3rd Sunday in Lent - Series B
(9)
Sermon shared by Ronald Harbaugh
March 2006
Summary: Throught out history, people have felt the need to make sacrifices to please God and atone for their sin. The Cross is all we need.
Denomination: Lutheran
Audience: Believer adults
my Father’s house a marketplace!”
Well, I can imagine that the people who had made the pilgrimage to the temple that day were shocked by what Jesus had done. After all, they had come to this holy place, the temple of God, to make sacrifice, to do what all of Israel had done for centuries. They came to make themselves right with God, to atone for their sins.
But Jesus said STOP! And I don’t think that Jesus simply meant to stop the commercialism that had crept into the temple, I think he was saying STOP to this whole temple practice of offering animal sacrifice. I think he was saying STOP to trying to make ourselves right with God.
I don’t imagine that it had taken long, before the temple guards came up and surrounded Jesus and demanded, “Who gives you the authority to do this?” But Jesus doesn’t answer their question directly. Rather, he says to them, “Destroy this temple, and in three day, I will raise it up!”
Of course, the guards probably laughed their heads off. After all, it had taken forty-six years to build that temple, and I’m sure, more money than Jesus had in his pocket, or in the bank. But then John, the author of our text adds, “But he [Jesus] was speaking of the temple of his body. [And] after Jesus was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture, and the word that Jesus had spoken.
The truth is, Jesus took upon himself, in his own body, the whole temple practice of offering sacrifice for the atonement of sin. As the author of Hebrews puts it, “Jesus put an end to all sacrifices needed to set people right with God, for he did this once and for all time, when he offered himself on the cross in atonement for the sins of the world.” What God would not let Abraham do, he did himself. He allowed his own Son gave his life, that we might all know God’s redeeming grace for all time.
As a result, the day of making sacrifices, the day of trying to do something to make ourselves right with God is over. Through Christ’s death and resurrection, God has declared, “The only sacrifice needed to atone for your sins, has been made. Embrace my Son in faith, trust in my redeeming grace, and set your hearts and minds at peace. For my Son’s death on the croos is all the sacrifice that I need to redeem you, and all generations, from sin and death.
Amen.
Well, I can imagine that the people who had made the pilgrimage to the temple that day were shocked by what Jesus had done. After all, they had come to this holy place, the temple of God, to make sacrifice, to do what all of Israel had done for centuries. They came to make themselves right with God, to atone for their sins.
But Jesus said STOP! And I don’t think that Jesus simply meant to stop the commercialism that had crept into the temple, I think he was saying STOP to this whole temple practice of offering animal sacrifice. I think he was saying STOP to trying to make ourselves right with God.
I don’t imagine that it had taken long, before the temple guards came up and surrounded Jesus and demanded, “Who gives you the authority to do this?” But Jesus doesn’t answer their question directly. Rather, he says to them, “Destroy this temple, and in three day, I will raise it up!”
Of course, the guards probably laughed their heads off. After all, it had taken forty-six years to build that temple, and I’m sure, more money than Jesus had in his pocket, or in the bank. But then John, the author of our text adds, “But he [Jesus] was speaking of the temple of his body. [And] after Jesus was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture, and the word that Jesus had spoken.
The truth is, Jesus took upon himself, in his own body, the whole temple practice of offering sacrifice for the atonement of sin. As the author of Hebrews puts it, “Jesus put an end to all sacrifices needed to set people right with God, for he did this once and for all time, when he offered himself on the cross in atonement for the sins of the world.” What God would not let Abraham do, he did himself. He allowed his own Son gave his life, that we might all know God’s redeeming grace for all time.
As a result, the day of making sacrifices, the day of trying to do something to make ourselves right with God is over. Through Christ’s death and resurrection, God has declared, “The only sacrifice needed to atone for your sins, has been made. Embrace my Son in faith, trust in my redeeming grace, and set your hearts and minds at peace. For my Son’s death on the croos is all the sacrifice that I need to redeem you, and all generations, from sin and death.
Amen.
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