Sermon for Trinity 19

Ephesians 4:22-28  +  Matthew 9:1-8

It’s a wonderful story we have before us in today’s Gospel about the healing of the paralytic. It’s especially memorable when we pull in some details from Mark’s Gospel, who explains that the paralytic was brought to Jesus in a very special way, by being lowered down by his four friends through an opening they had made in the roof, because the house where Jesus was preaching was so crowded with people that they couldn’t make a path to carry the stretcher through on foot. The faith of the five men was clearly on display as they went to such lengths to reach Jesus, because they believed that He could and would have mercy on the man who was paralyzed. And He did! But not, at first, in the way that everyone was expecting.

This healing account teaches us the lesson that was behind all of Jesus’ healing miracles: the lesson that Jesus, the Son of Man, was speaking and acting on God’s own authority, in everything He said, in everything He did. Jesus represented God the Father, not only because He was the Son of God, but because He had come into the world as a Man to be the perfect Mediator between God and man, with all the authority to speak and to act on God’s behalf. And the specific authority He displays in today’s Gospel is the authority to forgive sins—sins that had been committed against God, sins that would otherwise keep a person out of the kingdom of heaven, sins that would otherwise condemn a person to hell. It’s that authority to forgive sins that we want to focus on this morning.

The paralytic was successfully lowered down through the roof until his bed was lying on the floor right in front of Jesus. Matthew writes, When he saw their faith, Jesus said to the paralytic, “Take heart, son! Your sins are forgiven you.” No one was expecting those to be the first words out of Jesus’ mouth. Clearly the paralytic has come to receive physical healing from Jesus. But Jesus, the great physician of the soul, has diagnosed a deeper problem, a need to know if God was angry with him—a question that often troubles people who suffer from a chronic disease or illness. “Is God angry with me because of my sins? Is God punishing me with this illness or with this trouble that won’t go away?” Jesus sees the man’s doubts, as well as his faith that Jesus will help him. So God the Father speaks through His Son, “Take heart, son! Your sins are forgiven you.”

And, behold, some of the scribes said to themselves, “This man blasphemes.” Mark and Luke add the rest of what they were thinking: “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” You see, it is blasphemy, insulting God!, to pretend to speak for God without permission, without authority from God to speak for Him or to act on God’s behalf. The sins Jesus forgave at that moment weren’t sins that the man had committed against Jesus Himself, as if the man had made fun of Jesus or had slapped Jesus across the face. Anyone can forgive the sins committed against him or her, because, in that case, the one doing the forgiving is the one who was originally offended, and forgiveness means that you’re no longer holding that offense against the offender. Your relationship is healed. Forgiveness means that the one who has been offended is no longer angry over the offense, no longer angry at the offender.

But what Jesus did was something else. He didn’t forgive the man for offenses committed against Him, the Man Jesus. He forgave the man for all the offenses he had ever committed against God. And the scribes were right—only God Himself can forgive the sins committed against God. Only God can unlock the prisoner’s shackles and set him free death and eternal condemnation—unless God has authorized someone to forgive sins on His behalf.

And that’s exactly what God has done.

God the Father sent His Son into the world with the full authority to act on His behalf, to forgive sins in some cases, where the terms of the pardon (set by God) are met, and to withhold forgiveness in other cases, where the terms of the pardon are not met.

Now, what are the terms God has set for His pardon (for His forgiveness)? Well, first, atonement needs to be made for the sins committed against God. That lesson was driven home for the people of Israel through all the sacrifices for sin that God’s Law demanded. Atonement has to be made. Forgiveness has a price. In this case, the price of forgiveness is blood, that is, death—the death of God’s only-begotten, beloved Son. That is the price required for paying the sin-debt every sinner owes to God. And it has been paid, once for all, by Jesus’ suffering and death on the cross. And because God is eternal, not bound to the progression of time, as we are, the future sacrifice of Jesus, from the perspective of the paralytic in today’s Gospel, was just as valid for his forgiveness as the past sacrifice of Jesus, from our perspective, is for us. So that term has already been met; Jesus’ atonement is available for anyone and everyone to use in order to satisfy the terms of God’s pardon.

The other term of God’s pardon is that it can only be given out to the one who seeks it from Jesus Himself. Anyone seeking God’s forgiveness in some other way, in some other place, for some other reason, cannot have it, just as anyone who doesn’t seek God’s forgiveness at all, because he’s happy holding onto his sins, cannot have God’s forgiveness. But to the one who seeks His forgiveness through Jesus, God the Father speaks through the mouth of Jesus Christ, “Take heart, son! Your sins are forgiven you!” And it’s not blasphemy at all, because Jesus has the permission and the authority to speak and to act on His Father’s behalf. As He said after His resurrection, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.”

He goes on to prove that authority to those who accuse Him of blasphemy in today’s Gospel: Is it easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Arise and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—then he said to the paralytic, “Arise, take up your bed, and go to your house.” And the paralytic was immediately healed, with power only God can give, proving that Jesus, the Son of Man had authority from God to forgive sins.

The text before us is actually a perfect example of what Paul wrote to the Corinthians in 2 Cor. 5: God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not counting men’s sins against them. Now, reconciling the world to Himself doesn’t mean reconciling or forgiving the sins of everyone in the world—or everyone in the room. That’s not what Jesus did in today’s Gospel. But one by one, as the word about Christ brought people to faith, He reconciled them to God through faith. He forgave them their sins, according to the terms of the pardon set by His Father: that atonement had to be made, and that God’s forgiveness has to be sought from Jesus and from nowhere else.

But then St. Paul goes on in 2 Corinthians, and God has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Just as God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, forgiving sins to those who sought forgiveness from Him and through Him, so the Lord Jesus, who has all authority in heaven and on earth, has appointed ministers, who are His divine ambassadors to call sinners—in His name!—to repentance and faith in Christ Jesus, and to forgive the penitent and believing in His name.

So Jesus said to His apostles, I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. And again after His resurrection, Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained. And still there are many people today who call themselves Christians who hear a pastor pronouncing the absolution and cry out, “Blasphemy! Only God can forgive sins! I don’t need any man’s forgiveness! I’ll just go directly to God!” Well, good luck with that! I wonder how they hope to approach God, or where they hope to find Him! The truth is, it is God who has given this authority to men, to deal with sinners and to forgive sinners in His name. It’s an authority that Christ has delegated to His Church, which calls men to wield the authority of the keys of the kingdom of heaven, according to God’s command and according to those same terms of forgiveness that God Himself has established. They are to forgive sinners on the basis of Christ’s atonement, when the sinner seeks forgiveness from Christ, through the ministry that Christ has established on earth.

Now, that forgiveness may be given through the spoken absolution alone, as we do at the beginning of our services. There you hear, both in the confession of sins, and in the words I speak after the confession of sins, those same “terms of pardon” referenced, the atonement of Jesus as the basis for forgiveness, and the seeking of forgiveness from and for the sake of Jesus, which is what “believing in Jesus” means. You also hear in that absolution the very same words that Jesus spoke to the paralytic: “Your sins are forgiven you.” And you even hear the reference to the fact that Jesus has given me, “as a called and ordained minister of the Christian Church,” the authority to pronounce forgiveness in His name. That same forgiveness is also given in Holy Baptism, as Peter urged the crowds in Jerusalem to be baptized in the name of Jesus “for the forgiveness of” their sins. And it’s also given in Holy Communion, where Jesus has given this sacramental meal to us Christians to eat and to drink His body and His blood, which were given and shed for us “for the forgiveness of sins.” All done by the authority of Him to whom all authority in heaven and on earth has been given, who has authorized ministers to forgive sins in His name.

And that makes the absolution certain. That makes it something you can rely on, something you can believe in, something that your faith can stand on. “God’s authorized minister has examined me and has found that the terms of God’s pardon have been met. Atonement has been made for my sins. And I am, right now, seeking God’s forgiveness from Jesus and for His sake alone. God’s minister has, therefore, absolved me of my sins, with the full authority of God. So I know for certain that God is no longer angry with me, but that He has welcomed me into His kingdom and will give me eternal life. The forgiveness I have received through God’s authorized minister—in Baptism, in the absolution, and in the Lord’s Supper—is God’s own forgiveness, because God has given to men the authority to forgive sins.” Rejoice in that authority! Take great comfort in it! And, having put on the New Man through faith in God’s promise of forgiveness, live as the new person—the forgiven person!—God has created you to be! Amen.

Source: Sermons

Sermon for Trinity 19

Ephesians 4:22-28  +  Matthew 9:1-8

Last week we heard Jesus’ answer to the question about the greatest commandment in the Law: You shall love the Lord with all your heart, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. But, as we discussed, the greatest commandment is still not the greatest teaching in the Bible. The greatest teaching is the Gospel: how Jesus, the Christ, by His perfect life and by His innocent death on the cross, earned the forgiveness of sins for all who have broken the greatest commandments, and how the Lord now promises to forgive sins to all who believe in Jesus. We see a brilliant example of the forgiveness of sins taking place in today’s Gospel—what it is, how it takes place, and who has the authority to forgive.

We’re told that Jesus came to His own city. Now, we think first of Nazareth, where Jesus grew up. He’s known, after all, as Jesus of Nazareth. But, as Mark and Luke make clear, “His own city” is no longer Nazareth. It’s now Capernaum. Because not too long before this, the people of Nazareth, Jesus’ hometown, tried to kill Him, tried to throw Him right over a cliff. But Jesus is more than welcome in Capernaum. So welcome, in fact, that the people crowded into the house where He was teaching, crowded in so tightly that there was standing room only. That made it impossible for the four men carrying the stretcher with the paralytic on it to get in to see Jesus. So they climbed up on the roof of the house, hoisted the stretcher up to the roof, dug a hole through the roof, and lowered the paralyzed man down through the hole in the roof to where Jesus was.

What an amazing scene that must have been! But Matthew doesn’t bother with those details that Mark and Luke record. The way they entered Jesus’ presence wasn’t the important part of the story. What happened next was.

When he saw their faith, Jesus said to the paralytic, “Take heart, son! Your sins are forgiven you.”

You heard those same words this morning after you confessed your sins and your faith in Christ Jesus. Let’s take a step back and look at what it means to forgive sins.

There is such a thing as personal forgiveness. When someone hurts you in some way, you either hold it against them, so that your relationship with them remains fractured, or you forgive them and your relationship is repaired, although some consequences of the sin may remain.

That’s not what Jesus was doing in today’s Gospel, offering personal forgiveness. The paralytic hadn’t sinned against Jesus personally, not against Jesus the man. He had sinned against God directly, as all people have, and he had surely also sinned against other people, which is also a sin against God. He, like everyone else, had broken the greatest commandments in the Law, and, as a sinner, he deserved to remain separated from God for eternity. He deserved to die.

But Jesus takes all the man’s sins committed against God and against other men, lumps them all together, and simply says, “Take heart, son! Your sins are forgiven you!” Or, in other words, “You’re forgiven for all the wrongs that you’ve done!”

What does that mean, “You’re forgiven”? It means, God will not hold your sins against you anymore. God, the holy Judge, hereby releases you from your guilt and from the punishment you deserve for your sins. You are no longer condemned. You are no longer a subject of the devil’s kingdom. You are no longer going to hell. No, you are justified before God. You are declared righteous in God’s courtroom. You are now a subject of God’s kingdom, a beloved child of the heavenly Father, a member of Christ, an heir of eternal life. All of that is included in the statement, “Your sins are forgiven you.”

Are there any conditions given for this forgiveness? Not a condition, as in, “You have to do something first to earn it!” No, there’s a reason why the Holy Spirit sets a paralytic before us as a prime candidate for receiving the forgiveness of sins. Like paralytics, we are unable to move, unable to earn the forgiveness of sins. But there is a condition, or a component, or an ingredient that does have to be there. All three Gospel writers give us this key detail: When Jesus saw their faith. The Holy Spirit had all three Evangelists record this event and this specific part of the event, because it’s important. When we’re talking about forgiving sins, faith is an essential part of it.

And what is faith? It’s the confidence of the heart that Jesus is good and merciful, willing and able to help, and always faithful to His Word and promise. And faith isn’t our work or our contribution to our forgiveness. It’s simply the thing that has to be there, and it’s worked by God the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the word of Christ. This is why it’s stated so clearly in Scripture that a person is justified before God by faith in Christ Jesus and not by any works of the Law.

That’s so different from what the world thinks is the path to God. Just do your best. Just be a better person today than you were yesterday, and you’ll be fine. Just love everyone. I assure you, that is what the unbelievers in your life think. They probably even think that’s what the Christian faith is all about. So why bother being a Christian? Just be a good person, and you’ll be fine. But you have to tell them the truth. If they would really please God by doing good things, then they’d have to be a whole lot better than they are now. Impossibly better. No, it’s not a person’s record of being good enough that will ever get them to be accepted by God. It’s only faith in Christ Jesus.

And contrition necessarily comes before faith. What does a person have faith in Jesus for or to do? For the forgiveness of sins. That implies that you acknowledge you have sins to forgive. If you want God’s acceptance through faith in Christ, that means you acknowledge you’re not acceptable as you are. And if you want your sins forgiven, that implies that you no longer want to cling to them or defend them or think fondly of them. “Oh, I know that was wrong, but it was no big deal, or it was so much fun!” There can be no faith in Christ for forgiveness if you don’t hate your sin, if you don’t really want that sin to be erased from your past. But where there is contrition, where you yearn for a clean slate, and where you look to Christ in faith for that cleansing, there God is willing and eager to forgive, as Jesus did for the paralytic in our Gospel.

That leads to the other key question. Who has authority to forgive sins—to change a person’s status before God from condemned sinner to forgiven child of God?

Some of the scribes and Pharisees who were crowded into that house in Capernaum raised that issue among themselves. As Luke tells us, they were thinking to themselves, “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” They were exactly right about that. Only God can change a person’s status before God. What they didn’t account for was that God was standing right there in front of them. Yes, Jesus even knew their thoughts, which only God can know. And to prove His divine authority to forgive sins, Jesus asked them, Is it easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Arise and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—then he said to the paralytic, “Arise, take up your bed, and go to your house.” And he did, proving that Jesus, the Son of Man had authority on earth to forgive sins.

Jesus spoke of His authority in other places. The Father has entrusted all judgment to the Son. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. All judgment. All authority. The right to grant life as He pleases, or to hold people’s sins against them. That’s why forgiveness apart from Jesus is impossible, just as forgiveness apart from faith in Jesus is impossible. He and He alone has the authority to forgive sins.

But, if all authority and all judgment has been entrusted to Jesus by God the Father, then doesn’t that mean the same Jesus has the right to share some of that authority with others, if He chooses? And He has chosen!

The text before us is actually a perfect example of what Paul wrote to the Corinthians in 2 Cor. 5: God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not counting men’s sins against them. Now, reconciling the world to Himself doesn’t mean reconciling or forgiving the sins of everyone in the world—or everyone in the room. That’s not what Jesus did in today’s Gospel. But one by one, as the word about Christ brought people to faith, He reconciled them to God through faith. He forgave them their sins.

But then Paul goes on, and God has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Just as God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, so He has appointed ministers, who are Christ’s divine ambassadors to call sinners to repentance and faith in Christ Jesus, and to forgive the penitent and believing.

So Jesus said to His apostles, I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. And again after His resurrection, Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

And so ministers are set in place around the world by Jesus to keep carrying out this ministry of reconciliation, to keep reconciling sinners to God, first by preaching the Law to those who need to hear it, who are secure in their sins at the moment; then by preaching about Jesus, who offered Himself as the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world; and then by acting in Jesus name to forgive sins to those who have faith in Jesus. We can’t “see” faith, as Jesus could, so we are left to rely on a person’s confession of faith. We practiced it again here this morning in a general way. But private confession is also available, if you wish to be reexamined according to God’s Word, have your personal confession of faith heard, and have the absolution pronounced on you directly.

Now, the Christian life doesn’t end there, receiving the forgiveness of sins from Jesus through His appointed ministers. The paralytic was healed. Then what? He got up and walked. Well, St. Paul, in today’s Epistle, touched on the “Now what?” of the Christian life. Now that you’re forgiven, now that you’ve put on the New Man and put off the Old, you get up and walk according to the New Man. Live like forgiven children of God, not like unbelieving children of the devil. You wanted forgiveness for the deeds of the Old Man, right? So why would you continue to live in those deeds? Why wouldn’t you strive to get rid of them, if you wanted forgiveness for them?

There’s much more we could say about that, but we’ll leave it for another sermon, because today’s Gospel gives us enough to think about for the moment. The Christian faith centers around Christ and the forgiveness that He earned for us on the cross and offers to us in the Word and in the Sacraments. So use the ministry of the Word that Christ has instituted! Live in repentance! Believe the Gospel! And then know that the words of Christ always apply to you: Take heart, son, daughter! Your sins are forgiven you! Amen.

Source: Sermons