However, do
not fear because this is your opportunity to bear witness of your faith in Me.
Moreover, I will give you wisdom to know what to say and a clear voice with
which to say it so none of your adversaries may contradict your confession (vv.
12-15). Your suffering will be such that even your family will turn on you,
delivering you over to evil. You will be hated because of my name and some will
even be put to death, but fear not because not one of you will perish. Your
perseverance in the faith will save you (vv. 16-19). What wonderful news, to
know that we need Fear Not, because our
Lord has Redeemed Us.
Our Lord
warns, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There
will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences. And
there will be terrors and great signs from heaven” (vv. 10-11). Oh, how
this warning from our Lord has set people to great worry ever since His days
here on earth. Truth is ever since Adam fell into sin the earth has been a
violent place, there have always been wars; kingdoms fighting with one another
and natural disaster such as earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, etc.
These are the things that “must first take place” before the
Last Day. Yet it seems that each and every time there is an armed conflict
somewhere on the globe, the people begin to fear Armageddon. From its
inception, the history of our country is replete with wars and each time war
would break out, thousands upon thousands thought the world was coming to the
end; for they saw the conflicts as the sign of the coming of the age. Today, we
have a cottage industry within the church whose entire focus is on the
eschatological; the Last Day. Books have been written, becoming best sellers
regarding the Last Day, only they err in that the authors of these books write
not about the Last Day but the Last Days. Therefore, they become the false
teachers who trouble the people and lead them astray, chasing after rumors.
Given the
economic crisis our country is facing today, there are false teachers, prognosticators
of doom, who see a world-wide economic collapse as a sign of the coming of the
end of the world as we know it. Yet they do not offer comfort in the sweet
truth of the Gospel which says we are saved from sin and eternal death by the
merit of Christ alone. Instead, falsely stating that Scripture prophecies an
economic meltdown prior to Armageddon, they offer works-righteous solutions
that would teach you how to live in a New World Order; a New Global Economy. I
must ask, are signs of the coming of the age to lead us to temporal solutions? I
cannot find such a solution in Holy Scripture. In fact, our Lord Jesus says, “As
were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of
Trying to
consider what might lie ahead in days unknown is nothing more than a spirit of
expectancy. This is not necessarily a bad thing because it is in fact an
important element in a happy and healthy mental outlook for the believer. For
we anticipate the Second Coming of our Lord as a blessed event; an event which
will usher in the resurrection of all believers. On the other hand, a spirit of
expectancy can also destroy happiness. For those who are unbelievers they have
nothing to look forward to. Their lives are bound by their temporal existence.
Life for them is always threatening, fearful, and insecure because they have no
hope outside of this life.
There is an
old saying that a person needs to make at least six good friends in this life,
enough to carry their coffin to the grave. However, the Christian knows they
must have only one, true friend in this life, our Lord and Savior, Jesus
Christ. It might take six men to carry our coffin to the gravesite, but that’s
as far as they can go. Beyond the grave, they cannot be with us or help us.
However, our Lord Jesus accompanies us through our dying and beyond our burial as
He takes our hand and leads us into His eternal home of heaven. The fearless
and faithful servant of the Lord does not sorrow because they must surrender
the shell of their body to the earth. With their body they lay aside a burden
that often pressed hard on them in this life and they can say with Job, “For
I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth”
(Job 19:25 ESV). Moreover, un-frightened by the end of life they can
boldly say with
When such a
servant of the Lord’s looks ahead with expectancy toward eternity, they do not
see anything dreadful. During their lifetime, Christ has made His call and
election of them certain. Therefore, they can now stand before the gates of
death in expectation of the glory that awaits them in heaven. They know they
will not come into judgment because they are not ashamed of Jesus but confessed
Him before the world and they know that their Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ has
confessed them before His Father in heaven. Therefore, with great joy they can
take great solace in the words of
You, too,
may take great comfort in knowing that it is our Lord Jesus who began that good
work in you and He will see it through to completion on the Last Day. What a
marvelous expectancy to know that we need Fear
Not, because our Lord has Redeemed Us.
Years come
and go, church years come and go, but, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and
today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8 ESV). Moreover, the Second Coming of
our Savior is as certain as the First and as the First, the Second will be just
as exciting and wonderful for those who wait on the Messiah. Both advents
affect the lives of all men, living and dead, the difference is the Second
Coming will bring human history to its fulfillment. Each of us confessed this
truth just a few moments ago in the Second Article of the Apostles Creed; “From thence He will come to judge the
living and the dead.” Our anticipation of this blessed event is an
important and essential part of the Christian’s faith and life. In fact, it is
an indispensable part of our Christian life. Knowing that Christ has redeemed
us through His sacrificial death on Calvary’s Cross and made us children of His
Father’s through the blessed waters of baptism assures us that we are His for
eternity and on the Last Day we will be resurrected to new and glorious bodies
to live with our Lord for eternity in the new heaven and earth where there
shall be no years end or no Last Sunday for all time will stop and we shall
live in the blessed peace of God for eternity.
Therefore,
today, as we begin to look forward to the Advent Season, we know that whatever
happens tomorrow is in the Lord’s hands. The Second Coming of Christ may come
in our lifetime but if it does come, we’ll know it for there will be signs in
the heavens, the earth will be in great distress because of the advancing seas
and people will be fainting with fear at what is about to come (vv. 25-26).
Then, all shall see Christ coming on the clouds with all His power and majesty,
to judge the world (v. 27). However, all who believe, who are children of God,
shall stand with straightened backs, raising our heads in great expectancy
because the Lord, who is our redemption, is drawing near (v. 28) and we shall Fear Not, because we know He has Redeemed us
and we are His.
Thus, today
and everyday, we give thanks that our Lord Jesus offers us another year in
which we can live as His sanctified children, blessed by the presence of His
Holy Spirit. However, we live without fear because when our Lord calls us from
this life, either on the Last Day or at the end of our temporal life, we know He
will be calling us to be with Him in His heavenly home for eternity. Secure in
this knowledge, we hold fast to the love of Christ while clinging to His Holy
Word as our guide. We hold fast to the blessed truth that we need not fear because our Lord has redeemed
us to be with Him for eternity. Amen.
Let us pray: Lord God, heavenly Father, look
with favor upon all Your children who are Your’s by faith; grant them Your
forgiveness and comfort them with the promise of resurrection to life
everlasting; through Your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns
with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
May the Peace of
God which passeth all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Amen.