Prince of Peace and Christ Our Savior Lutheran Churches December 21, 2003

Pastor Steve Geiger Fourth Sunday in Advent

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Hebrews 10:5-10

5 Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said:

“Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,

but a body you prepared for me;

6 with burnt offerings and sin offerings

you were not pleased.

7 Then I said, ‘Here I am—it is written about me in the scroll—

I have come to do your will, O God.’”

8 First he said, “Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not desire, nor were you pleased with them” (although the law required them to be made). 9 Then he said, “Here I am, I have come to do your will.” He sets aside the first to establish the second. 10 And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

God Gives Us What We Need Hebrews 10:5-10

1. So many things don’t remove guilt

2. One thing erases all guilt

The minds of children may be racing this day. Do you know how many days are left until Christmas?

You’ve made your lists. You’ve dropped your hints. You may even now see packages under the tree with your name on them. You dream. You imagine. You can’t wait to see what’s inside.

What if, on Christmas, you open one of the boxes and inside you find a shirt?

Has that ever happened to you? Where you opened a present when you were little, and inside you found something like a shirt, or socks. You tried to force a smile. You’d say a polite thank you. But you were moving on to the next box. Because you didn’t ask for a shirt, and you didn’t ask for socks.

Though your mother may have smiled: “I knew you needed some socks.”

While in your mind you may be secretly thinking, “Christmas is not for what I need. It’s for what I want!”

For what I want, and not for what I need? I’m not sure we ever outgrow this thought that begins already in youth.

I wonder if this same thought can color our attitude toward God. In our minds we have an idea of what we want from God. Unfortunately, what we often imagine as a path to joy is actually a dead end. Rejoice today that at Christmas God does not give you what you want, but what you need.

Many in the early Christian church weren’t so sure that God had done this. They knew about Jesus. But they weren’t so sure that he was what they needed.

They thought they already had what they needed. If the goal was peace with God, they thought they already had what they needed in that collection of sacrifices and gifts that Jews brought to the temple. Farm products were the answer to everything. Animals. Grain. Whatever the situation, there was something a Jew could bring to the temple to make things right. Had he committed a sin? Bring an animal and kill it. Did he want to say thanks? Bring a bag of grain and give it. Did he want to show God that he loved God above all things? Bring an animal and burn it up completely.

Now it wasn’t that God hadn’t commanded these things. If you would read Leviticus, you’d find all the rules.

The danger had been that individuals would obey all these outward rules, but then they’d show no love for their neighbor. They’d bring sacrifices to the temple, but they’d disobey without concern God’s Ten Commandments. They did the outward worship, but their heart was far from God.

They were missing the point. The point of sacrifices, which needed to be repeated again and again, was to show that people sin again and again. The sacrifices were to show that people needed a permanent, lasting solution, a Savior. The sacrifices were to show that we are so evil that never can our consciences be cleared by something that must be repeated, because we’ll always sin again.

The point of the sacrifices was to show that sin was a problem, that sin can be dealt with only by death, but that the death of animals obviously by itself was not the answer. There was something in the future that the death of these animals was pointing to.

Jesus.

Yet for many Jews who lived after Jesus had come, they thought that Jesus was unnecessary. As they thought of the sacrifices, they thought, “We’ve got what we need to have a good relationship with God.” Outward actions. Something humans think they have the ability to do. Though never had God implied that the mere outward action of sacrifice was power to create that good relationship with the Almighty.

Do we ever try to create a good relationship with God through things that have no chance of giving us what we want?

What do you want for Christmas? Some peace? Do you wish that you could undo something you did a long time ago? Do you wish that somehow you could make God happy so that he’d give you a physical blessing you’ve waited so long for? Do you wish for a bad memory, to forget a mistake you made? Do you long for calm as you think about death, so that then nothing would be left to fear?

How we long to know that all is well between us and God. How many things we can attempt to create the illusion. We’ll go through the motions. We think, “Coming to church has got to have something to do with it,” but sometimes we sit and stand and enter and leave and still our heart is troubled.

So we’ll punish ourselves. We’ll make ourselves work harder. We may even volunteer for more activities at church or fill our schedules so full that we never finish anything. We make our own life hard.

Or perhaps we try hard to make our life easy. We escape the skeletons that haunt us through diversion. Always looking for a good time. Hanging with friends. Sipping from a secret bottle. Gambling away money better spent to help others.

How we long to be at peace.

And Christmas can be one of the worst times of the year for us. We know that at Christmas you’re supposed to be at peace. Maybe you’ve had a Christmas where you didn’t find peace at all. That’s when you’re tempted to give up.

Is it possible that our sinful flesh can still trick us into thinking that we can create a good relationship with God through things that have no chance of giving us what we want? That we can find peace by going through the motions, by working harder, by punishing ourselves, by finding more fun?

The writer to the Hebrews works so hard to show to his readers which roads are dead ends. If they thought that peace could come merely through animals dying, they would be disappointed. If you think that you can erase an accusing conscience through your own clever solutions, you will be disappointed. If God were to give us success this Christmas, success in our own plans to make our relationship right with him, he would have given us nothing but the illusion of victory before the reality of eternal defeat.

Jesus does not give you what you want—what your sinful flesh thinks is the solution to guilt and fear— . . . Jesus does not give you what you want this Christmas. He gives you what you need.

And he really thought about it before he wrapped it.

In our family it’s always a challenge to figure out what to give to our mom and dad. In a very godly way they tell us that they have everything they need. And they do. But still we ask them.

On my trip to Colorado last month, I was the secret agent to find out what Mom and Dad needed. Once again, they needed nothing. Though my mom mentioned that they’d like to rent a pontoon for the end of June when all us kids will get together for a little family reunion in Watertown. My dad said that we could give a gift in their name to a Lutheran high school. Then my sister-in-law sent out a note that maybe we could get them a night at a bed and breakfast. Then my sister sent out a note that said Mom and Dad might not enjoy that a lot. Then another sister said that maybe they’d enjoy a ticket to a show.

You think about presents, don’t you?

So did Jesus. He didn’t just react. He didn’t just wrap the first thing his eyes saw. He didn’t just look at the sacrifices given in the Old Testament and say, “Oh, OK, I’ll just kill another bull or a goat.”

He really thought about this. He looked at all those sacrifices and he remembered a prophecy made about him in Psalm 40, hundreds . . . maybe even a thousand years before. “Sacrifices and offerings you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me” (Hebrews 10:5).

Jesus understood that an animal wouldn’t be the gift that you needed. It would be nice, but it wouldn’t permanently erase your guilt. So he kept looking. And the prophecy in Psalm 40 keeps going: “With burnt offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased.” Not that God hadn’t commanded them, but people kept sinning. Jesus saw the real problem. That people, you and I, from conception are evil. We just can do what’s wrong, even when we know it’s wrong.

So what would be a good present for us? “Then I said, ‘Here I am—it is written about me in the scroll—I have come to do your will, O God.”

With the presents we give each other, there are limits. We may figure out what someone really needs, but it’s too expensive so we can’t give it.

When Jesus figured out what we really needed, he didn’t ask how much it cost. When he understood that not just an animal was going to do it, he then said, “Whatever needs to be done, I’ll do it.” He said to his Father, “I will do your will. I am the one who was predicted from the beginning. I am the promised Savior. I will be what you have made me. I will do whatever pleases you.”

If it was to drink a cup of suffering, he swallowed deeply. If it was to carry the horror of our wicked words and evil thoughts and vicious complaints and hurtful actions, he lifted with willing strength. If it was to be forsaken God as our substitute, for us who deserve no peace but only terror . . . if it was to be forsaken by God, this too he would do. If it meant sacrificing his very self, his own body, giving up everything for someone he loved, he’d wrap up his body and put it under your tree.

This is what he did. He thought so carefully about what you needed, and then he wrapped it up, and now he says, “Merry Christmas.” By my obeying the Father’s will, you have been made holy through the sacrifice of my body.

Made holy. You have been made holy through the sacrifice of Jesus’ body. Perfect. Every evil thought, word, action? Where did they go? Through the sacrifice of Jesus’ body you have been made holy.

Under your tree is a present from Jesus himself. With the excitement of a child rip off the paper. With the thrill of a five-year old tear open the box. With the tears of a grandma who finds from her granddaughter something so beautiful, so full of love, so perfect, see Jesus, who through his sacrifice has made you perfect.

I don’t know what you want this Christmas. Thank God, who gives you what you need at Christmas.

You have a most blessed Christmas. Amen.