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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s Gospel Reading is one of those Gospel Readings that, when I am done reading it and say, “This is the Gospel of the Lord”, you may think twice about saying, “Praise to You, O Christ”. Today you heard that Christ list a complete number of evil things that come from within and defile a person, and news of that defilement is the Gospel, the Good News? You want to praise Christ for that? Even the Christ’s declaring all foods clean may seem to be good news really only if you were trying to keep the law’s dietary restrictions, which I do not think any of us were trying to do. Yet, I assure you, that today’s Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St. Mark is the Gospel of the Lord, at least in a broader sense, which includes its showing us our sin, and, as we this morning consider today’s Gospel Reading, I pray and trust that the Holy Spirit uses today’s Reading to apply to us the Gospel also in a narrower sense, which shows us our Savior from sin and so forgives that sin. For, considering today’s Gospel Reading this morning we realize that “Jesus makes defiled people holy”.
You may recall that in last Sunday’s Gospel Reading some Jewish leaders asked Jesus why His disciples did not walk according to the tradition of the elders but ate with defiled hands, after which question Jesus criticized them both for their false worship of God and for their making God’s Word void by their traditions that they hand down. Then, as we heard in today’s Gospel Reading, which picks up where last Sunday’s Gospel Reading left off, Jesus called the crowd to Him again and, more or less answering the Jewish leaders, told the people that nothing outside of a person by going in defiles the person, but that the things that come out of a person are what defile the person. And, when Jesus had entered a house and left the crowd of people, His disciples asked Him about what He said, and He essentially gave them two answers, corresponding to the two parts of what He had said to the crowd. Jesus’s first statement, with its “anatomy lesson” of a sort, explained that what goes into a person cannot defile the person because it enters the person’s stomach not the person’s heart, and Jesus’s second statement listed the evil things that come out of the heart and do defile the person.
Perhaps there is some irony in Jesus’s explaining why His disciples did not walk according to the tradition of the elders by eating with defiled hands and His disciples’ not understanding or perceiving what He said. Of course, as they were, by nature so we are: without understanding or correctly perceiving. In the Gospel Reading Jesus emphasizes the sinful nature that we all share and how that sinful nature leads us to all sorts of actual sins of thoughts, words, and deeds: sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. And, those sins against our fellow human beings apparently are not even to mention our sins more directly against God! For any one and all of those sins we deserve both death here and now and torment in hell for eternity.
But, God calls and so enables us to repent: to turn in sorrow from our sinful nature and all our actual sin, to trust Him to forgive our sinful nature and all our actual sin, and to at least want to stop sinning. When we so repent, then God forgives us. God forgives our sinful nature and all our actual sin, whatever our sin might be. God forgives us for the sake of His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. “Jesus makes defiled people holy.”
Jesus Himself was and is holy. The Holy Spirit came upon the Virgin Mary and the power of the Most High overshadowed her, so that the Child born of her was called—and was!—holy, the Son of God (Luke 1:35); demons and later disciples confessed His holiness (Mark 1:24; John 6:69; Acts 3:14). Jesus was tempted in every respect as we are, yet He remained without sin (Hebrews 4:15). From within Jesus, out of His heart, came good thoughts, words, and deeds—not making Him holy but demonstrating that He was holy, undefiled. Jesus perfectly loved God the Father, and Jesus perfectly loved all human beings, including you and me. Jesus loved us in the greatest possible way (John 15:13): taking our sins and the sins of the world to the cross and there dying in our place the death that we deserved. And, Jesus rose from the grave, showing, among other things, that God the Father had accepted His sacrifice on our behalf. When we defiled people repent, then God makes us holy, giving us both the righteousness of Jesus’s actively keeping all of God’s Commandments and the righteousness of Jesus’s passively suffering and dying—all for us!
God makes us holy through His Word and Sacraments. In the words of Psalm 51 quoted in today’s Introit (Psalm 51:7, 10-12; antiphon v.2) and in the Offertory Hymn, we ask God to create in us a clean heart, and God does create in us a clean heart. Especially in Holy Baptism, God washes us thoroughly from our iniquity and cleanses us from our sin. That water and the Word may appear to have little, if any, external benefit, much less any internal benefit, but, received in faith, that water and the Word work forgiveness of sins, rescue from death and the devil, and give eternal salvation. Similarly, when we privately confess to our pastor the sins that we know and feel in our hearts, his touch and words of individual Absolution are as valid and certain, even in heaven, as if Christ our dear Lord dealt with us Himself, for so He does! And, the bread and the wine of the Sacrament of the Altar that are the Body of Christ given for us and the Blood of Christ shed for us are things outside of us that go into us and make us holy, miraculously strengthening and preserving us in body and soul unto life everlasting.
Our new heart and right Spirit begin to at least want to love God and our neighbors as we should love them. Instead of the complete list of vices, we think of the complete list of virtues. As we prayed in the Collect of the Day, God, the source of all that is just and good, nourishes in us every virtue and brings to completion every good intent, that we may grow in grace and bring forth the fruit of good works. Oh, the Christian life is a battle for sure, a battle for which we need the whole armor of God that was described in today’s Epistle Reading (Ephesians 6:10-20). And, though at times we fail in our various battles, as it were, Christ has already won the war. We live in both the forgiveness of sins that we receive from God and in the forgiveness of sins that we in turn extend to one another. As Moses described in the Old Testament Reading (Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9), others see that there is a God near to us Whom we call upon for forgiveness, and they also are drawn to Him.
As we this morning have considered today’s Gospel Reading, we have realized that “Jesus makes defiled people holy”. The Holy Spirit used today’s Gospel Reading not only to show us our sin but also to show us our Savior from sin and so to forgive our sin. Our otherwise sinful hearts, from which come out evil things that defile us, are cleansed and begin to produce good things that give evidence to our saving faith in Jesus Christ. We have peace and joy, now and for eternity. As Jesus said, and as we heard in today’s Appointed Verse (Matthew 5:8), “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” This is the Gospel of the Lord! Praise to You, O Christ!
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +