Abraham's Day [Lent 5; St. John 8:46-59]

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Jesus speaks to you today, saying:

“Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad.”

Today, Passion Sunday, we begin to feel the imminent approach of Jesus crucifixion more intensely as our Gospel displays the world’s reaction to Jesus, that is to put Him to death. It doesn’t matter how much He talks about love and peace, it doesn’t matter how many people He heals, and it doesn’t matter how many miracles He performs. The mass media outlets of His day have labeled Him a liar and they repeat that story until everyone believes it.

This is because, now that His hour is fast approaching to suffer and die for the whole world, Jesus is desperately trying to convince everyone of the need for repentance. Unfortunately, He must first convince everyone that they are sinners, which is never easy. So we see Him spend the entirety of chapter 8 of John’s gospel explaining this point to the Jews.

Chapter 8 opens with the woman caught in adultery. Eager to prove to God their worth, the Jews have shoved the Law in Jesus’ face giving Him two choices: either He agree with them and murder her or disagree with them and call Moses, and therefore God, a liar.

There is a curious verse in the Old Testament that explains what is going on. It comes in the beginning of Moses’ second book, Exodus, 300 years after Joseph saved Egypt from famine and died. Verses 8-10 says, “Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. And he said to his people, “Behold, the people of Israel are too many and too mighty for us. Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply, and, if war breaks out, they join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.”

The people of Israel were made slaves, then. In that environment they were severely oppressed and yet they multiplied the more they were mistreated. They may have been making bricks out of mud and straw, forced into ghettos, and unable to vote, assemble in peace, or speak their peace, but they were alive and strong.

They began to love their tormentors in a twisted way. They loved the abundance of their masters and the plenty of the land. They had shelter, they had food, they had routine. Sure, freedom would be nice, but at what cost to our stability?

Thus, out of this exile, this slavery, arose a new people that did not know God. God said, “He who is without sin cast the first stone” and they hated Him. He said, “I AM the light of the world” and they covered Him with grave dirt. He says, “if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” and they declare Abraham their father and Caesar their king.

Repent. We have forgotten God. You never had a chance in the first place. All of the events in the Bible took place 2000 years ago, at the earliest. How can you be expected to know what’s what? You don’t need Church to study history and the Bible and other devotionals. Your sins are not as bad as the Jews, I mean, at least you had nothing to do with crucifying Jesus, right?

Do you know why Jesus hid Himself and why we covered our cross after the Gospel reading today? Jesus did not run away, afraid to face His aggressors. He hid Himself because a stoning is too little of a punishment. A simple stoning, though barbaric, is only for idolaters (Deut. 13:7) and sexual deviants (Deut. 22:13ff) and Jesus was not going to go down as one of those only. He needs to heap on some more sins, before He is satisfied.

The image we veiled today is the image of the invisible God. The God that only chooses to reveal Himself in the self-sacrifice of His Son on the cross. There is no other way to the Father except through the cross of Christ. The Jews, not believing this, had come to not know their own God.

How did Abraham know and not his descendents, the Jews? You heard from the Old Testament this morning how Abraham saw Jesus’ day and rejoiced in it. On that day, Abraham encountered two things: an undying son and a substitute lamb.

Oh yes, it says ram, but a ram is a male sheep. Chief among them, to be exact. Thus what we see in Isaac and the ram are the two natures of Christ. His divine nature hidden in Isaac which cannot die and His human nature hidden in the ram which suffers and dies for the whole world. Abraham rejoiced that his son did not have to die, but would be substituted out instead.

Oh yes, Abraham saw His Redeemer’s day. He saw the promise given by God, written in his son and written in the lamb. There was no mistaking it. Abraham’s descendents will hear about this for the rest of history that the most treasured image of God is not that of Father, but that of substitutionary atonement. In other words, the cross.

Even though Abraham didn’t know about Roman crosses, he knew the substitution that the Lord made with that ram, so no matter what form the death took, it would be redemptive. In this way, we, the true descendents of Abraham keep his story alive, for in the crucifix, the cross with Jesus on it, we beautifully and artfully proclaim exactly what Christ did for Abraham, for Isaac, and for us.

The Lord has provided. He has provided Christ’s crucifixion for the sins of the world and it remains the center of His entire work of history and salvation. Even after Jesus was taken off the cross and raised to the right hand of God, still the Apostles say things like:

“We preach Christ crucified” and “I determined to know nothing among you except Christ and Him crucified” and “As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes” and “God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of Christ” and “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (Heb. 12:2).

Jesus would not finish His work until He was more than a liar, more than an idolater, and more than a sexual deviant. He would become all sin to all people in order that through Him they would be saved. He hides Himself under the weight of sin, death, and the devil to free us from those very things.

The only way we are “of God” is the way of the crucifix. The only way we “keep Jesus’ word” is by always speaking the word of the cross. The only way to know the Father, is through the Son, Who sends His Holy Ghost to call you by the Gospel, enlighten you with His gifts, and sanctifies you and does the keeping for you.