Text: Mark 14:12-26
Beloved
in Christ, during our Lenten midweek services we have been looking at various
aspects of the fruit of the Spirit. Altogether there are nine, and they can be
grouped into clusters of three. First are the three general internal attitudes
that permeate our being: love, joy, and peace. Next come the three attitudes
that help us deal with external matters, especially when people are less than
nice toward us: patience, kindness, and goodness. And then there are the last
three, which help us to have the fortitude and persistence to live as new
creations in Christ: faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Within those
last three, we see a different relationship emphasized: we are to be faithful
to God, gentle toward others, and possessing self-control with respect to our
own selves.
Tonight
we speak of gentleness. You could also translate it “meekness,” for it comes
from the same root as the word “meek” that we read in the Beatitudes: “Blessed
are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” People who are gentle
or meek are not arrogant. They don’t think that other people exist purely for
their own pleasure. They don’t stomp on others just so that they can get their
own way.
Well,
what do we learn about meekness or gentleness from tonight’s readings? As
always, that virtue is to be found in our Lord Jesus Christ. Since He is the
holy Son of God in human flesh, you wouldn’t expect anything less out of Him. He
submitted Himself wholly to the law. But more than that, He kept what the law
did not even demand. He was meek and gentle toward us human beings when that
was not required. God had commanded, “love your neighbor as yourself.”
But Christ went beyond the call of duty in loving others wholeheartedly and in
a sacrificial way. He did not pull rank on us, but “humbled Himself by
becoming obedient, even to the point of death.”
I
mention Christ’s meekness for a couple of reasons. First, He does indeed serve
as an example of real Christian virtue and the fulfillment of the law. That is
why the Scriptures commend Christ’s humble obedience and urge us to have the
same mind that Christ did. But there is a second reason to mention His meekness
and that is to enjoy the fruits of all that He has done. He was meek not merely
so that we also could be meek. He was meek so that we could be saved. For He
knew that the only way to redeem an arrogant humanity was by embracing the way
of gentleness and meekness.
In
today’s gospel we see three traces of His gentleness and meekness, one in each
of the larger paragraphs. First, He humbly celebrated the Passover in rented
space. He could have demanded the biggest hall in the city. He could have
ordered Herod or some other dignitary to invite Him to their Passover feast.
Instead He allowed Himself to be hosted in an ordinary home. He also kept the
festival in the generally expected manner. Nothing in this paragraph seems
remarkable—and that is what makes it all the more remarkable. This was going to
be our Lord’s last Passover and the night that He would institute the Lord’s
Supper. This was going to be the grand finale. But He didn’t book a place at
the swankiest downtown hotel, but chose an ordinary home.
But
there is an even deeper gentleness that we see in the next paragraph, where He
tried to convince Judas not to betray Him. Now His disciples would do all sorts
of things: they would deny Him and run away from Him. And so elsewhere He
warned the disciples to be on the alert not to yield to temptation. Nonetheless,
it is Judas’ sin that looms large. A faltering cowardice of a hasty moment can
perhaps be undone by later bravery, but premeditated treason is so permanent.
It is not that Judas was contemplating an unpardonable sin, something that even
Christ couldn’t countenance atoning. No, his act of betrayal would scar him in
a more profound way than other sins would. And our Lord would use all of His
gentle persuasion to try to restrain Judas from his course.
Let
me take a moment to talk about why Jesus had to deal with Judas’ sin. You may
have heard the saying, “All sins are equal” and wondered why Jesus dealt so
seriously with Judas. Well, the saying is both true and false. That is to say,
there is something true about it and something utterly misleading and false. It
is true that all sin is equal in a certain sense. Every sin—from disobeying the
smallest traffic sign to committing the most gruesome murder—is a sign of our
innate selfishness and is therefore damnable. Furthermore, there is no such
thing as one isolated sin, as if a person could live entirely righteously
except commit one tiny, little boo-boo. Because sin comes out of our
self-centeredness, there is no way that it can take place in isolation. Sin is
like mold that has gotten into the walls. You see black spots appearing here
and there and you may be able to paint over it and block it for a while. But
the wall is moldy through and through, and it is going to manifest itself
again. In the same way we bear a sinful nature that is going to show itself
again and again. The fact that we keep it from popping up in certain ways
doesn’t mean that we’ve solved the problem. Every sin, therefore, is an
indication of a deeper problem, and thus all sins are equal.
But
in another sense not all sins are equal. A flash of anger and a murder have the
same root cause, but a murder has more devastating consequences for both the
perpetrator and the victim. That is why Christ did not treat Judas’ betrayal in
the same way He treated the other disciples’ abandonment of Him. He knew that
Judas would afterwards wish that he had never been born and would end his life
in despair. Christ didn’t want that to happen. And so gentleness doesn’t mean
that we ignore sin. It would have been so much easier for Christ to have
ignored what Judas was contemplating. After all, Jesus was going to the cross
one way or another, so what difference could Judas’ act of betrayal make? But
Jesus gently appealed to Judas not to give in to this sin, for it would have
devastating consequences. Because Jesus loved Judas, He couldn’t ignore his
sin.
Indeed,
He couldn’t ignore our sin, either. And this leads us into the third paragraph,
where we see a third aspect of our Lord’s gentleness. He deals with our sin by
going to the cross and by giving us His body and His blood for the forgiveness
of sins. The words our Lord spoke instituting the Lord’s Supper draw the two
together. On the one hand, He had to deal objectively with sin. He had to be
given into death and pour out His blood so that the penalty for sin could be
dealt with once and for all. If Christ had not done these things, it would have
been pointless for Him to institute the sacrament. Even if He gave His body and
blood, it would mean nothing without His death creating a way for us to stand
before God. Indeed, without His death for our sin, this feast would only
terrify us, for we would be receiving the body and blood of the holy Son of
God, even though we were under God’s wrath and condemnation. So, on the one
hand, Christ had to deal with our sin once and for all, and He did so on the
cross.
On
the other hand, it would do us no good if Christ had made atonement for our
sins, but then didn’t connect us with that forgiveness. If He kept it a secret,
it would do us no good. If He told us about this forgiveness, but never let us
access it, it would do us no good. But He has given us His Word and the
sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper so that we can have access to this
forgiveness and grace. In His Word He does more than inform us about the
possibility of forgiveness. He conveys the very forgiveness He has won. Through
His Word He speaks to us, “I forgive you all your sins.” He has commissioned
pastors in particular to preach and to teach His Word—not as mere information,
but as the living voice of God, pronouncing holy and forgiven those for whom
Christ has died. He has also given us baptism and the Lord’s Supper so that we
can receive this grace in a very personal way. I mean no slight to the Word of
God, but the Word is spoken to all. It is a message to all, not just to me. But
when I was baptized, I was united with Christ and His death, burial, and
resurrection. And when I receive the Lord’s Supper, I myself encounter Christ’s
body and blood that had won my salvation.
But
then we see more of our Lord’s meekness and gentleness in doing both these things:
dying for us on the cross and giving us His body and blood. Dying for us would
have been more than a kind and gentle way to treat us. But He shows His great
gentleness toward us in that He continues to serve us after His resurrection.
If we had done such a mighty feat as our Lord had done, we might have said,
“I’m glad that’s over with. Now let me forget about humanity and enjoy my
retirement.” But Christ continues to treat us gently. He meekly comes to us in
a way that we cannot see or fully explain and gives us His body and His blood.
He does this all because He knows that we need it.
And
so, beloved in Christ, we benefit greatly from our Lord’s gentleness toward us.
I pray that you would relish His meekness and be moved to show a similar
gentleness toward other people whom you meet. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
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