Quinquagesima (2025)
Pre-Lent • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
0 ratings
· 2 viewsNotes
Transcript
Luke 18:31-43
Luke 18:31-43
My dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, our Lord and Savior speaks to His disciples about His coming suffering and death and resurrection. Though he speaks plainly to them about it, we find that they are confused and uncertain and have no idea what to do with this information, for they find it to be at odds with what they see, and while they could give praise to God for the many healings and miracles that Jesus performed for the sick and demon possessed when it came to His true purpose, they didn’t understand.
The Miracles
They loved the miracles.
Honestly, who wouldn’t? Witnessing Jesus do some amazing things that just astonished everyone. Look he heals a blind man, he made the lame walk, he raise people from the dead, walked on water, fed thousands, the list goes on, who wouldn’t love to witness these things with our own eyes. But they were given for a purpose,
These showed God’s blessing.
That Jesus truly was the one sent by God to accomplish this task, throughout the Old Testament the prophets had miracles that God gave so the people would know who they should listen to, when Elijah calls down fire from heaven, when Daniel is kept safe in the lions den, when Moses stretched out his staff and hand over the red sea and it parted. You knew these were men of God. All these miracles,
They didn’t fit with suffering.
They were about victory, power, might and majesty, and showed the world who the true God is that is over all powers. Why not embrace it and rejoice in the power, might and majesty of God? This is called
Theology of Glory
They wanted to see God’s Power.
They didn’t want the weakness the suffering, the pain, the agony that would come with the Son of man being thrown in jail and put to death on the Cross for sinners. There are still those today who peddle this type of theology, and this
This would be the health / wealth gospel.
That if God is pleased with you, he will bless you with good health, and poverty will be eliminated, and these are the evidence of God’s favor in life. Your life will be blessed in many and various ways. The trouble is we already naturally think like this. We think that God should give us a life that is free from all troubles, and
There’s little room for weakness.
Less for suffering, and barely anything regarding a tortorous painful death, what type of blessed God is that? Think of the endings that we want, we want to be strong in mind and body until the very end and to go suddenly. We don’t want to fade away to nothingness. The
The World’s Desire
What can God do for me today?
This is where our hearts are never satisfied, think about the Israelites in the Exodus, who God had rescued from slavery by a mighty hand, who had been redeemed from their slavery, and yet they complained that today they didn’t have what they wanted. Here the disciples hear about Jesus coming death and crucifixion but they were not yet permitted to understand even though he spoke to them plainly,
That’s because they’re blind.
They see the miracles, the see the glory, they see that Jesus is going to establish a kingdom but what they cannot see is how he will accomplish that without the glory, the wisdom, the strength that all mankind desires. It’s no mistake that right after telling them this that he heals a blind man, it’s ironic, and tragic, for
That’s the power of sin.
It blinds us to the will of God, and has us chase after the things that are valuable to this world, but this world will pass away. We are trying to flee from all those signs of weakness and sin, and convince ourselves that if God loves us, we will never have to suffer in this life, he wouldn’t actually lay any burden upon us in this life.
Many fall away and blame God for they cannot reconcile the fact that God would work through something like the Cross for our good.
Theology of the Cross
This isn’t easy, but it’s good.
It’s hard to describe the theology of the Cross, but it is something that is experienced and lived, and it is most understood when an affliction comes upon us that we do not choose, nor can we let go of it. It is a cross that is laid upon us and it is hard to bear. It can be the result of our sins, or it could be the result of others sins, but the nevertheless we suffer. What happens in the midst of that suffering, and that pain, and that fervent prayer asking God for help, and wondering whether or not He has abandoned us,
We are brought to Christ.
We look and see there with us in that suffering, the pain, the disappointment, and frustration, there is the Son of God who has joined us not only in the good days, and the good times, but He joined with sinners in their darkest hours, that He might fulfill His promise that He would save us, no matter how much it would hurt Him.
It is here we witness Love.
This isn’t the puppy love and infatuation of youth, or just a fleeting feeling that sweeps by lifts us up, and drops us down without a thought. This is True Love that saw you in your darkest hour, and in your most desperate need, He didn’t come to save you when the world was good and perfect and rosy, this is love that stands beside someone and doesn’t forsake or leave us even when friends and family abandon us. This is why we can have hope no matter how dark the day is.
Never Leaving Us
Jesus joined us in life and death.
The good times, but especially the bad, because folks have no issue standing by your side when things are good, and your name is well loved, but Christ knows what it is to be abandoned, and will stay by you. For,
Jesus shared in our suffering.
This is amazing, because in this we know love and what a friend we have in Jesus, we have people who we call friends, but when they run into trouble do we hesitate, and yet we find ourselves approaching the hardest moments of our life, be it the loss of a loved one, or we ourselves approach the valley of the shadow of death, He’s already been there, and won’t abandon us, if all we had were the miracles, the good health, the riches, then Jesus would have only come for those people who are well off, but He
He promised to save you.
Not just on the days where you feel good, or your health is good, but God keeps His promises, whoever believes and is baptized shall be saved, whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and by itself that sounds a bit too good to be true, but then we see that He told His disciples that He would die, and rise again, and Jesus kept this promise.
