Posted On: May 21st, 2006 at 1:15 am
Sixth Sunday of Easter Trinity Lutheran Church 21 May 2006 Murdock, NE
+ Jesu Juva +
1 John 4:1-11
“Don’t believe every spirit.” Loads of spirits around. Spirit of the Antichrist spirits. Which you’ve heard is coming and already is in the world. St. John, eminent apostle and pastor, tackles this naughty Antichrist “spirit” stuff that threatens the dear Christian people under his care. And you too. False prophets. False teaching. False preaching. The Antichrist. As it was then, so it is today.
So “don’t believe every spirit.” Instead “test them” to see if they’re from God.
Test them. Put them to the test. Find out what these spirits say about Jesus. That’s the theological white glove test. It’s really quite simple. What kind of Jesus do you spirits confess?
So spirits – tell us! Is your Jesus the God-Man? I.E. did Jesus, eternally begotten of the Father, became a man? Did He take on flesh and blood like you and me? Was God Jesus conceived in the womb of the Virgin Mary? Carried full term in her womb? Born with eyes, ears, mouth, fingers, toes? Did God Jesus physically suffer under the judgment of Pontius Pilate? Was His Body brutally beaten? Viciously crucified? And most of all, did God Jesus die – stone cold dead on the Cross? And then on the third day rise in His Body from the dead?
The false prophets will very religiously say: “Of course not! We’re offended and hurt! How could you even ask such questions? God can’t change! He’s immutable. God can’t become a human. The infinite cannot become finite. God doesn’t mess with all the ugly, grubby, revolting stuff down here. He’s stays where it’s nice, neat, and beautiful. God taking on nasty flesh? Are you kidding me? Then He wouldn’t be God anymore!”
Well, there you have it. The spirit of the Antichrist spirit’s answer is a resounding: “No!” And what kind of Jesus are they left with? What’s the Jesus they confess? A Jesus without flesh and blood. A Jesus who isn’t human at all.
Protect yourself from a Jesus who isn’t fully human and you’re left holding the salvation bag all by yourself. It’s all up to you to get to God Jesus who’s way up there but not down here. It’s up to you to be more like God since He can’t be like you. It’s up to you to become more like God until you’re one with Him – leaving your humanness behind – to become divine. Jesus is nothing. You’re quest to leave your humanity in order to become divine is everything. You’re your own savior. This truly is the spirit of error – the spirit of the Antichrist!
The opposite is the Christ: Jesus. God Himself. Comes all the way down. He takes on human flesh. Jesus is Immanuel: God with us. Nurses at Mary’s breasts. Lies in the manger. Dies on the Cross. He is with us in the muck and work of our lives so much that His skin smokes! (Dr. Luther, WA 4:608,32-609,1) That’s how truly human He is. Apart from this man Jesus there is no God!
And He’s for you. He is the propitiation for your sins. That means your sins are answered for. The wages your sins earned – death and hell – have been paid to Jesus. In his physical, fleshly, bloody, bodily death on the Cross.
What love! A God Jesus who takes on flesh size love. God Jesus – who for us men and for our salvation became man. A while we were yet sinners Christ died for us love. Listen again to the text: “This is love. Not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”
Your sins are forgiven. All of them. There’s none God-Man Jesus didn’t die for. You are a new creation in Christ. For you are baptized into His Good Friday death. You eat His Good Friday Body and drink His Good Friday Blood.
And now there is the life of being the human God created and redeemed you to be. “Beloved, let us love one another . . . Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”
Loved by God in the body of Christ Jesus on the Cross, you are free to be human. Free to live in the places God has put you. Not to run away from your creatureliness in order to climb the ladder to become divine! You are set free in Christ to live where you are AS A HUMAN. The very person that God created and died for.
Free you are TO LOVE those God has put into your life. Your wife or husband needs your love. So do your children. Your neighbor who is sick. Your brother, sister or cousins. Your grandchildren. They too need your love.
The love comes in kisses and hugs. It comes in helping with the homework, or playing a game of catch. The love is teaching your neighbor to pray, taking them to Sunday School and church, and helping them to use Christ against their sins. Loving one another is providing a meal, sending a card, saying a prayer and offering a shoulder to cry on. Sometimes the love comes by offering a nice cold one after a long hard day.
You are of God little children. You really are. He created you. He died for you. Your sins are answered for in the body of God Jesus hanging on the Cross. This is the truth.
So go ahead. It’s all right. Enjoy and embrace the freedom He gives. In Christ you are new creations. And this new creation life looks like this: faith in Jesus who took on flesh to die for you and fervent love toward one another.