13th Day of Lent
Today we continue our Lenten journey with Jesus and we find ourselves first in the upper room. And here we see Jesus’ great love for us as He gives His Church the holy Sacrament of His body and blood. Even as He knew what was before Him, in love He was thinking of His disciples there that evening and also us down through the ages. What great love of our Lord—looking out for our good—and what a great miracle. It was just as much a miracle that first Maundy Thursday for Jesus to give His disciples His body and blood then as it is for us today. So focused in love was our Lord on His Church that He gave her that precious sacrament so tied up with His suffering and death—all for the forgiveness of our sins and the strengthening of our faith. So dearly did Jesus want to be with His Church and each of His dear Christians in such a close and intimate way!
And then we find Jesus in the depths of agony in Gethsemane. Here, as the all- knowing God, He knew exactly what was before Him; and for this very moment He came. But as true man, He recoiled at the thought of what He would have to suffer and endure so that He prayed: Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from Me. Nevertheless, not My will, but Yours be done. So great was our Lord’s agony and so fervent in prayer was He that His sweat became like great drops of blood falling to the ground. And not only that but an angel from heaven [had to appear] to Him [to strengthen] Him. And now strengthened for all what was ahead, it all began in earnest as Judas came and betrayed Him with a kiss. But showing that Jesus was still in charge and that He was laying down Him life, willingly becoming the sacrifice for the sin of the world; showing that He is the true God Himself, Jesus said I am—and all those there to arrest Him backed away and fell to the ground.
And now as they try to arrest Jesus, Simon Peter drew his sword and ended up cutting off the ear of Malchus, the servant of the High Priest. But in the love and compassion—even for, especially for His enemies Jesus healed the servant’s ear. Not only was that a sign of love for Malchus, but it was one last attempt by Jesus to show those about to arrest Him who He really is—the very God Himself. What they were now doing could not have been in ignorance. Those responsible for arresting Jesus must have truly hardened their hearts against Him, not even letting this miracle, this compassion of Jesus soften them.
And now we come to our text from St. Mark’s Gospel: And they all left Him and fled. And a young man followed Him, with nothing but a linen cloth about his body. And they seized him, but he left the linen cloth and ran away naked. This event of the young man running away naked is only recorded in St. Mark’s Gospel. This has led many scholars to think that this young man was St. Mark, including this autobiographical account in his Gospel account. It was a literary device of the day that we see also in the other Gospels, that the writer does not include his name. For example, in his Gospel St. John refers to himself not with his name but as the disciple Jesus loved. If, indeed, this young man is St. Mark, it is a confession; with great sorrow he confesses that he, too, deserted Jesus and left Him alone. Each of us this Lent would also have to confess with great sorrow that had we been that young man, that we too would have run away. The thing is, as we see so clearly in the Gospels, the disciples were real people—weak and fallible; they are people just like us. What they did in great weakness, we ourselves would have done. Like us, they had the Holy Spirit but they still sinned; we would not have done better.
Those are very haunting and damning words: And they all left Him and fled. This, too, Jesus knew was upcoming. He knew that He would face this entire ordeal without His disciples—the three falling asleep as He prayed was just the beginning—and this is what made everything all the worse for Jesus: And they all left Him and fled. But again, Jesus knew this going into it. After they finished the Passover, as they were going to the Mount of Olives, Jesus told them [vs. 27]: You will all fall away. To that Peter said and the rest chimed in in agreement: If I must die with You, I will not deny You. Not only was Jesus speaking because as the all-knowing God, He knew what would happen, but this event—the disciples fleeing—was already prophesied in the OT: You will all fall away, for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ But Jesus also gives the promise of and comfort from His resurrection: But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee. Notice, this is and always has been the work of the devil to divide/ separate. But Jesus gathers and calls together—into His Church. After they fall away, but reflect on Jesus’ words, they have the promise of the resurrection and Jesus gathering them that fled.
The same thing applies to us. Even though we by our sins run away from and forsake Jesus, He calls and gathers us together. He does so as He gives the promise of the forgiveness of sins—which is what His resurrection proclaims: forgiveness! And He gathers us to Himself in the waters of Holy Baptism; He gathers us as He forgives our sin in the absolution; He gathers us in and through His holy word; He gathers us and actually unites with us and so also us with our fellow Christians in the Holy Sacrament of His body and blood.
As we read in our text that the young man was seized … but he left the linen cloth and ran away naked, there we are pointed to how completely forsaken Jesus was, not just by the eleven but also by “one who was tagging along.” And now Jesus is completely in the hands of His enemies. And isn’t this pointing us to a great theological truth—that the work of our salvation is a work that only Jesus could do? As Jesus spoke through the OT prophet Isaiah [63.3]: I have trodden the wine press alone, and from the peoples no one was with Me. Jesus’ disciples fleeing from Him and leaving Him all alone reminds us that our salvation is not a “me and Jesus” work, but it is Jesus’ work alone. He alone faced our enemies of sin, death, devil and hell and He conquered them alone. Really, only Jesus could face our enemies for us. He is the sinless one who could not and did not sin. He is the very God Himself; the very one who can and does create life. How can death stand in the face of life and win? What could we add to our salvation? All we can do is add our sin upon sin. Our salvation is only because of the work of Jesus; our salvation is a divine work. That’s why it is so comforting for when we see Jesus alone in the hands of the guard—because it is a picture of Him being alone in the hand of our enemies: sin, death, devil and hell. And because He is God, because it is a divine work He is doing—unmixed with anything of us—that’s why we can be certain of our salvation. It is all God’s work for us; if we had our mitts in it, if we were responsible for even one tiny fraction of our salvation, it would forever be unsure: have I done enough, the right thing, correctly? But when we see only Jesus in the hands of the temple guard here, we are reminded that only Jesus can do the work of carrying out our salvation. And we are reminded that He alone has!
But although Jesus is without any human company, He is here not abandoned. Jesus had just told the disciples in the upper room, again warning them that they would abandon Him [Jn 16.32]: Behold, the hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home, and will leave Me alone. But then Jesus adds: Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with Me. The Father would be with the Son during this ordeal, strengthening Him to carry out His saving work. That’s why in the Garden of Gethsemane, He sent an angel to strengthen Jesus. Here is the glorious comfort to us that Jesus’ work is pleasing to His Father and His Father is with Him to help Him carry it out. That means that we can be certain of our salvation. Again, if it were up to us, our salvation would forever be uncertain for us. But here we see the Persons of the Godhead at work for us and our salvation. Jesus, the Son, is in the hand of and facing the enemies—agents of the devil and his allies; but the Father is with Jesus and strengthening Him. And He is with Him and strengthening Jesus until the cross—where Jesus is finally abandoned and rejected by both man and God. That’s where on the cross as Jesus is made sin [2 Co 5.21] and the Father turns away from Him and Jesus endures the very pangs and sufferings of hell as He cries out: My God! My God! Why have You forsaken Me? Notice, even though He was made sin and abandoned by the Father, Jesus, having been strengthened by Him and in perfect love of Him, still calls Him My God! My God. Jesus faithfully carries out His saving work even though abandoned by all. And the Father accepts Jesus’ perfect sacrifice on the cross for when Jesus commends His spirit into the Father’s hands, the Father receives it and raises Him on the third day—Easter.
Jesus was forsaken and rejected so we wouldn’t have to be. Yes, by our sins we forsake Jesus; we forsake God because sin is turning away from Him and turning toward self and sin. And as we see the scene of our text unfold before us, let us see ourselves forsaking Jesus by our sin: And they seized him, but he left the linen cloth and ran away naked. When we forsake Jesus by our sin and live to self, we run away from Him naked, in great shame and humiliation. That’s the reality! The devil with his temptations will try to make the sin look good. But the reality is, we flee from Jesus in shame and humiliation; we are naked before Him with all our sin.
But even here, dear Christian, let us take comfort. Because Jesus was forsaken and died on the cross for our sin, we who stand before Him in sin and shame, naked, have something better than a linen cloth. As we recognize, sorrow over and confess our sins, we, by faith, receive the perfect robe of Jesus’ righteousness that covers us from all our sin. In Jesus, our sins are forgiven us and His perfect righteousness is credited to us, covers us. That’s what faith clings to and believes; and faith has a firm and certain ground/ reason: Jesus and His suffering and death for us, that He was forsaken for us.
Lent will do its job on us this year as we examine heart and life in the holy Law of God, recognize our sin, sorrow over those sins, go to the Lord asking His forgiveness for those sins and in faith receiving that forgiveness Jesus won for us on the cross and and so we are then clothed not in some linen cloth but in the robe of Jesus’ righteousness. This is Lent’s heart and core.
There is one more interesting thing as we look at our text: And they seized him, but he left the linen cloth and ran away naked. Yes, that refers to the young man. But couldn’t we also look at it as a foreshadowing of Easter, of Jesus escaping from the grips of death? The interesting thing is that St. Mark uses the same word here, linen cloth, as he does Jesus’ burial shroud in the next chapter which is translated as linen shroud [15.46]: And Joseph bought a linen shroud, and taking [Jesus] down, wrapped Him in the linen shroud and laid Him in a tomb that had been cut out of the rock. Our text is an interesting foreshadowing of Jesus escaping death’s capture, leaving behind in the tomb that linen cloth/ shroud. But the huge difference is that Jesus did not leave it behind in fright fleeing; He left it behind as Conqueror of death. His linen cloth was left behind because He didn’t need it. He rose from the dead. The One who had been forsaken faced the enemy alone and triumphed over it for us! INJ