Sermon – "Encourage One Another" – Mark 13:1-13 / Hebrews 10:23-25 – 11/15/09
November 16th, 2009Click play to listen to the audio version of this sermon.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
To download the mp3 file, right click the image below and "save as."
In 1996, I had the wonderful opportunity to go to Israel and tour of the Holy Lands. The first two days we toured the city of Jerusalem and the hotel we stayed in was perched right on the top of the Mount of Olives. From the top of the Mount of Olives, you look down on the whole city of Jerusalem. Like all cities, it's expanded outward from Jesus' day. But the city, as it was in Jesus' day is still clearly marked out by the massive wall that surrounds the old city, dating all the way back to the 1st century A.D.
As a 21st century tourist, all you can do is try to imagine what it must have looked like in Jesus' day because all of the buildings that were there then are now gone.
This is where Jesus led his disciples after He left the Temple with them after marveling the faith of a poor widow who put her two copper coins into the Temple treasury. On the way out of the Temple, the disciples marvel at the impressive architecture of the Temple. It had to have been something really. It was one of the seven wonders of the world. Stones of solid granite measuring 36 feet long and 18 feet wide and 12 feet wide and covered in solid gold. They say that the roofing shingles of the Temple were made of solid gold. "Look teacher, what wonderful stones, what massive buildings." They sounded like our tour guide pointing out sites of special interest to Jesus.
What a contrast between the disciples and Jesus. He marvels at the poor, lowly widow and her two copper coins. They marvel at the massive, gold-plated buildings. Jesus tells His wannabe tour guides not to be too impressed by the outward appearance of things. You won't believe how fragile they really are. "Do you see all these great buildings? There will not left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down."
We've come across this before, but here again, we actually know more than the disciples. We know how foolish they were being because what for them was future is for us history. We know that in the year 70 AD., the Roman general Titus attacked the city of Jerusalem for trying to gain its independence from Rome. Titus ordered that all of the buildings in the city be burned. As the Temple burned, all of the gold from the roof and the rocks melted and ran into all of the cracks and crevices between the massive stones and Titus ordered that every stone be overturned so that all of the gold could be confiscated.
Jesus is the ultimate tour guide. He doesn't tell us the history of what we see. He tells us the future as though it were history. And that ought to affect our life in the present.
As He looks down on the city, He's sees what I saw. No temple. Just a Muslim Mosque. His disciples look down on the city and the Temple and marvel at the sight of it all. Jesus cries at the sight of it all. "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem. How often I have longed to gather you as a hen gathers her chicks. But you were not willing."
Four of the twelve were listening and they want to know, "when will these things be, and what will be the sign when all these things are about to be accomplished?" And Jesus answers, expect to see false messiahs, false teaching, many led astray, wars and threats of war, rising international tensions, increasing natural disasters and religious persecution.
But now we're confused. We wonder, is He talking about the future? Because it sure seems like all that stuff is going on in the present and has been going on in the past. How are we to understand these words of our Lord? Is He talking about the fall of the Temple in Jerusalem? Or is He talking about you, whom the Holy Spirit has made His Temple?
I suspect that every age and each generation thinks that things are worse than they were and that we must be right on the brink of the end of the world. "I'm glad I don't have to raise kids now a days. We never had these kinds of problems back when we were kids." Somehow, the 'old days' are always the 'good old days.'
But frankly, Jesus doesn't say that things are going to get worse and worse. In fact, He says that we shouldn't mistake these things as signs of the end. "Do not be alarmed. This must take place, but the end is not yet." Jesus says, "These are but the beginning of birth pains." When you see these things taking place, labor has just begun and what you're feeling is just the beginning of contractions. This world's been in labor for a long time.
Just try complaining about the natural disasters that threaten us today to Noah. Ask the prophets like Jeremiah and Hosea and Joel if false teachers ever led God's people astray in their day. If it seems like we're constantly at war, you can bet that men like Joshua and David would be able to say, 'I know just what you mean.' Brother has been delivering brother over to death every since Cain killed his brother Abel. And if it seems to us that this world is becoming more and more hostile towards Christians, then maybe we need a history lesson about how the prophets and apostles have been treated and how there have been faithful in every age who have faced persecution and martyrdom.
We could talk about the reasons for all of the trouble in the world and why Christians are bound to face persecution for their faith. But Jesus doesn't do that here, and so neither will we. He'll leave a lot of the explaining the reason for the trouble we face up to Paul and Peter and James who explain that the underlying cause behind all of this is the devil and our own sinful nature.
What Jesus is interested more than anything else here, is that in the midst of all of this, His disciples persevere in faith. It's a dangerous world out there. "See that no one leads you astray." "But be on your guard." "The one who endures to the end will be saved."
It is very easy to get eaten up by all of this. Reading about all of these things in the paper is one thing, but sooner or later these things come very close to us all. And they raise all kinds of doubts in our heart. They make us angry. They make us afraid. And doubts lead to suspicion and suspicion to rejection. And anger leads to hatred and hatred to murder. And fear leads to withdrawing and withdrawing leads to lovelessness.
These things can swallow up our faith and we can grow cold and die. And Jesus is fully aware of this and says, "See that no one leads you astray." "But be on your guard." "The one who endures to the end will be saved."
Warning! Warning! This is not a pep-talk. Jesus is not a cheerleader, cheering on His team to 'hold that line.' He hasn't made you and purchased you with His blood and given you the gift of faith to let you take care of yourself and do the best you can. What a waste of His precious work that would be. He sustains and keeps you in this one true faith until life everlasting. It's all Christ at work in you. So when you come to the end of your life and wake up in heaven, all you can say is, "thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ my Lord."
But we want to explore how Christ is at work to keep us from going astray and sustain us to the end. And to do that we need to switch trains. We need to get off the Mark train and board the Hebrews train and lets all take out our bible and turn to our Epistle reading for this morning – Hebrews 10:23-25. (Page 1007) Let's read these three verses out loud together please. "Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near." (Heb.10:23-25).
The author of Hebrews is writing to believers. Believers just like you and me who live in a dangerous world where all the things that Jesus has just described happen on a daily basis. How do we remain on guard so that no one leads us astray? How do we endure in the faith we have been given to the end?
First, he says that we must always "hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering." The confession of our hope is that Jesus Christ is the One who is telling us what this world is like. He knows that this is a dangerous world and He knows the trials and troubles that we are faced with. And He knows because He has entered this world and has become a full participant in it with us.
Never has this world treated anyone more terribly than it has Jesus Christ – who created the world. This dangerous world ate Him up. It swallowed Him up. But look! "Christ is risen!" "He is risen indeed!" Alleluia! This dangerous world with all its trials and troubles has no dominion over Him. He has overcome this dangerous world by His cross and tomb. And He delivers you from all evil. "He who promised is faithful." "Hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering."
Holding fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, is not something that we can do independently or individually. It happens in the community of believers. "And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near."
This "meeting together" of "one another" is the local Christian congregation. This is the visible, physical, "meeting together" of the "one another," who have been redeemed for "one another" and brought to "one another" by our Lord – Jesus Christ. It is in and through this community that Jesus works in us, individually and collectively, by His washing of regeneration in Holy Baptism, by His Word and Promise, by His body and blood, "to strengthen and preserve us in this one true faith to life everlasting."
This community is the "communion of saints." This is where we receive the strength to live by faith in troubled times and where we give the power to live by the same faith to "one another." God has put His Word and Promise into the mouth of men and women to speak to one another. We need to be with other believers who "stir us up to love and good works" by speaking Christ to us.
I find this to be true in a very practical way. In my daily devotions, I very often use the ancient prayer services of the Church to accompany my reading of the Word. But frankly, as I confess my sins to God in prayer, it's pretty hard to pronounce the words of Absolution on myself – "I forgive me all my sins." When I come to the Benediction, it's just a little too weird and strange to say to myself, "The Lord bless me and keep me. The Lord make His face, shine upon me and be gracious to me." You get the idea.
Brothers and sisters, the Word of Christ from my lips to my heart is always weaker than the word of Christ that comes from your the lips to my heart. And isn't this why God has given us not only ears to hear but also lips to speak? To speak His Word that keeps us and sustains us in this one true faith to one another.
So, let us "not neglect this meeting together, as is the habit of some, but encourage one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near."
Related Entries:
» Sermon Index – Lutheran – LCMS» Penetcost 13 – "The Lord's Discipline" – Hebrews 12:4-17 – 8-22-10
» Sermon – Ash Wednesday – "The 40 Days of Lent" – Hebrews 3:13 – 4:6 – 2/25/09
» Sermon – Thanksgiving – "Remembering To Remember" – Deuteronomy 8:1-10 – 11/21/07
» Sermon – Pentecost 2 – " The Power of the Gospel" – Romans 1:8-17 – 5/28/08
» Sermon – Lent 5 – "A Ransom For Many" – Mark 10:32-45 – 3/29/09
