Mark 1:1–8

December 11 2013 Sermon Midweek 2

¹The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. ²As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, "Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way, ³the voice of one crying in the wilderness: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,'" ⁴John appeared, baptizing in the wilderness and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. ⁵And all the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. ⁶Now John was clothed with camel's hair and wore a leather belt around his waist and ate locusts and wild honey. ⁷And he preached, saying, "After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. ⁸I have baptized you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."

Responsory from page 255

Grace, mercy, and peace from God our heavenly Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The text is from the reading from St. Mark:

And he preached, saying, "There's coming after me the mightier man than I—I am not worthy to stoop down to loose the strap of the sandal of him. I myself baptized you in water, but he will baptize you in the Holy Spirit." (Mk 1:7–8, author's translation)

The mightier man than John the Baptist. That's saying something! "All the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to him and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins" (v 5). They weren't going out to see wonders, nor to be healed, but to confess their sins.

Not only their sinfulness, but their sins. Can you imagine the mighty influence that would compel so many people to flock to the Jordan? John was a phenomenon. He was filled with the Holy Spirit before he was born, and he was the greatest prophet in the Old Testament. He even stood up to King Herod Antipas concerning the king's adultery. I'd say that's mighty.

But John was only the warm-up act. "He preached, saying, 'There's coming . . .' " (v 7, author's translation). This is nothing. John preached that he wasn't worthy to be Jesus' slave. Knowing that Jesus was perfect man, free from sin, John said, "I'm not worthy to stoop down to loose the strap of his sandal" (v 7, author's translation). Why? Because it was God's sandal. God has sandals. That's doctrine. It means God came as our brother. He is one of us. He became a man. I can say John preached the incarnation, but I can be even more specific:

John Preached the Doctrine of the Personal Union of Christ; the doctrine that God has become man and this is the significance that he wears sandals just like us.

I.

John preached the personal union of Christ to terrify comfortable sinners who haven't faced the fact that God has sandals. What do I mean by terrify comfortable sinners? We're all glad that he humbly walked in those sandals all the way to Jerusalem and made salvation available to us anytime we want it. "Comfort, comfort my people" (Is 40:1). It's comforting to get up in the morning and know Jesus is there just in case we want to pray. It's comforting to get up on the Lord's Day and know Jesus will be in our midst should we want to gather in his name.

But, It's also comforting to ignore Jesus when his words make us uncomfortable, and comforting to dodge devotions when it's uncomfortable to stoop down and pray. It's comforting to skip church when we're too comfortable to stoop down and inconvenience ourselves. Because, after all, Jesus has sandals. He's my friend. He's one of us. He's my personal Savior, and he respects my personal choice not to stoop down to him unless I feel like it. He's such a nice guy and loving friend that he would never bring me to judgment for what I do or say or think. He's nice to have around just in case I need a friend.

"But [John] preached, saying, 'There's coming after me the mightier man than I—I am not worthy to stoop down to loose the strap of the sandal of him" (v 7, author's translation). John wasn't comfortable around Christ. He knew too much.

What is it that makes us too comfortable around Christ to fear him? It's false comfort. We would never say it was our doctrine. We would never say our faith was weak or lacking. Everyone who claims to be a Christian and is comfortable dodging devotions and skipping church claims to have correct doctrine and plenty of faith. But it's false doctrine. It's false comfort. It is dying faith.

If that's you, this is the problem: You don't believe John's preaching. You don't buy his doctrine of the personal union, the Jesus is not only your personal savior and good friend, but he is also true God, holy, righteous, and the one who will sit on the judgment seat to judge you.

"There's coming after me the mightier man than I." Jesus, enthroned upon the cherubim, came after John. He came into time after John and into space with John and the rest of us mortals. But he was still mightier than John. How mighty? "Say to the cities of Judah, 'Behold your God!' Behold, the Lord God comes with might, and his arm rules for him; behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him" (Is 40:9–10). How mighty? "John bore witness about him, and cried out, 'This was he of whom I said, "He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me" ' " (Jn 1:15).

You can't dodge the Jesus with sandals without dodging the Jesus who is God. You can't skip gathering in the name of the Jesus who submitted to John's Baptism, without skipping the worship of the Son who is equal to the Father, who created John, who created you, and knows all the lies of false comfort that we swallow. When they plotted against Jesus, they accused him of falsely claiming to be equal with God. When we ignore Jesus' divinity, we accuse him of being inferior to God too. Don't we sometimes act as if we were mightier than he by trying to keep him out of our life? As if we could let him have some parts of our lives and not other parts.

Advent means that God incarnate is coming to make all things right: "The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come"—with his sandals and scars—"like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed" (2 Pet 3:9–10). That's who John baptized in the Jordan. "Behold your God!" (Is 40:9).

But just as John preached that personal union to terrify comfortable sinners, he preached to comfort terrified sinners. Sometimes, especially when we suffer, we talk about God as though he didn't know anything about human suffering, as though he were above it, as though he didn't still have scars to go with his sandals. You can agree that Jesus is God and still reject the doctrine of the personal union. The doctrine of the personal union is that God in the highest—in a body like yours, in his humiliation of being inferior to the Father—was made complete through suffering. His suffering is more important to you than your own.

Sometimes, especially when we get impatient in our struggle with temptation, we talk about him as though he is not aware of our struggles. The doctrine of the personal union is that God in the highest—in a body like yours, in his humiliation of being inferior to the Father, was sorely tempted in all temptations that you have suffered. His resisting temptation actually has more to do with your salvation than your giving in to temptation.

"Behold the man!" (Jn 19:5). God incarnate, mighty in sandals; mighty in thorns, to keep our heads crowned with innocence and glory; mighty in blood, with which he washed our sins away; mighty on the cross, more human, more dying, more guilty than any of us; mighty, risen, and ascended, bone of your bone, flesh of your flesh, still God incarnate, and still coming. "He will tend his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms" (Is 40:11).

When you were baptized, "he saved [you], . . . by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on [you] richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace [you] might become [an heir] according to the hope of eternal life" (Titus 3:5–7). John preached, "He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit" (Mk 1:8). St. Paul preached the same thing in the synagogue in Pisidia, "Let it be known to you therefore, brothers, that through this man forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you" (Acts 13:38).

Here's the real comfort. There is coming the man mightier than you. His human life is mightier than the record of your past, and his human crucifixion is mightier than all your sins. His human resurrection is mightier than your death, and his human intercession is mightier than every power ranged against you, and his body and blood are mightier than all your doubts!

"Comfort, comfort my people" (Is 40:1). "Make ready the way of [His] only-begotten Son, that by His coming we may be enabled to serve [him] with pure minds" (Collect, LSB Altar Book, p. 650). He's coming now. God the Son assumed the body and blood into personal union with his divine person when Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit inside the Virgin Mary, making that body and blood his own. "Behold your God!" One holy mystery called the sacramental union. Perfect God and perfect man; I'm not worthy to stoop down and prepare this bread and this cup, but he who baptized you in the Holy Spirit will come with his Father and make his home in you (Jn 14:23). "One Lord, one faith, one baptism" (Eph 4:5), for "we, though many, are one body in Christ" (Rom 12:5)!

That's called the mystical union, "for we all partake of the one bread" (1 Cor 10:17).

See what comfort the personal union started? You, in mystical union with Christ, will now eat and drink the sacramental union! Perfect God and perfect man—not two, but one Christ, all the fullness of God—bodily (Col 2:9). "Comfort, comfort my people." Amen.