Organized Religion [Epiphany 3]

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READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:

• 2 Kings 5:1-15

• Romans 12:16-21

• St. Matthew 8:1-13

 

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Eph 1)
 
Jesus speaks to you this day from His Gospel heard, saying:
“…but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a proof to them.”
 
You can be sure that this now purified Leper took his illness so seriously that he went and did EXACTLY as Jesus said. Not only in believing, but understanding the way that God wishes to work in the world. That is: going to the rightly called and ordained priest and offering the proper, prescribed sacrifice
 
It’s amazing how when we take something seriously, we believe in reverence and religion. We keep silence at the tomb of the unknown soldier. We stand respectfully for the flag. We recite the pledge of allegiance without turning it into a pop song. 
 
Those of us who wear the uniform snap to attention when an officer enters the room. We salute the flag with respect when we walk past it. We don’t mind the religious ‘liturgy’ of drill and marching, and would be appalled at someone just “doing his own thing” in the presence of any of that. 
 
But when it comes to someone more important than an officer, more important than the president: God Himself in the flesh, we want casual, we want entertainment, we want “anything goes”. We want anything but what God wants.
 
That’s because our real American religion is statism. Christianity is simply a hobby we get to, every now and then. Now would be a really good time to repent, as I think the days are getting shorter, and our Lord is coming. 
 
If you really believe that He is physically present with us by means of a miracle in the Divine Service (and not merely symbolically), and that He invites you to His altar to worship Him, why are you pushing for songs that you like instead of hymns that confess and glorify Him?  Why are you balking at liturgy (you don’t even complain about the liturgical actions at football games and graduations)?
 
We all need to think on this and pray about it, for today Jesus is promoting organized religion. Dun dun duuuuuuuun. So grab your torch and pitchfork, we have a Jesus to crucify for Him even thinking about such things.
 
And it wasn’t just this one time that Jesus spoke in such a way. If it was, we may be able to play it off as a metaphor or something, having nothing to do with us today. However, Jesus also said the same thing to the 10 lepers that He healed in St. Luke 17 saying, “Go and show yourselves to the priests” (v.14). In this case, however, one doesn’t go as commanded, but returns to give thanks to God: Jesus. 
 
What is it that Moses commanded? First of all, its important to remember that there is no sacrifice that will effect the purification of disease. That is satanic to think that something outside of God’s order and command can effect a better cleansing than God Himself. We are not dealing with low intelligence here on God’s behalf. The world works as God made it and He works within that. You can not fool Him.
 
The sacrifice, described in Leviticus 13-14, is for afterwards. It is there only to declare that a purification had taken place and that this newly purified man may now resume normal life. 
 
So what effects the cleansing? Is it simply “waiting things out” or waiting for a miracle? To be sure some natural stuff is involved, like immune systems. But if that’s true, what is the point of all that religion stuff, if things work all on their own?
 
Turns out, things don’t actually work out so well on their own, as is evidenced by the last two years in this country. In fact, they don’t work out on their own so much that the only way out of this world is through death, with no say, no reprieve, and no mercy.
 
In this way sin, death, and the power of the devil are very predictable. You could say that they are organized to the point where you know what they are up to each and every time they show up. They are not here for you, but for your harm. Jesus even suggests this “organized anti-religion” when He says, “If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand?” (Mt 12:26)
 
Evil is apparently organized, so Good must be as well, and moreso. As it turns out, Jesus talks the talk and walks the walk. He does not organize religion as a pretense for political power, or money laundering, or to mete out oppression. 
 
In Christ’s organized religion, Jesus organizes Himself. He gets Himself together, comes out of heaven, and shows Himself to the priests, in order to “offer the gift that Moses commanded”. 
 
And Moses commanded not only Two lambs, but the sacrifice must be made on the Eighth Day at the Temple. Not only must it be made on the Eighth Day at the Temple, but one lamb is offered for guilt and the other for sin. The blood of the sacrifice must then be placed upon the ear, thumb, and big toe of the one being cleansed, then he must be anointed with oil (Lev 14:10-20).
 
So it is the lamb of God’s choosing, offered up, and the blood of Him covering the impure person along with being anointed for such an event (the Hebrew for anoint is Messiah, btw).
 
And to top it all of, it is not the offerings or the priest that make one clean, as I already stated. No. The whole point of this ritual is not only to declare one pure, but atoned for. Leviticus 14:18 and 20 both say that once the blood and the oil are applied, “the priest shall make atonement for him before the Lord.”
 
It is as St. Chrysostom tells us in his Homily #26 in Matthew, from the ancient organized church:
“…only the leprosy of the soul is to be feared, which is sin; and that leprosy of the body is no impediment to virtue.” The lepers, the blind, and all the other bodily afflicted, while begging for and needing bodily healing, all, more importantly, need atonement.
 
This is what the sacrifices were for and this is the sacrifice that was brought before the priest, the High Priest, on Good Friday. It is there that our Lamb of God, our sin, our curse was presented in front of the priest and was utterly rejected. 
 
He was deemed unfit, uncouth, and unclean. He was sacrificed on behalf of worldly “organized ant-religion” and though they meant it for evil God meant it for good. Even the priest could not escape God’s will and even prophesies against himself saying, “it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, and not that the whole nation should perish” (Jn 11:50) and “His blood be on us and on our children” (Mt 27:25).
 
So we must be careful with our words. In “organized religion”, popularly understood, we have uncaring, unfeeling, and unhelpful religion; anti-religion. With what was just said, we must redefine “organized religion” properly to what it actually is. That is: that the blood from the Lamb of God is upon us and we are justified by grace, through faith, for His sake, Who was anointed, Messiah-ed, Christ-ed, chosen of God to complete and perfect true organized religion on earth, as it is in heaven.
 
In other words, true organized religion is Christ working through Word and Sacrament to offer Himself as the Lamb of sacrifice in your place, to purchase and win you back from sin, death, and the power of “organized anti-religion”.
 
For our souls are leprous and are falling apart faster than any remedy can fix them, much less are they able to accomplish anything for their own good or anyone else’s. But we are not the leper in the Gospel story, neither are we the centurion. We are the servant, unable to heal ourselves and unable to seek help.
 
But Christ has not left us as orphans, but has brought us to His Church on earth and organized it in such a fashion that pastor and people are there, even when we are not, and are working, even when we cannot. For it is there, that the sacrifice of Christ has not only declared baptized believers pure, but has also effected them so, in God’s eyes.
 
It is the organization of Christ, under the Law and upon the cross that effects complete and utter perfection for us. And it is His baptized believers ordering themselves underneath that cross, in Word and Sacrament, that make it possible for that effect to go out to the whole world.