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Isaiah 40:1-11
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2 Peter 3:8-14
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Mark 1:1-8
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Grace,
Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ, Amen. Our text today is the Old
Testament lesson, especially these words, “Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has
been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the
LORD's hand double for all her sins.”
Thus far our text.
Dear friends in Christ, Comfort, Comfort ye my
people. Comfort, your warfare is ended,
your sin is paid for double. Your savior
is coming, he’s on his way. The glory of
the LORD will be revealed, and all mankind together will see it. For the mouth
of the LORD has spoken. Jesus is drawing
near.
This is the very center of the message of Advent, that
Jesus is coming so that we may be at peace, in comfort and at rest. For that is not what we normally
experience. We are not used to being in
comfort, but instead are used to the tribulation and discomfort of this
world. Our text today says that men are
like grass that withers away at the breath of the Lord. We wither away, because we are unworthy to be
before our God, because we cannot stand in the presence of his great and
amazing holiness.
For we are not holy, we are unholy. We are not righteous, but we are terrible
sinners. We are not the people that God
created us to be, for we have fallen into our own vices and sin. And so like grass dies in the heat of summer,
so too do we die in the heat of God’s great wrath over sin.
We fade like grass as we deal with and suffer from
cancer, and our bodies get weaker and weaker.
We fade like grass as we hear the word that a loved one has passed away
from old age or Alzheimer’s. We fade
like grass as we face our own mortality and the consequences for our own
sin. We are guilty, and we face death
because of it.
Dear
friends in Christ, your sin is not a laughing matter. We can’t just shrug it away. We can’t just ignore it. It is not something that will just get better
on its own if you ignore it. You are
sinners, you are guilty. You have broken
every one of the Ten commandments from “You shall have no other gods,” to “You
shall not commit adultery,” to “You shall not covet.” You have shattered God’s law, and so now you
deserve great punishment for it, you deserve to be consumed in fire as our
Epistle lesson says. You deserve to be
burned up as grass is burned in a ditch or as the elements waste away in
fire. You are responsible for your sin,
and there is no hiding form it.
But
our text does not say to us, “Punishment, Punishment ye my people,” or even
“destruction ye my people.” Our text
today says, “Comfort, Comfort you my people.”
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem. Tell
her that her sins are covered two fold.
Tell her that she is forgiven.
Tell her that her war fare is over.
Tell her that God will not dawdle to save us from our sin. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise,
as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to
perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
For
God will come to save you. He’s coming,
His Advent is soon. God sent his
servant John the Baptist to prepare the way for your salvation, to prepare in
the desert the way for the LORD; make straight in the wilderness a highway for
our God. Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the
rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. All this will happen so that you God will
have no obstacles to saving you. There
will not be a valley that will slow down the Lord’s coming. There will not be a mountain that your God
cannot overcome to make sure you will be forgiven. Not even the mountain of Golgotha.
Comfort
Comfort to you, God’s people. Jesus is
coming, he is on his way, and the reason he comes is to die. As we heard last week, the reason Jesus came
was to ride a donkey, to ride that donkey into Jerusalem to be your blood
sacrifice, to be your blood offering, to die in your place. Comfort to you, because of punishment to
Jesus. See, the Sovereign LORD comes with power, and his arm rules for him. See,
his reward is with him, and his recompense accompanies him.
Comfort, Comfort people of God. You are redeemed. You are saved. You belong to God forever in the blood of the
Lamb who takes away the sin of the world.
Comfort in your times of sorrow.
Comfort in your times of hurt.
Comfort, your service is finished, you are freely God’s people. Comfort to you. Amen.
