Trinity 6
Beloved. Our text today comes from St. Isaiah at a time of OT history when God’s people were on the verge of being conquered by the Assyrian Empire. The northern kingdom of Israel had indeed been conquered by the Assyrians and brought into exile and never heard of again in history. But through the preaching of St. Isaiah, the Lord was calling the southern kingdom of Judah to repentance; and the Lord was giving the people of Judah, and Jerusalem its capital, the promise that the Assyrians would not conquer and destroy them. Our text is part of the section in which the Lord, through the prophet Isaiah, tells of the incompetence of Assyria to destroy Judah. The mighty Assyrians are unable to destroy—and in contrast, the Lord is able to and will create and save a faithful people. This shows the superiority of the Lord to any and all worldly powers.
This theme—that the Lord will create and save a faithful people—is a theme that we find in our readings. In the Epistle we hear of God creating and saving a faithful people in the waters of holy baptism: We were therefore buried with him by this baptism into his death, so that just as he was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too would also walk in a new life. Our baptism unites us with Jesus in His death and resurrection. We come out of the baptismal waters raised to a new life. God creates us anew in baptism as His faithful people who love Him, who strive to do His will and who, in the faith baptism creates, receive Jesus’ perfect holiness/ righteousness. And that’s how, as Jesus says in today’s Gospel, our righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and experts in the law. Our righteousness before God is the perfect righteousness of Jesus that we receive in faith. Through faith, we receive both the forgiveness of our sin and the perfect holiness of Jesus.
Now, since we through faith receive the forgiveness of sin and the perfect holiness of Jesus, since through faith our righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and experts in the law, does that mean that we can live any way we want, that sin doesn’t matter? Absolutely not! Hear again St. Paul in the epistle: We died to sin. How can we go on living in it any longer? Again—remember what our baptism is. It is us dying and being buried with Jesus—baptism unites us with Jesus. And it is us being raised with Jesus as new people, people of God who are empowered and led by the Holy Spirit to fight against sin in our life and live a life of good works.
Our baptism is us dying to sin and rising again to a life of holiness. That’s God’s work of creating us to be His people. We are now in baptism His dear children and heirs of heaven. We have both an inward righteousness and an outward righteousness. Our inward righteousness is that in Jesus our sins are forgiven us; we are cleansed and Jesus’ perfect keeping of the law is credited to us. And our outward righteousness is our life of fighting sin and of good works. God’s holiness calls for our holiness; because God is holy, we too are to be holy.
For us Christians, then, our baptism is the foundation of our life of holiness. Remember: in baptism God brings us into His holy family, the Church; He creates and saves a faithful people. Shouldn’t we then resemble our heavenly Father in holiness? And this is not something that is unpleasant or burdensome to the Christian. As Christians we have the glorious certainty that in Jesus things are right between us and God. As Christians we have that most glorious comfort of the forgiveness of sins and we have the firm hope of heaven. And it is this that leads us to strive to live a God-pleasing life. The forgiveness of our sins makes us hate our sin all the more and makes us fight against them and temptation all the more. A Christian does not see the forgiveness of sins as a license to sin or an excuse to sin—since they’re all forgiven anyway. Because of the forgiveness of our sins we are no longer a willing servant of sin. For in baptism we have been born from above; now through the faith baptism worked, our heart is right with God. And from this new heart of ours that is right with God, we in love, gladly and willingly, conform ourselves to what God requires of us in His law. The good works we do, the right things we do, all flowing out of our love for the Lord who saved us, shows the reality of our faith—that our faith is truly there.
But if someone claims to be a Christian and child of God and hopes for heaven but willingly lives a life of sin, not caring that they sin and live an ungodly life, that person is a liar as St. John clearly writes [1 John 2.4]: Whoever says, “I know Him” but does not keep His commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in Him. Also our Lutheran Confessions state [SA III, III, 4]: If sin does what it wants, the Holy Spirit and faith are not present.
In our text, St. Isaiah gives concrete day in day out examples of holiness—or to tie in the other readings: our text gives us examples of living out baptism's daily life of holiness. Our text: He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly, who despises the gain of oppressions, who shakes his hands, lest they hold a bribe, who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed and shuts his eyes from looking on evil. To walk righteously is a general statement that true righteousness of life is practiced in every way; that righteousness/ a life in accord with God’s law/ will is a characteristic of the life of the baptized—and again, how can it not be since in baptism we were given the Holy Spirit. To speak uprightly means that we don’t lie to one another and there’s no hypocrisy in our words. But it also means that the words we speak agree with our inward feelings—that is, that we truly say nice things because we mean them because they flow from a heart of love; and if we say something “harsh” it is said also out of love, gentleness and humility in the hopes of warning or correcting a person caught up in sin. To despise the gain of oppressions means that from our very heart we despise the notion of and want nothing to do with getting rich by doing something wrong. And that shows itself in outward actions—even by shaking the hands so they cannot hold a bribe. Our outward actions make the occasion of sin impossible—like shaking the hands so that even if the bribe were pressed or “forced into” the hand, it would fall out. And here too, by extension, we see that the holy life the Christian lives is a life of quiet reliance on the Lord—not on bribes or other questionable ways of “getting ahead”. And then our lives of holiness, grounded on our baptism means that they are characterized by us stopping our ears from hearing bloodshed and shutting our eyes from looking on evil. This doesn’t mean that we are willfully ignorant of the evil in the world around us. But by shutting our eyes and ears, we want no part of it. We don’t want any part of revenge, hatred, violence. We don’t look on with delight in sin, nor do we want to participate; we don’t sanction or give in to it; and certainly we don’t want to become hardened to sin. Instead by shutting our eyes and ears to sin, that means that we have an aversion to sin—and as St. Paul writes [1 Cor. 13.6]: Love does not rejoice in iniquity.
What does all this mean? It means that our baptism where God gave us a new birth from above and saved us; where we were connected with Jesus, buried and raised with Him into a new holy life; where we died to sin and received the Holy Spirit to lead us into a life of faith and good works--Baptism has meaning and significance. It is the foundation of our daily life of holiness. And what is so glorious, is that God both treasures and rewards these works—these good works that He Himself leads us into and strengthens us to do. Not only does our Lord forgive us our sins, but, in grace, He delights in and rewards our works of holiness.
What does St. Isaiah say in our text? Precisely the righteous one, or as we would say—our Lord’s dear baptized Christian living out his/her baptism in a life of faith and good works, precisely that one will dwell on the heights; his place of defense will be the fortresses of rocks; his bread will be given him; his water will be sure. Your eyes will behold the king in his beauty; they will see a land that stretches afar. Living out our baptismal life of holiness leads the Lord, in His grace toward us, to bless us. Or to put it differently, in grace, the Lord in baptism gave us the gift of faith and His Holy Spirit who enables us to live a life of holiness and the Lord blesses us for this holiness!
And what does that blessing consist of? He will dwell on the heights; his place of defense will be the fortresses of rocks. A fortress high among the rocks and cliffs is a picture of the ultimate protection. It is a place of perfect security. It’s a place inaccessible to the enemy. No enemy can sneak up on you—you can see them coming a long ways away. No enemy can easily get to you—they first would have to climb up the high rocks and cliffs and what sort of great weaponry can they bring? How easily they can be picked off!
And what is this a picture of? It’s a picture of our baptismal grace, that is, that now as our Lord’s dear Christian, we are dwelling under His protection. That means that the holy almighty God is protecting us and working all things for our spiritual and eternal good. In baptism, He has claimed us and made us His own. He has placed us in the stronghold of His Church. That means that in His Church He will protect us—this is not some superstitious notion like the building here won’t collapse on us. But rather it means, that the Lord will work mightily through His holy word as we faithfully and diligently make use of it. He will warn of our sin and call us to repentance. He will warn us of the approach of the devil and his temptations and He will make us wise lest we are deceived by the devil; He will strengthen us in time of temptation to resist sin; and He will lead us and strengthen us again for our lives of holiness.
Notice how this image of the inaccessible fortress at the rocky heights—the ultimate picture of our Lord’s protection—leads into the next image: he will dwell on the heights; his place of defense will be the fortresses of rocks. The top of the rocky height is no place for a garden or babbling brook—so what: his bread will be given him; his water will be sure. The Lord gives the sustenance! Again a beautiful picture of the Church. In the Church, as His dear Baptized Christians, not only is the Lord protecting us from all harm and danger, but He is also providing for us. His bread will be given him. That bread that the Lord gives us in the Church is Himself—Christ Jesus the Bread of Life and He does so through His holy word and Sacraments. In the Blessed Sacrament, Jesus literally gives us Himself—His Body and Blood—uniting Himself with us and giving us His gifts of forgiveness of sin, life, salvation.
And in the Church his water will be sure. In the Church, we live in our baptismal grace; in the absolution we are washed clean from our sin again and anew, clothed once again in our baptismal purity.
In the Church—and the Church alone—does Jesus reveal Himself as to who He really is: the Son of God and the Savior of the world. Our text: Your eyes will behold the king in his beauty; they will see a land that stretches afar. We see Jesus in His true beauty—love; with the eyes of faith we see Him crowned with glory and honor wondrously reigning over His Church blessing us and ruling all things for our good. Now by faith we see His glorious beauty, but one day we will see Him in all His divine beauty and splendor with our own eyes.
All this because of His grace to us in holy Baptism in which He called us into holiness and which will culminate in our perfect holiness one day with Him in heaven with the Church Triumphant. INJ