To find the other sermons in this series, click the post label "Stories of the Saints" at the bottom of this post, or in the sidebar on the left of your screen.
A technical note on today's audio file: a portion of the sermon was recorded at a lower volume than the rest of the sermon. This volume change happens 11:20 into the recording. If you have difficulty with the audio quality during the last three minutes of the sermon, you can follow along with the written transcript I've included below the audio player.
Old Testament Reading:
Exodus 3:13-17
Epistle Reading:
Philippians 2:5-11
Gospel Reading:
John 11:17-27
[transcript begins at 10:45]
When you misuse the name of your God He is well within His rights to strike you down right where you stand. The wages of sin are death, and we all deserve it. We’ve not treated God’s name with the honour it deserves, but instead we make it just another dirty word. We’ve taken the name of our holy God and we just throw it into the gutter. It’s shameful. And we should be ashamed of ourselves because of it.
However, there is a rest of this story: to our story too. There is One who came and never blasphemed God’s name. There is One who had the authority to take that name upon Himself and when confronted by the Jews in John chapter nine this sinless One replied: “Truly, truly I say to you: before Abraham was, I AM.”
This is Jesus, the Christ, the only true son of God, the one who we confess as God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God. The one called Immanuel - God with us. In His name there is power. In His name there is forgiveness. Our blasphemous sin makes us deserving of death but Jesus comes with forgiveness, and takes God’s name upon Himself again, and He says “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he died, yet shall he live. And everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die.”
You have been baptised into Christ’s death and resurrection. You were baptised in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and Christ has come to you and given you His name. When it comes time for you to stand before God and account for your actions, it will be like there’s a stack of papers with your name on them. And under your name will be your sin. Blasphemer. And it won’t matter if your stack is smaller than everyone else’s: one single paper equals your damnation.
But there beside you stands your advocate, Jesus, who takes every single one of those papers and stamps over your name and puts His holy name over it. He erases your name, He erases your sin; and He places it firmly upon Himself.
It’s not that the law has changed. The punishment for blasphemy is still death. However, Jesus now stands as your advocate and says "I have taken this penalty: My death guarantees your life. My resurrection guarantees your resurrection." This is not so that we can go out and continue to treat His holy name with contempt; but instead He says to you, as He says to the woman who is to be stoned for her sin, "There is no one left to condemn you. Go and sin no more."
When He takes your name upon Himself He writes it in the book of life. In His name you have forgiveness. In His name you have solace. In His name you have eternal life.
Amen.
Now may the peace of God which surpasses all understanding guide your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Amen.
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Here is the bulletin insert for further study, to which Vicar Todd refers early in his sermon.
Saints 13 Moses
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