Isaiah 12:1-6/James 1:16-21/St John 16:5-15
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
As it was last Sunday, so today, the Gospel puts us back in the upper room on the night of our Lord’s betrayal, on the eve of His death. He is going back to the Father by way of His Cross and Passion, in His blessed death and the handing over of the Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life.
For He who came from the Father, full of grace and truth, who in His Person reveals the love and life of the Father who dwells together with the Son and the Holy Spirit, Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity, has come down from above in order to make men His again. He has joined Himself to you in flesh and blood in the womb of the Virgin Mary in order to join you to Himself by way of His flesh and blood, crucified, risen, and ascended that you might have fellowship in Him together with His Father by His Spirit.
Though the prospect of His imminent death fills the hearts of His disciples with sorrow, much as it did Elisha as his dear father in the faith, Elijah, was taken from him, Nevertheless, Jesus says, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away; to your advantage that He go to the Cross in His innocent suffering and death. This is for your benefit. His death is for you. It avails for you; His crucifixion sets you free from sin and sorrow. It slays bitter death on your behalf in order that you may live with Him forever.
For He who goes to His Father by being lifted up in death, likewise hands over His Spirit. The self-same Spirit who hovered over the natal waters of creation, the Spirit, by whom God breathed life into Adam, the Spirit who spoke by the prophets, the Spirit who descended from heaven like a dove and remained upon Jesus the Christ, anointing Him the very Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The Spirit who drove Jesus into the wilderness in order to be tempted by the devil in place of idolatrous and adulterous Israel, to be tempted in your place, and yet remain without sin.
Our Lord Jesus hands over this Spirit, His Holy Spirit, to His Father in His Crucifixion and death, in the faithful obedience of the Son who obeys His Father’s will.
But the Spirit who is the Lord and Giver of Life, who breathed life into Adam in the beginning, likewise breathed new life into the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, and raised Him from the dead on the third day (Rm 8:11). On that same day, the first day of the week, that is also the eighth day, the day of the new creation, Jesus Christ appeared to His disciples in the locked upper room, breathed on them and said, Receive the Holy Spirit, as the Father has sent Me, I am sending you to forgive the sins of terrified and repentant sinners (Jn 20:21, 22).
Indeed this is the blessing and comfort of the Helper, the Spirit of Truth. This is His Office and work. “Here Christ makes the Holy Spirit a Preacher” Dr Luther preached in a sermon on this same text, saying:
He does so to prevent one from gaping toward heaven in search of Him, as the fluttering spirits and enthusiasts do, and from divorcing Him from the oral Word or the ministry. One should know and learn that He will be in and with the Word, that it will guide us into all truth, in order that we may believe it, use it as a weapon, be preserved by it against all the lies and deception of the devil, and prevail in all trials and temptations. The Holy Spirit wants this truth which He is to impress into our hearts to be so firmly fixed that reason and all one’s own thoughts and feelings are relegated to the background. He wants us to adhere solely to the Word and to regard it as the only truth. And through this Word alone He governs the Christian Church to the end (AE 24:362).
For this reason St James places all emphasis on the preached Word when he says, Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, that is, quick to hear the Word of Christ read and preached, to hold it sacred and gladly learn it. For this implanted Word alone - sola Scriptura - is able to save your souls. As the Holy Spirit hovered over the Blessed Virgin Mary and by the Word conceived through her ear the very Word-made-Flesh within her womb, so too does the Holy Spirit, by the Word, conceive faith within your heart by the hearing of the Word of Christ, crucified and risen, for the full and free forgiveness of all your sins.
For He who drew all men to Himself when He was lifted up on the Cross, is now lifted up in preached, as crucified before your very eyes. And whereas He handed over the Spirit to His Father in His crucifixion, now, in the preaching of His Cross, He gives the Holy Spirit to you, the Spirit of truth and of adoption, by which you are able to cry, yea to sing, Abba! Father!
Sing praises to the Lord, for He has done gloriously, let this be made known in all the earth. Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.
And the new song that you are given to sing is the song of repentance and faith, confession and absolution; as He convicts you of unbelief evidenced by your various sins and transgressions, your lack of proper fear, love, and trust in God above all things. But He also causes you to sing of righteousness, one not your own, but Christ’s, bestowed upon you by His Word and Spirit, received in faith. And indeed you sing of judgment, not in fear and trepidation, but in joy, for the ruler of this world, the evil foe, Satan himself, the accuser of Christ’s brothers, has been cast down and defeated.
This song is not new, per se, but fulfilled in Christ Jesus, and given to you by His Spirit. For this is the song the Church has sung since Adam and Noah, Abraham and Moses, through the prophets and judges, in slavery and captivity, by Zechariah and Elizabeth, by their son, St John the Baptizer, in Mary’s Song. The song of Jesus, God’s salvation, and His victory over sin, death, and the power of the devil, and His bestowal of that victory upon you by His Spirit in His Word.
For the Spirit of truth is the Spirit of Christ Jesus, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who spoke the Truth of God’s Holy Word by the prophets and who gives all glory to Christ by taking what is His and declaring, that is, preaching and delivering it to you.
In Holy Baptism the Spirit was over the waters and in the Word to rescue you from Satan’s jaws and bring you safely into the Holy Ark of the Christian Church.
In the Holy Absolution the Spirit of Christ announces the grace of God unto you, bespeaking you righteous with the very righteousness of Christ. This absolution, that you are forgiven for Christ’s sake, is the verdict of the Last Day, the final judgment, slipping out ahead of time.
And in the Holy Communion, the Holy Spirit, again, by way of the Word of Christ, declares to you concerning the bread and the wine, the very Body and Blood of Jesus Christ given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins. In this way He guides you into all the Truth, bringing you by the Body and Blood of Christ into the very fellowship of the Blessed Holy Trinity. All that the Father has is Christ’s; by His Spirit all that Christ has is yours.
And what the Holy Spirit does for you He does for the whole Christian Church on earth, keeping it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. Therefore do you, who partake of one Body, dwell together in unity with one another in the one Body of Jesus Christ, whose head is God the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, to whom be glory, power, might, and dominion, now and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
Alleluia! Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
As it was last Sunday, so today, the Gospel puts us back in the upper room on the night of our Lord’s betrayal, on the eve of His death. He is going back to the Father by way of His Cross and Passion, in His blessed death and the handing over of the Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life.
For He who came from the Father, full of grace and truth, who in His Person reveals the love and life of the Father who dwells together with the Son and the Holy Spirit, Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity, has come down from above in order to make men His again. He has joined Himself to you in flesh and blood in the womb of the Virgin Mary in order to join you to Himself by way of His flesh and blood, crucified, risen, and ascended that you might have fellowship in Him together with His Father by His Spirit.
Though the prospect of His imminent death fills the hearts of His disciples with sorrow, much as it did Elisha as his dear father in the faith, Elijah, was taken from him, Nevertheless, Jesus says, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away; to your advantage that He go to the Cross in His innocent suffering and death. This is for your benefit. His death is for you. It avails for you; His crucifixion sets you free from sin and sorrow. It slays bitter death on your behalf in order that you may live with Him forever.
For He who goes to His Father by being lifted up in death, likewise hands over His Spirit. The self-same Spirit who hovered over the natal waters of creation, the Spirit, by whom God breathed life into Adam, the Spirit who spoke by the prophets, the Spirit who descended from heaven like a dove and remained upon Jesus the Christ, anointing Him the very Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The Spirit who drove Jesus into the wilderness in order to be tempted by the devil in place of idolatrous and adulterous Israel, to be tempted in your place, and yet remain without sin.
Our Lord Jesus hands over this Spirit, His Holy Spirit, to His Father in His Crucifixion and death, in the faithful obedience of the Son who obeys His Father’s will.
But the Spirit who is the Lord and Giver of Life, who breathed life into Adam in the beginning, likewise breathed new life into the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, and raised Him from the dead on the third day (Rm 8:11). On that same day, the first day of the week, that is also the eighth day, the day of the new creation, Jesus Christ appeared to His disciples in the locked upper room, breathed on them and said, Receive the Holy Spirit, as the Father has sent Me, I am sending you to forgive the sins of terrified and repentant sinners (Jn 20:21, 22).
Indeed this is the blessing and comfort of the Helper, the Spirit of Truth. This is His Office and work. “Here Christ makes the Holy Spirit a Preacher” Dr Luther preached in a sermon on this same text, saying:
He does so to prevent one from gaping toward heaven in search of Him, as the fluttering spirits and enthusiasts do, and from divorcing Him from the oral Word or the ministry. One should know and learn that He will be in and with the Word, that it will guide us into all truth, in order that we may believe it, use it as a weapon, be preserved by it against all the lies and deception of the devil, and prevail in all trials and temptations. The Holy Spirit wants this truth which He is to impress into our hearts to be so firmly fixed that reason and all one’s own thoughts and feelings are relegated to the background. He wants us to adhere solely to the Word and to regard it as the only truth. And through this Word alone He governs the Christian Church to the end (AE 24:362).
For this reason St James places all emphasis on the preached Word when he says, Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, that is, quick to hear the Word of Christ read and preached, to hold it sacred and gladly learn it. For this implanted Word alone - sola Scriptura - is able to save your souls. As the Holy Spirit hovered over the Blessed Virgin Mary and by the Word conceived through her ear the very Word-made-Flesh within her womb, so too does the Holy Spirit, by the Word, conceive faith within your heart by the hearing of the Word of Christ, crucified and risen, for the full and free forgiveness of all your sins.
For He who drew all men to Himself when He was lifted up on the Cross, is now lifted up in preached, as crucified before your very eyes. And whereas He handed over the Spirit to His Father in His crucifixion, now, in the preaching of His Cross, He gives the Holy Spirit to you, the Spirit of truth and of adoption, by which you are able to cry, yea to sing, Abba! Father!
Sing praises to the Lord, for He has done gloriously, let this be made known in all the earth. Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.
And the new song that you are given to sing is the song of repentance and faith, confession and absolution; as He convicts you of unbelief evidenced by your various sins and transgressions, your lack of proper fear, love, and trust in God above all things. But He also causes you to sing of righteousness, one not your own, but Christ’s, bestowed upon you by His Word and Spirit, received in faith. And indeed you sing of judgment, not in fear and trepidation, but in joy, for the ruler of this world, the evil foe, Satan himself, the accuser of Christ’s brothers, has been cast down and defeated.
This song is not new, per se, but fulfilled in Christ Jesus, and given to you by His Spirit. For this is the song the Church has sung since Adam and Noah, Abraham and Moses, through the prophets and judges, in slavery and captivity, by Zechariah and Elizabeth, by their son, St John the Baptizer, in Mary’s Song. The song of Jesus, God’s salvation, and His victory over sin, death, and the power of the devil, and His bestowal of that victory upon you by His Spirit in His Word.
For the Spirit of truth is the Spirit of Christ Jesus, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who spoke the Truth of God’s Holy Word by the prophets and who gives all glory to Christ by taking what is His and declaring, that is, preaching and delivering it to you.
In Holy Baptism the Spirit was over the waters and in the Word to rescue you from Satan’s jaws and bring you safely into the Holy Ark of the Christian Church.
In the Holy Absolution the Spirit of Christ announces the grace of God unto you, bespeaking you righteous with the very righteousness of Christ. This absolution, that you are forgiven for Christ’s sake, is the verdict of the Last Day, the final judgment, slipping out ahead of time.
And in the Holy Communion, the Holy Spirit, again, by way of the Word of Christ, declares to you concerning the bread and the wine, the very Body and Blood of Jesus Christ given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins. In this way He guides you into all the Truth, bringing you by the Body and Blood of Christ into the very fellowship of the Blessed Holy Trinity. All that the Father has is Christ’s; by His Spirit all that Christ has is yours.
And what the Holy Spirit does for you He does for the whole Christian Church on earth, keeping it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith. Therefore do you, who partake of one Body, dwell together in unity with one another in the one Body of Jesus Christ, whose head is God the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, to whom be glory, power, might, and dominion, now and unto the ages of ages. Amen.
Alleluia! Christ is risen!
He is risen indeed! Alleluia!
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