Sept. 12, 2021 Sermon

 

September 12, 2021       Sermon       Rev. Peter Hofstra

Luke 1: 26-38; Hebrews 2: 11-18

          How often do we think of Jesus as a human being?  We call him Lord and Savior and Friend, the last of which we might consider more ‘human’ than ‘divine’, but is that really so?  We talk about Jesus who rose for us, Jesus who in reigns in power over us.  Who is Jesus at the end of time?  Jesus is our Judge, all of which are, well, divine things, not so much the human.

          We recognize Jesus’ humanity.  We say he was tempted in every way like us, but did not succumb to temptation.  Even as a human, Jesus out performs us.  But do we really get that part of who are Jesus is?

          The New Testament presses that point.  I looked up the statistics for when Jesus is called “Son of Man” versus the “Son of God”.  Found a couple of different amounts, but the one thing that was consistent is that Jesus seems to be called the “Son of Man” more (not by a lot) than “Son of God”.  I remember sweating over that title “Son of Man”, trying to figure out what it meant at one point.  But if we go back to the promise of Jesus, made to Mary by Gabriel, one we share every Christmas Season, Jesus is the Son of Mary and of God.  So how about reading those eighty to one hundred references (depending on the count) of Jesus as “Son of Man” rather as Son of Mary, or even Mary’s Boy, to ground us in the human side of our Savior?

          Why do we not focus so much on the humanity of Jesus?  It gets lost in the shuffle.  After all, it is the Plan of God and the Power of God that overcomes our sin and saves us-in Jesus.  Our passage in Hebrews uses the word ‘flesh’ to mean human, in a neutral sense.  Most times we see the word ‘flesh’ in the New Testament, it usually has the negative connotation of being in sin, as opposed to the ‘spirit’, which is of God.  It is easy to see how quickly the humanity of Jesus rolls under the power of God.  But Jesus himself is very determined that we see how being human is important to us.

          Our passage in Hebrews gives us some really good stuff about why Jesus the human is so important.  One step connects us back to last week, to our adoption as children of God, through the first born, our Lord Jesus.  Jesus is flesh, so are we, one in the flesh and one in our God.  The writer of Hebrews inserts an interesting comment in here, about Jesus NOT being for the angels, but for the descendants of Abraham.  Sounds like something was going on at that time that made Jesus into some kind of divine hybrid, more than human.  No, Jesus is established as a human being.

          The centerpiece of our salvation is the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus.  It is the human that is Jesus which the writer points to in this regard.  Through death, Jesus not only saves us, but also destroys the one “who has the power of death, that is, the devil.”  Death is punishment for our sins, and that punishment is to be sent to hell, into the devil’s grasp.  But as a human, able to die, Jesus will destroy the devil.  Not only that, not only through being human is Jesus able to destroy the one who has the power of death, but, according to verse 15, it delivers those who are slaves to the fear of death from that fear.  This is accomplished because it was as truly human, Jesus did die.

          So here’s a question.  Who is the holiest person you know?  I don’t mean holier than thou, but truly holy.  Picture this person standing before the throne of grace in heaven, on their names, only to have Jesus help them to their feet and put an arm around their shoulders because of the sanctity they have expressed in life.  I am talking a Bishop Desmond Tutu or a Martin Luther King or a Jonathan Edwards or a John Calvin.  For those of a more Catholic background, a saint that is venerated, for many, it is Mary, Jesus’ mother herself.

          For the Jewish audience that the writer of Hebrews is addressing, this would be the high priest.  The one person who could step into the very presence of God in the Holy of Holies of the temple once a year to make atonement for them.  The ultimate expression of human holiness is found in the human who is Jesus.

          The windup of this focus on the humanity of Christ comes in our final verse from Hebrews 2.  Because he himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.  Maybe the accusation is hypocrisy.  How on earth can God care about what happens to us poor humans if God is so perfect and cannot connect to what I am feeling?

          Yesterday was the twentieth anniversary of 911.  There are two sides to that coin.  On the one side, there was a resurgence of church attendance, at least for awhile, as people turned to God to make sense of what happened there.  On the flipside, there was anger at God.  How could you?  How dare you?  Couldn’t you stop it?  Twenty years ago, watching the smoke and the collapse…it gets real close real fast. 

          The game of life is that God does not stop bad things from happening in the world.  Hurricane Ida wrought havoc from the Gulf shore all the way through our state and beyond.  I would argue that if it were not for the human Jesus, we would have turned our backs on the Almighty as a useless, unhelpful force in creation a long time ago.  The promise that everything will be better at the Second Coming, great, so lets kill it all and get the Apocalypse rolling. 

          But rather, it is the human Jesus that brings hope once again.  Some churches have such trouble facing the emotions of death here and now because there is such an eye on the Godhood of Jesus, to be fulfilled at the end of time.  The reality of the humanity of Christ is that when we are in the darkest moments of our life, Jesus, tested by what he suffered, is a real comfort to us in our own suffering.

          Grief is a God-given way of allowing humans to process the worst of sin and death in our world.  And Jesus is right in the middle of it, because Jesus knows it.  Do we realize that even our grief has become political?  Black lives matter versus police lives matter versus all lives matter.  Even in our deepest feelings, sin and anger and hatred have crept in.  Fingers are pointed, “they” are responsible, and there is a lot of truth to that.  But there is another truth.  In our grief, fingers point inward too.  “I” am responsible.  “If only” is a devastating demand we put on ourselves.

          Let’s be honest, we are having conversations now, some really uncomfortable conversations that we have NEVER had before.  Jesus is in there with us.  It is not about blame, but responsibility.  It can be so hard to admit something we have done or taken for granted our entire lives is, in fact, something that has hurt someone else, especially when it comes to matters of grief and pain.  But we have been advancing for two thousand years under the humanity of our Lord Jesus.  Could we have had some of the conversations going on in the culture about equality, about equity, about freedom, a generation ago? 

          But our Lord is among us, reminding us to love, to tolerate, to be patient.  For some, things go way too fast.  For others, way too slowly.  It is easier to blame, to cut bait and run, to bury it.  Sometimes, even Jesus is going to tell me I am wrong, but he does it with love and affection.  That is the Jesus who has endured what we have endured, who comes alongside of us and is with us as the most enduring of friends.

          Jesus, the Son of God, the Judge of the Second Coming, the Second Person of the Trinity, this all-powerful side, this Divine, is our hope and salvation, but we can’t touch it-except by the mercy of the Lord.  But God doesn’t stand over us and belittle us in God’s goodness.  Rather, Jesus did not take being God as something to be grasped, but he took on the form of a human being.  And he walks with us and he talks with us, and he knows what we are going through, because he went through it.  And he will be with us in the darkest corner of our existence and in the light of the New Age when he comes back to us, and at every point in between.

          How often do we think of the humanity of Jesus?  I am willing to wager that the more we consider it, the more we will be aware and know the comfort of his outstretched arms and his tender mercies to us all.  Amen.