Daniel 10:10-14; 12:1-3/Revelation 12:7-12/St Matthew 18:1-11
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back. It sounds like the stuff of big budget Hollywood movies. Some ancient, long forgotten prequel to the Avengers. You have St Michael who is like Captain America, Thor, and the Hulk all rolled into one. He stands at the ready, commanding a supernatural army of extraterrestrial beings that numbers in the thousands upon thousands, ten thousands upon ten thousands. This is the mighty angelic band of the Lord God of Sabaoth, the Maker and Master of the Universe. An elite squad of truly invisible warriors, greater than any ninja clan or assembly of Avengers.
And their opponent? The arch, super villain, one of their own rank, a traitor from their midst, Lucifer. He posses a dark, chaotic power of his own. Imagine Loki times a thousand. He is the ultimate Trickster, hell-bent on one thing: the destruction of God’s good creation and its inhabitants.
The author of this real-life comic book, St John the Apostle and Evangelist, calls him the Deceiver of the whole world, the great dragon, the ancient serpent who is called the devil and Σατανοσ, the deceiver of the whole world. And he has a third of the host of heaven at his command, willing to fight to the destruction of the heavens and the earth in a violent, venom fulled rage all on account of the Incarnation of the Son of God; because the Second Person of the Blessed Holy Trinity became Man, Satan wants to annihilate the earth and mutiny heaven. Even if you don’t like comic books or super-hero movies, this is still pretty cool.
And into this heavenly battleground, amidst angelic beings wielding phenomenal cosmic power beyond our wildest imaginations comes the cinematic juxtaposition of the ages, a scene so usually outrageous you’d think the editor made a mistake. A Lamb. Between the ferocious jaws of the beastly dragon and the flaming sword of the Arch Angel stands a helpless, defenseless little Lamb.
It is so out of place, so surreal, that we never would have presumed it on our own. Such is the natural of the Gospel. It is always a surprise.
Like our Lord putting a child in the midst of these theologically hulking giants, between Saints Peter and Matthew, James and John the Sons of Thunder, and saying, “This child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven, not you.” Not fame or fortune, power or might, not intellect or reason, but whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Humility. Poverty of spirit. These are the marks of greatness.
For it is not the seven older brothers of shepherd who stand down against the Philistine, but the child David, protected not with the weighty armor of a man, but guarded by the Name of the Lord and the five smooth stones of His Torah, foreshadowing the number of our Lord’s own wounds received on the Stone Ground of Golgotha, the true war zone. But the shepherd king takes his place on the battlefield not in the strength of his arm, but in the Name of the Lord, the God of heaven and earth, YHWH Sabaoth who gives His holy angels to guard and defend His little ones. In heaven their angels always see the face of My Father who is in heaven.
Not even the seraphim in the heavenly throne room as beheld by Isaiah were privileged to see the face of God, but covered their eyes with two of their six wings. Not so the children’s angels! They always see the face of the Father! This is why Jesus takes the question of the disciples so seriously. Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Is it St Michael? Gabriel? David or Samson? Joshua or Moses? This question is potentially satanic. This is why Jesus warns against temptations to sin with such sobriety: Woe to the world for temptations to sin! It is better to loose members than to perish eternally. Is it better to expel the perpetrator, to cut off the sin and throw it away than to tolerate it and be eternally damned.
But how shall this be done? How is the dragon slain? How is the evil horde expelled? They have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the Word of their testimony. And the great dragon and his angels were defeated and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. Therefore woe to you, O earth and sea, for the devil has come down to you in great wrath, because he knows that his time is short!
We get lost in the mystery of it all. We let out imaginations roam and think it can’t possibly be real. We hear Jesus praise the humility of children and we mistakenly apply this to their worldly innocence, falling into the prideful trap of the culture, relegating them to second-class citizens, even within the Church. Jesus says they are the example of faith; the rule, not the exception. And His Word says that the cosmic battle between St Michael and the Devil, between good and evil, light and dark, life and death is real. It is not a comic book fairy tale, but more real than what our eyes see, than our senses detect and our reason determines.
We think we’d pay anything to have Peter Jackson turn this story into movie, but its happening all around us. Those dastardly things you heard about in the Psalm - the snare of the fowler, the deadly pestilence, the terror of the night, the arrow of the day, the stalking pestilence in the darkness, the wasting destruction of noonday - all those pitfalls and traps, seventh century Church Father St John Cassian wrote, “All these names we ought not to take as given at random or haphazard, but as alluding to their fierceness and madness under the sign of those wild beasts which are more or less harmful and dangerous among us” (Conferences 7:32).
Imagine the grotesque creatures allied with the White Witch in Narnia. Hags and ghouls, minotaurs and wraiths. They represent the fallen angels, those whose beauty and splendor, the majesty in which God the Father created them has been demonically altered. They represent on the outside what our sin has done to us on the inside. Their outer nature exemplifies our scarred conscience. They are the army of the Evil One, amassed in battle worse than any orc or oruki. And they are all around us. Elsewhere St Paul says, We do not fight against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces in the heavenly places (Eph 6:12).
But fear not, O Christian! For against such cosmic forces in the present darkness you have the truly powerful, your great champion, the Lamb of God who bears away the sin of the world. For while the battle between St Michael and the dragon is captivating, the truly epic victory, the ultimate triumph of good over evil, is the Cross. It is folly. It is shame. It is weakness and humility.
It is the power of God unto salvation. It is the radical nature of the Gospel: that as the dragon opens his foul mouth to devour this little Lamb, as his deadly teeth pierce the flesh of this helpless Creature, the surprise is revealed: the Blood of the Lamb undoes the power of Satan. And the Lamb of God turns out to be the Lion of the Tribe of Judah who stalks death to the grave and destroys Him forever.
Thats what this Feast Day is all about - not angels and demons, greatness and power - but about the Lamb and His Blood which covers over your sin. For the antidote to death and the grave, the victory over the dragon, pulses through veins of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
How much would you pay for this movie? Its playing every Sunday! Every Sunday, every Divine Service, heaven and earth meet in the very communion of the Body of Christ, in the fellowship of the Lamb. Behold the Lamb of God! And the Bread that is His Body is held before your eyes and placed upon your tongue. He takes away the sin of the world! And the Wine that is His Blood is poured from the chalice over your sin-parched lips and you are steeled for battle.
Here He prepares a Table before you in the presence of your enemies. But fear not, for they exist only here, only this side of glory. Over there, beyond that mystical East lies the country of our Aslan, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, and we long for His holy habitation. On the other side of the Altar, hidden from our senses, are all the angels and archangels, the whole company of heaven, joined together with us around the throne of Lamb, ever singing His praise: Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back. It sounds like the stuff of big budget Hollywood movies. Some ancient, long forgotten prequel to the Avengers. You have St Michael who is like Captain America, Thor, and the Hulk all rolled into one. He stands at the ready, commanding a supernatural army of extraterrestrial beings that numbers in the thousands upon thousands, ten thousands upon ten thousands. This is the mighty angelic band of the Lord God of Sabaoth, the Maker and Master of the Universe. An elite squad of truly invisible warriors, greater than any ninja clan or assembly of Avengers.
And their opponent? The arch, super villain, one of their own rank, a traitor from their midst, Lucifer. He posses a dark, chaotic power of his own. Imagine Loki times a thousand. He is the ultimate Trickster, hell-bent on one thing: the destruction of God’s good creation and its inhabitants.
The author of this real-life comic book, St John the Apostle and Evangelist, calls him the Deceiver of the whole world, the great dragon, the ancient serpent who is called the devil and Σατανοσ, the deceiver of the whole world. And he has a third of the host of heaven at his command, willing to fight to the destruction of the heavens and the earth in a violent, venom fulled rage all on account of the Incarnation of the Son of God; because the Second Person of the Blessed Holy Trinity became Man, Satan wants to annihilate the earth and mutiny heaven. Even if you don’t like comic books or super-hero movies, this is still pretty cool.
And into this heavenly battleground, amidst angelic beings wielding phenomenal cosmic power beyond our wildest imaginations comes the cinematic juxtaposition of the ages, a scene so usually outrageous you’d think the editor made a mistake. A Lamb. Between the ferocious jaws of the beastly dragon and the flaming sword of the Arch Angel stands a helpless, defenseless little Lamb.
It is so out of place, so surreal, that we never would have presumed it on our own. Such is the natural of the Gospel. It is always a surprise.
Like our Lord putting a child in the midst of these theologically hulking giants, between Saints Peter and Matthew, James and John the Sons of Thunder, and saying, “This child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven, not you.” Not fame or fortune, power or might, not intellect or reason, but whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Humility. Poverty of spirit. These are the marks of greatness.
For it is not the seven older brothers of shepherd who stand down against the Philistine, but the child David, protected not with the weighty armor of a man, but guarded by the Name of the Lord and the five smooth stones of His Torah, foreshadowing the number of our Lord’s own wounds received on the Stone Ground of Golgotha, the true war zone. But the shepherd king takes his place on the battlefield not in the strength of his arm, but in the Name of the Lord, the God of heaven and earth, YHWH Sabaoth who gives His holy angels to guard and defend His little ones. In heaven their angels always see the face of My Father who is in heaven.
Not even the seraphim in the heavenly throne room as beheld by Isaiah were privileged to see the face of God, but covered their eyes with two of their six wings. Not so the children’s angels! They always see the face of the Father! This is why Jesus takes the question of the disciples so seriously. Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Is it St Michael? Gabriel? David or Samson? Joshua or Moses? This question is potentially satanic. This is why Jesus warns against temptations to sin with such sobriety: Woe to the world for temptations to sin! It is better to loose members than to perish eternally. Is it better to expel the perpetrator, to cut off the sin and throw it away than to tolerate it and be eternally damned.
But how shall this be done? How is the dragon slain? How is the evil horde expelled? They have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the Word of their testimony. And the great dragon and his angels were defeated and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. Therefore woe to you, O earth and sea, for the devil has come down to you in great wrath, because he knows that his time is short!
We get lost in the mystery of it all. We let out imaginations roam and think it can’t possibly be real. We hear Jesus praise the humility of children and we mistakenly apply this to their worldly innocence, falling into the prideful trap of the culture, relegating them to second-class citizens, even within the Church. Jesus says they are the example of faith; the rule, not the exception. And His Word says that the cosmic battle between St Michael and the Devil, between good and evil, light and dark, life and death is real. It is not a comic book fairy tale, but more real than what our eyes see, than our senses detect and our reason determines.
We think we’d pay anything to have Peter Jackson turn this story into movie, but its happening all around us. Those dastardly things you heard about in the Psalm - the snare of the fowler, the deadly pestilence, the terror of the night, the arrow of the day, the stalking pestilence in the darkness, the wasting destruction of noonday - all those pitfalls and traps, seventh century Church Father St John Cassian wrote, “All these names we ought not to take as given at random or haphazard, but as alluding to their fierceness and madness under the sign of those wild beasts which are more or less harmful and dangerous among us” (Conferences 7:32).
Imagine the grotesque creatures allied with the White Witch in Narnia. Hags and ghouls, minotaurs and wraiths. They represent the fallen angels, those whose beauty and splendor, the majesty in which God the Father created them has been demonically altered. They represent on the outside what our sin has done to us on the inside. Their outer nature exemplifies our scarred conscience. They are the army of the Evil One, amassed in battle worse than any orc or oruki. And they are all around us. Elsewhere St Paul says, We do not fight against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces in the heavenly places (Eph 6:12).
But fear not, O Christian! For against such cosmic forces in the present darkness you have the truly powerful, your great champion, the Lamb of God who bears away the sin of the world. For while the battle between St Michael and the dragon is captivating, the truly epic victory, the ultimate triumph of good over evil, is the Cross. It is folly. It is shame. It is weakness and humility.
It is the power of God unto salvation. It is the radical nature of the Gospel: that as the dragon opens his foul mouth to devour this little Lamb, as his deadly teeth pierce the flesh of this helpless Creature, the surprise is revealed: the Blood of the Lamb undoes the power of Satan. And the Lamb of God turns out to be the Lion of the Tribe of Judah who stalks death to the grave and destroys Him forever.
Thats what this Feast Day is all about - not angels and demons, greatness and power - but about the Lamb and His Blood which covers over your sin. For the antidote to death and the grave, the victory over the dragon, pulses through veins of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
How much would you pay for this movie? Its playing every Sunday! Every Sunday, every Divine Service, heaven and earth meet in the very communion of the Body of Christ, in the fellowship of the Lamb. Behold the Lamb of God! And the Bread that is His Body is held before your eyes and placed upon your tongue. He takes away the sin of the world! And the Wine that is His Blood is poured from the chalice over your sin-parched lips and you are steeled for battle.
Here He prepares a Table before you in the presence of your enemies. But fear not, for they exist only here, only this side of glory. Over there, beyond that mystical East lies the country of our Aslan, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, and we long for His holy habitation. On the other side of the Altar, hidden from our senses, are all the angels and archangels, the whole company of heaven, joined together with us around the throne of Lamb, ever singing His praise: Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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