Bible Passage: Luke 18:31-34
Pastor: Joel Jenswold
Sermon Date: March 5, 2025

Bulletin – Ash Wednesday

There is a technical error in the recording, part way through the sermon. The audio is recorded but the video is frozen. We apologize for the error.

In the name of, and to the eternal glory of, Jesus,

It is time to make our yearly journey to Jerusalem.  The one we make each year in heart and soul.  That is why the words we hear Jesus speak to us this Ash Wednesday are pleasing to our ears.  He says to his friends, Look, we are going up to Jerusalem. (v. 31)  Jesus says “we.”  He wants his friends to come!  He wants the company!  He wants you and me to join him on this journey!

And of course, we are happy to do so!  What could be more blessed than to spend time with our Lord?  What could be more beneficial for our souls than to travel with Jesus to Jerusalem?  What could bring us more peace and joy than this time of close fellowship with Jesus?

And yet, as Jesus continues in our text, we notice a change.  Jesus has said, We are going up to Jerusalem.  But then he says, And everything that is written through the prophets about the Son of Man will be accomplished.  Indeed, he will be handed over to the Gentiles.  They will mock him, mistreat him, spit on him, flog him, and kill him.  On the third day, he will rise again. (v. 31-33)  Now it is no longer “we”!  Now Jesus speaks only of “he” and “him.”

There is something in Jeruslaem Jesus needs to do by himself.  Jesus says, Everything that is written through the prophets about the Son of Man will be accomplished.  The prophets of old have written things about him!  There are no prophecies about what “we” would do! But they did write much about what “he” would do!  The prophet Isaiah did not write, “We were pierced for our transgressions, we were crushed for our iniquities.  The punishment that brought us peace was upon us, and by our wounds, we are healed.”  No!  The subject of that great prophecy is the third person, masculine, singular!  “He”!  He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed. (Isaiah 53:5-6)  “We” will go to Jerusalem with Jesus; but only he will suffer and die.

You say, “That makes me feel so helpless! I want to do something to help!”  We cannot!  There is nothing we can do to help!  Jesus came to be the “Help of the helpless.”  One of the things our trip to Jerusalem must remind us is that we cannot “help” save ourselves.  I am helpless.  I have nothing to contribute.  In fact, remember what happened when Jesus’ disciples tried to “help.”  In Gethsemane, they will fall asleep.  What great “helpers”!  Jesus will ask, Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour? (Matthew 26:40)  Later, when the soldiers come to arrest Jesus, Peter thinks it’s time to help.  He whips out his sword and lops off the ear of one of those who came.  Jesus tells Peter to put his sword away!  Jesus did not ask for, nor does he need, Peter’s sword-skills…or lack thereof!  We can go with Jesus, but we cannot help.

And here is where some penitential honesty is called for.  Not only must we admit that we cannot help Jesus, we must confess that we are the cause of his suffering and death!  If we return to Isaiah’s famous prophecy about Jesus, we do not notice there is a time in this prophecy when Isaiah does use the subject “we.”  He wrote, We all like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:6)  Far from bringing help, we bring the iniquity and the sin!  Paul wrote to the Romans, He was delivered over to death for our sins. (Romans 4:25)

A number of the beloved hymns of Lent will remind us of this.  I think of the hymn that says:  “If you think of sin but lightly, nor suppose the evil great, here you see its nature rightly, here its guilt may estimate.” (CW 127:3)  Or we think of the hymn that says: “Ah!  I also and my sin, wrought your deep affliction; this indeed the cause hath been, of Thy crucifixion.” (CW 98:3)  Your sin!  My sin!  My failure to love God with heart, soul, strength and mind!  My failure even to come close to loving my neighbor as myself! Caused this!  [H]e will be handed over to the Gentiles.  They will mock him, mistreat him, spit on him, flog him, and kill him. (v. 33)  Jesus must save me without my help.  We insult his grace if we offer to help.  We can watch.

But let us remember that we are so much more than just “watchers” of this story!  We are the beneficiaries of it all!  A “beneficiary” is the person who benefits.  Often we speak of “beneficiaries” in connection with death.  My life insurance policy names a “beneficiary,”  the person who will benefit when I die, the person who gets my “riches” when I die.  WE are the beneficiaries of Christ’s death on the cross!  We benefit!  We receive all the riches.  Forgiveness, peace of conscience, the hope of heaven, a glorious resurrection, like Jesus’ own resurrection.

We have not yet spoken of that part of our text.  Jesus adds that this too awaits them in Jerusalem.  On the third day, he will rise again. (v. 33)  Our trip to Jerusalem would not be complete without Jesus rising from the dead.  And here is something to think about:  Christ will die alone.  The story of Good Friday is “solus Christus.”  Christ alone.  Only Christ.  But he will not rise alone!  The resurrection is not “only Christ!”  We will not die a death like Christ’s on Good Friday, but we will rise like Jesus on Easter!  He promised!  Because I live, you also will live. (John 14)

There is a solitude about Jesus during Lent, an “aloneness” that must be.  It is a glorious solitude!  It is hidden glory, hidden beneath blood and shame.  But it is there!  He, and he alone, is Savior!  Let us go now to Jerusalem with hearts focused on “solus Christus.”  Christ alone!

Amen.