At the end of chapter nine, St. Luke records “Jesus set His face to go to Jerusalem.” In Greek is the word “steadfastly.” Jesus set his face steadfastly – He was resolved to go to Jerusalem and the danger there did not matter. “To Jerusalem” is a literary motif in Luke’s gospel – Jesus is determined to fulfill His father’s saving will and purpose no matter where that led Him. St. Luke fills in the gaps – Herod wants Jesus dead and the Pharisees want Him gone. And then another literary motif appears. Jesus insists that on the third day He will finish His course. Jesus is not one to ignore subtlety. But this is hardly subtle. After three days, indeed.
Today, tomorrow, and forever point to the cross. This is not about anything less than the place where Jesus would offer Himself as priest and victim to pay for the sins of the whole world, your sins and mine. It marks the very essence of what it means for God to love us. He sends His Son for just this moment, to face the destiny of the cross in Jerusalem – where many a prophet met their end, Jesus will go. In fact, He says, “I must go.”
Except, perhaps, for a split second decision to act, every instinct of our lives is to protect our lives, to prolong them and prevent death. We are jealous of our lives and will do whatever it takes to preserve them. That is the clear lesson of the pandemic. No cost is too great and no sacrifice too much to protect our lives and the lives of those whom we love. But Jesus says He will and, indeed, He must go right into harm’s way. This is not some last moment choice to rush out into traffic to save a child or dive into the waters to save a friend but the whole direction of His life. He must go. . . to the cross. . . for you. . . for me.
Nobody wants Jesus to go there. The devil does not want Jesus to meet the destiny that will save a world marked by sin and death. The Pharisees did not want to dirty their hands with death. Neither did Herod. Neither did Pilate who washed his hands in a public display to wipe them clean from this mess. But they knew it had to be done; Jesus knew it had to be done – but for very different reasons. For all the rest His death would tidy up a problem. For Jesus it would end the problem of sin and its death once for all. The Pharisees knew what they were going to do; Herod knew what he had to do; Pilate knew what he must do; but Jesus knew better than them all what He must do. All except those for whom Jesus was to die.
The people God formed to be His own people, called out from all the peoples, covenanted into a formal relationship of adoption, and sealed in sacrificial blood were the very people who refused God’s mercy. Over and over again He sought to cover them with His mercy and shelter them under His wing but they refused. Now the hour had come for the consequence of this refusal to be felt. Israel would be forsaken and they would hear or see no more of Jesus until He was ready to feel the pounding of the nails and bear the full weight of the sins of the world in His body on the cross.
God’s people always complain that God is not listening to their prayers or paying attention to their plight or following the right time line to deliver them. You are no different. Neither am I. We wonder where God is when our lives come crashing down and presume God has other interests greater than ours or that we have done something to make Him angry and so much appease Him to get back on His good side. We blame God. These are the lies we tell ourselves as we nurse our wounds and salve our consciences and tend to our bruised egos. But they are lies.
Jesus must go and the cross must be accomplished. It is not God who is deaf or the Lord who is not paying attention. The people of God scatter at the very moment when God was gathering them. And it happens here every Sunday. Those whom God would gather are scattered by busy lives or distractions or bigger interests than church and worship. In this congregation, more than half our people are not here on Sunday morning. The Lord must do all to save us but apparently we don’t have to do anything we don’t want to do – not even show up. God lifts His wing of mercy and comfort in the voice of the Gospel preached, the sound of absolution spoken, and the taste of bread His body and wine His blood. God calls us here from the wherevers of our lives but we respond with stones and curses.
In the Introit we heard the Psalmist’s words: Zeal for Your house has consumed me.” What is true of Jesus can hardly be said of those who claim to belong to Jesus. We are not zealous. All around us Christianity is threatened and shaken. The world and the devil have combined with our sinful flesh to taunt and tempt and try the people who claim the Lord by faith. The promise of God does not waver but the people of God do. And at what cost? Those who reject the Lord or simply deem Him not as important as everything else in their lives live under this threat of destruction and the consequence of being forsaken by God.
That is exactly what happened to the Pharisees when their beloved Temple fell and all they were left with was the temple of Christ’s crucified and risen body. What will happen to us? God calls and gathers and what of our response to the call and shelter of the means of grace?
We are two weeks into the mighty journey of Lent. Last week we heard about temptation. Now we hear about rejection. It was never God tempting and it is not God rejecting. It was always about the temptation we love to find and the rejection that has become the norm in every congregation. God wants us but we do not want Him. God calls us but we do not hear. God gathers us under the arms of His mercy and we wiggle out of that mercy to stand on our own two feet. That is the call of repentance we hear today.
Any God worth His salt would have turned His back on us and left us for dead at the side of the road. Any God worth His salt would have given up on the prodigal’s return. Any God worth His salt would have said “You sinned; it is your problem.” But thanks be to God we have a God not worth His salt as a God. He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. For now there is still time to hear, still time to hide in the arms of His mercy, still time to rejoice in the relentless love of God determined to save us whatever it cost.
Herod warned of death and the Pharisees warned Him to leave them alone. Jesus refused. He set His face to Jerusalem, determined to finish the path of redemption even at the cost of His life in suffering and His death upon a cross. He must do this not for Himself and not even for the Father, but for us – all that was necessary for us to be gathered to our Father as His beloved sons and daughters.
Jesus said you will not see Him until you say “Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord.” Well, that is what we sing today. It is the voice of faith, the song of worship, and the canticle of redemption that we sing right here and right now. Jesus is here to keep his word. Here in this Word. Here in this Eucharist. Here to shelter us in the wing of His mercy, comfort us in our sorrows, forgive and restore our many sins, and deliver us with the victory of the third day – His resurrection that we too might live forevermore. In the Holy Name of Jesus. Amen.
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