The Man of Sorrows & The Sparrow

Jeremiah is a hard book and when I first looked at the lessons for this week I wondered what they were doing pairing this reading (Jeremiah 20:7-13) with the gospel lesson. But the pairing might not be as off as I first thought.

The first thing you should put in your memory is the context of Jeremiah. He is a prophet for forty or so years. And his message the entire time is essentially “you guys are doomed.” Jeremiah is the archetype for the “The End is Near” sandwich board guy ringing a bell. He’s the archetype, but with two primary differences. That guy to us is a character of mirth. The end never comes. The end most definitely was coming for Jerusalem. That comedic guy is not self-aware. He goes ringing that bell with the pure bliss of ignorance. Jeremiah is self-aware.

And that is where our lesson today starts, with one of the most heart rending verses of the entire bible. “O LORD, you have deceived me, and I was deceived; you are stronger than I, and you have prevailed. I have become a laughingstock all the day, everyone mocks me (Jeremiah 20:7).” Jeremiah has been preaching doom for 40 years, and it has not yet come. He has been shouting “violence and destruction” for decades, and the walls of Jerusalem still stand. Everyone wants him to just shut up to the point they would be willing to kill him. “Denounce him! Let us denounce him…and take our revenge on him! (Jermiah 20:10).” It’s the guy with the sandwich board who knows how everyone looks at him. And know that his message has no effect.

This burden is enough for Jeremiah that he attempts to put it down himself. “I will not mention him, or speak anymore in his name.” But the Word of the LORD, the prophetic calling is too powerful. “There is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with holding it in, and I cannot (Jeremiah 20:9).” The LORD is stronger and has prevailed. The Word finds its way. Yet the question I think lingers to anyone who reads it. How can God do such a thing? Is this really how God is, a divine tyrant making us the rump of jokes?

Jeremiah works his way to his answer. Those who laugh at him now will not have the last laugh. “The LORD is with me as a dread warrior; my persecutors will stumble, they will not overcome me.” He even manages to get in a bit of bragging. They are laughing at Jeremiah like sandwich board guy, but “They will be greatly shamed…Their eternal dishonor will never be forgotten (Jeremiah 20:11).” And indeed it is not forgotten. 2600 years later the book of Jeremiah is still read. 2600 years later his message continues to resonate and spread the warning to those with ears. 2600 years later, those residents of Jerusalem standing on the precipice of destruction who would not hear, who looked to kill the prophet of the LORD are held up for derision, for blind eyes and stubborn hearts. Jeremiah’s ultimate answer is that the LORD “tests the righteous and sees the heart and mind.” That this LORD justifies all who commit their cause to Him (Jeremiah 20:12). And like all hard meditations, it ends with praise. “Sing to the LORD!”

Jesus himself is a fulfillment of Jeremiah – the man of sorrows. We put him to death in the most shameful way possible. But his cause was trusted to his Father who raised him from the dead. And we disciples are not above our teacher. We can expect these things. Cause part of our message is definitely “The End is near.” If not capital T capital E THE END, we all meet our end. “Fear not those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. (Matthew 10:28).” The LORD is not the tyrant we might fear, but one who shared the temporal shame. He is one who knows when every sparrow falls. And are you not worth more than a sparrow? Entrust your cause to the LORD.

Guilt, Shame and the Good News

That something can both be a cliché and not well understood is a paradox I keep running across. The biggest one might be all the people who think they understand the gospel and then equate that good news with “be nice.” And if they have arrived at that point, you will never preach or explain them out of it. Only events will move them. Another one is the difference between guilt and shame. Those are the two words in English that cover the result of sin. We can feel guilty, or we can feel ashamed. They are related, but worlds apart.

One can be guilty without feeling any shame. “I did it, and I’m glad I did it.” One can be guilty, but think the offense is ticky-tack. Like getting a ticket for 73mph in a 65mph zone. There are also all the cases that won’t land you in the legal system, they might even be encouraged by sections of society, but are still contrary to the law of God. I often think how we just blow right past the 9^th and 10^th commandments. Luther’s explanation of the 9^th would hold us guilty if we scheme to get our neighbor’s stuff in a way which only appears right. The law requires that we be of help and service to our neighbor in keeping what they have. But so much of our capitalist system is schemes to extract everything we can from our neighbors. And I’m a capitalist, fully credentialed with MBA/CFA, but pushing credit cards with 30% interest on 20 year olds, or $100k student loans, or gambling devices on your phone at any time, especially when they will kick you off if you win too much, but big losers will get personal contact. These are all legal, and they appear right. The people taking the other side do so willingly. They sign the paperwork. That doesn’t remove the guilt of the scheme.

Maybe it is here that guilt moves into shame. It is the other side of those schemes that eventually feel shame. Did they do anything wrong in a guilt sense? You can argue that the gambler knew they were in a zero-sum game. If they got richer, they were making someone else poorer. And the only reason they would enter that would be envy. But I think I’d argue in most of these cases that the people entering into such schemes don’t recognize the wrong. Which doesn’t remove any guilt, but it does mitigate it. What does happen is that when you become cognizant – when all of sudden you have eaten the apple and know that you are naked – you feel shame. Shame at naivete. Shame at the justifications employed to engage in various activities. Shame at being brought low and being made a fool. What might seem like years of never-ending shame digging out from a moment’s mistake. Like wearing a scarlet letter, although in our day and age I think that letter would be a D, for debt instead of the A for adultery. It is interesting that like the cheeks that burn, both are marked by red-ink.

The Reformation church I think spends most of its time on guilt. The law is proclaimed which increases the trespass (Romans 5:20). The purpose of the law is to help us understand “ticky-tack” breakings of the law of a Holy God are disqualifying. We are called to be perfect, as our Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48). And when we’ve felt the guilt and cried out with Paul, “who will deliver me from the body of death (Romans 7:24)?” We proclaim the good news of free remission. What our Old Testament Lesson says first, “The LORD has taken away the judgements against you (Zephaniah 3:15).”

The Reformation church spends it time on guilt, but the gospel also has something to say about shame. And maybe it’s the bigger thing the gospel promises. Because long after we might have accepted the remission of sins, we might still be dealing with the results of sin. We might also just be dealing with a world that is fallen. We might be in a shameful position not because of acts we have done, but just because that is the way the world is. How does the remnant of Israel in the decadence of the time before the exile feel? How does an exile after 70 years, 3 generations later, feel? Yes, Isreal was sinful, and that had brought on the shame. But why is it falling on me? What have I done to deserve this? Yet it is shameful.

The gospel in Zechariah addresses the shame. “I will gather those of you who mourn for the festival, so that you will no longer suffer reproach…I will save the lame and gather the outcast, and I will change their shame into praise (Zechariah 3:18-19).” The promise of God is that He shall be our pride. The LORD loves you. And from his love he shall restore your fortunes. “He will quiet you by his love.” When the shame cries out, it is met with the love of God. “he will exult over you with loud singing…for I will make you renowned and praised (Zechariah 3:17, 20).” Rejoice O daughter of Jerusalem, for the LORD reigns, and his promises to you are sure.

Be Silent

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Biblical Text: Mark 1:21-28

The text is specifically an exorcism text. And if I am being honest, these texts are outside of the philosophy and experience of many people. If you’ve had an experience of spiritual evil, you’ve been forced to change your philosophy and these texts are strong comfort. “Even the Spirit’s obey Him.” If you grew up early accepting Spiritual reality, then the Biblical accounts are formative on your philosophy of them. But if you are part of the great sweep of de-mythologized WEIRD de facto atheists, exorcisms and real spiritual evil are embarrassing stories. The purpose of this sermon is not exactly to defend the idea of personal evil. Let’s just say I know that it is a fact. The purpose of this sermon is two-fold. First to proclaim the gospel which is that Christ has freed us from anything such uncleanness can throw at us. Yes, the unclean spirit is partially correct. We initially have more in common with them than we do with Jesus “the Holy One”. But Christ has taken mankind into himself. We now have a place and our sin is cast out; even if it leaves kicking and screaming, it is forgiven. The second purpose is to think about a way that might give even a sceptic second thoughts.

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Unbelief to Believing

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Biblical Text: John 20:19-31

At the word cloud would tell you, this is “Doubting” Thomas Sunday. But there are really two things in the text. The Thomas story is one of unbelief to belief and the things that stand in the way. The biggest of them I think is simply shame. The sermon goes into that in the 2nd half. The first half is the commissioning of the disciples. We believe, how then do we live? Jesus gives some directions here. The first half of the sermon looks at what it means to be sent as Christ was sent and the role of the Holy Spirit.

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Conceiving Hope

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Biblical Text: Isaiah 7:1-17, Matthew 1: 18-25

What is the virginity of Mary all about anyway? That is what this sermon is about. Matthew tells you, but he tells you by pointing you at the Israel’s story, in this case at Ahaz and Isaiah. I’ll cut this short, it is about hope. It is about how God conceives hope, when all our natural hopes are gone. But this sermon takes a longer look at that. And why the Virgin Birth should conceive hope in all hearts.

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God is No Repsecter of Shame

Biblical Text: Matt 1:18-25
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I’ve just start reading this book, only just past the theses declarations, but I’m somewhat amazed at them. The book is supposed to be the culmination of a generations scholarship on sexuality in the ancient world. And that culmination is supposed to be the upsetting of prior or simplistic thinking. This is what is startling to me: his theses are more or less what I have been taught my entire benighted life in the church and that horrible bastion of it called the LCMS. My guess at what that means is that scholarship is now distant enough from the church that it can “discover” the church’s understanding and roughly agree with it without really knowing.

How does that intersect with a small parish sermon. Well, the text is Matthew’s account of the birth of Jesus. (Our kids program is next week, so instead of doing John the Baptist, The Return we took Advent 4’s texts on Advent 3.) And Matthew’s account is really about the virgin birth. Coming off of the genealogy, Matthew had something to explain and an Old Testament prophecy to link in (Isaiah 7:14). In the ancient world (which the modern world is growing ever closer to) shame was the regulatory principle. Actions were governed less by any personal sense of a cosmic right and wrong but more by a social agreement upon what is honorable and what brings dis-honor or shame. The gospel disrupts all of that. It is a proclamation of freedom. Freedom from shame and freedom for right action. The core of the shame system was slavery. A slave could not have honor, so it didn’t matter how they were treated. And many were treated as sex slaves. It was an everyday occurrence. So, sexuality would be a defining sphere of shame. Caesar’s wife had to be beyond repute because Caesar was at the top of the honor pyramid and less than that would bring shame. And you can fill in the rest from slave to Caesar and all the forms of human sexuality.

Now the Jews had a much better grasp of sin or personal adherence to a cosmic code, but they were always fighting the honor system. Think of every time Jesus goes to a meal with the Pharisees and takes note of how they are sitting(Luke 14:7) or mocks those who like to parade around in fancy clothes (Mark 12:38-40). Pure honor/shame status clubs. Hence why Jesus calls the woman giving two mites better because she is much closer to the cosmic standard of justice.

Then comes the story of Joseph and pregnant Mary. This is pure shame vs. sin. Mary is sinless. The child is from the Holy Spirit. This is how God has chosen to act. How God has chosen to act, if Joseph goes along with it will bring him great shame. His village was still calling Jesus “Mary’s Child” at the start of his ministry (Mark 6:3). Honor/shame called for stoning. God said this is how I am going to save my people. Honor/shame says that God couldn’t be associated with anything that is shameful or lowering of status. God is born as a baby from a humble virgin. God is Immanuel in the midst of his people. In the midst of their shame. And he brings grace. And grace itself is shameful, because you can’t pay it back, because you are not in control.

God is no respecter of shame. He does care about sin and the law, but he also has given the remedy. Jesus, who saves His people from their sins.

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