Behold, Your Savior Comes :: Matthew 21:1-9
Behold, your king comes to you.
Behold, He has. He is. And He will. Your king comes to you. He comes as Jeremiah proclaimed, because The covenantal love of the Lord never ceases. He comes. His compassions never come to an end ... He continues to come. ... They are new every morning ... He never stops coming. This word (Lam 3:22-23) comforted the believers of the old covenant as they groaned in a different kind of captivity and their temple lay in ruins. And it should give you comfort as you enter a new year and the new temple, seeing your king coming to you again today to set you free.
Although God has for thousands of years shown endless mercy to the whole sinful human race ... though he has pursued some of us with nothing but mercy for years ... though he has overwhelmed us with compassion ... Behold, your king still comes to you in compassion.
If we human beings ever show mercy at all, especially to fellow sinners, it’s only in a limited amount. Too often we hold grudges, and we stop coming. Too often we remember their sins too much, and we stop coming. Too often, when we think we’ve been merciful too many times, we finally say, Enough is enough ... and our mercy comes to an end. We lose our compassion.
The fountain of divine mercy, on the other hand, flows on without interruption; even to those harboring the greatest unthankfulness. He is always coming to us in Holy Baptism. He is always coming to bring us his Holy Supper. This covenantal love never ends. Our Lord is an eternal sea of love. His mercy is always the same. His mercy is as great as it was in the beginning.
God doesn’t think of how much or how long he has put up with us. He doesn’t think how much or how long he has already shown any man, woman, or child mercy. He doesn’t keep score. He doesn’t build a tab that shows how much debt we owe him. He knows we can’t repay.
Instead, every day, God acts as though he had never shown mercy before.
OUR SAVIOR ALWAYS COMES TO YOU
This is our theme. And from it I direct your attention to two points ...
1) Who will come ... and 2) To whom He will come.
If scripture has any comforting word to begin a new Church year, it is this: Jesus ... our Lord, our King, our Savior ... is coming with all his grace as if he had never come to us before. With God’s help, that is what I will try to impress deeply upon your hearts today. To this end may he graciously assist both of us to receive him as he comes.
I
For more than two millennia, Christ has been coming and hasn’t stopped coming to each of us. Thousands ... millions ... ok, billions ... have noticed his presence. But few in the world have actually received him. They spurn his Service of the Word. They spurn his Service of the Sacrament. They spurn his Divine Service. They say these things don’t mean anything. They say they are mere symbols and memorials. They say we don’t need him to come in these ways. They think they can go to him on their own.
Given how the world spurns him so ... can we therefore be certain that in the church year now beginning Christ will come again? Do you think he could become tired of coming after having come so often in vain? Is it possible that the church year we just ended was the last in which he wanted to come?
No! That’s impossible! Jesus never tires of coming. This is one of the messages of Advent. Behold, your king comes.
Today’s Gospel reading from Matthew 21 shows us that. Christ’s coming into Jerusalem is nothing else than a picture of his continual coming to the New Jerusalem, his church, just as he promised in the upper room as he gave us the Lord’s supper. Jesus said, If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my father will love him, and we will come to him, and make our home with him (Jn 14:23).
But is it really so comforting to know that Jesus will come again this new church year ... on his terms, not ours? Is he not the holy Son of God? Are we not sinners who continually come short of the glory of God? Is he not the eternal judge? Is not our conscience burdened with guilt? Must we not expect that, when Jesus comes, he will come in wrath to punish us as we deserve?
It might seem that way as we hang our heads in shame.
But let’s take a closer look at today’s Gospel. How does it describe Jesus who comes?
We read ... Now as they drew near to Jerusalem and came to Bethphage, to the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them: “Go into the village in front of you, and immediately you’ll find a donkey tied, and a colt with her. After you’ve loosed them, bring them to me. And if anyone might say to you what are you doing, you will say, ‘The Lord has need of them,’ and he will send them at once.” Now this happened in order that the word through the prophets may be fulfilled, saying, “Speak to the daughter of Zion: Behold, your king comes to you, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the son under a yoke” (Mt 21:1-5).
Who is this Jesus, who comes? He’s coming as a king. Should we fear him?
Or should we have every reason to await him with longing and welcome him with joy?
Our Gospel certainly pictures Jesus in exaltation. It tells us that he knows all things ... all the thoughts and words of every inhabitant of Bethphage. He knows people will doubt him. It tells us that he is almighty. So he ensured that the owner of those two animals would do his will. But our Gospel also tells us that he didn’t come as a holy judge ... He comes humbly, a king of grace and mercy. Can any truth be more comforting than this one on this first Sunday of the new year?
Think about it. Jesus is coming, even though he knows all your sins. He knows all the sins you did yesterday. He knows all the sins you are doing now. He knows all the sins you will do tomorrow. He knows how black your heart really is. He knows us better than we know ourselves. Yet he comes.
He comes not as a judge who punishes sin, but as a humble king of grace, a savior who comes to forgive you, to blot out all sin, to cover all sin with his blood, to make all sin as white as snow. He comes to hurl sin into the depths of the sea. He comes in the waters of baptism. He comes for the Lord’s supper. He comes because he knows our troubles. ... pain. ... worries. ... fear. ... judgments. ... He has heard our pleas for mercy.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, your savior comes. So lift up your heads and join in the song of jubilation. Greet your savior with songs of praise, evermore singing, Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the anime of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!
II
Now listen to whom he wants to come. Listen to whom he promises to come.
There is no problem in figuring out who that is. It has already been given in our Gospel in clear and simple words: Say to the daughter of Zion, Behold your king comes to you!
Did you hear that? Jesus comes to you! You are the daughter of Zion.
Zion was indeed the name of a mountain, the place where heaven and earth meet. This is one reason the temple was built on Zion’s peak. But the daughter of Zion means the Holy Christian Church. The church has the promise that Jesus will come to her at all times ... today and every Lord’s day. Because we are in him and he is in us, he comes to us ... the new temple.
And he comes to us whenever and wherever his Word is preached and his Sacraments are administered. No daughter of Zion, no church, no salvation, no bliss can be found where these means of grace are not used. Whoever does not use God’s Word and sacraments hopes in vain for Christ’s coming. As Luther tells us in our confessions: He who spurns God’s Word and sacraments has no part in Christ nor Christ in him.
But you haven’t, have you? So rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king comes to you! This is the message that should be announced to the daughter of Zion who has his word and sacraments.
Blessed are all of you who ... not despising God’s word ... have come today to hear it and who long to hear the Word of God diligently in the new year! No matter who you are, no matter how hopeless you may think things are, join those who hear Christ’s Word and come to his sacraments. As we sang to open this Divine Service ...
O Zion’s daughter, rise / To meet your lowly king.
Nor let your faithless heart despise / the peace he comes to bring (LSB 331:3)
The joyous word that Jesus comes in this new church year applies then also to all of you. But despair not, O Sinner ... you ... who in the Auld Lang Syne ... forgot, forsook, or lost your Lord Jesus. You may have broken your promises, but Jesus never breaks his. He still comes. He comes bringing new mercies every day. Cast off the garments of your own righteousness and let Christ trample them under foot. He comes to give you his garment of righteousness.
He who lived for you, who died on the cross for you ... He who rested in the tomb for you and rose again into eternal glory ... He who ascended into the heavens ahead of you to prepare a place for you is coming ... Today, and every day. Brothers and sisters in Christ, behold, the gates of the new year are open. And Jesus our savior comes. Rise and greet him! In Jesus’ name.