Easter 7 2019 Exaudi
Ezekiel 36:22-28
June 2, 2019
Zion Lutheran Church + Nampa, ID
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Alleluia! Christ is risen. He is risen indeed, alleluia!
This morning we’re going to take a look at the Old Testament reading from Ezekiel 36, and we’re going to focus on 5 theological words and phrases, most of which should be familiar to you, at least in passing. As we do so, we’ll see how God saves us by grace alone, which is His work alone, and He cleanses us from our sin by the blood of Christ, sprinkled it on us in the regenerating power of Holy Baptism wherein the Holy Spirit is bestowed and a new heart given, that we may live as one of God’s saints struggling against our sinful nature with the sure and certain hope of our eternal life with Him on the day of resurrection wherein we will be His people and He will be our God forever. So let’s begin.
First, sola gratia, Latin phrase that means, “grace alone.” We are saved by God’s grace, and by grace alone. In the opening verses of our lesson today, God speaks to His people and makes it very clear to them that He is acting because of His name’s sake, His reputation, His holiness. Reputation is very important. We all want to have a good reputation, we want others to think well of us, to have a certain amount of respect from others. When people think of us, we want them to think, “Oh, they are good at their job, a good parent, a good student, a friendly person.”
God has a reputation to uphold as well. When people hear His name, they should think of His mighty deeds, His creative and redemptive acts in history, His promises for the future. There is no other name under heaven by which we can be saved. But God keeps coming up against a barrier. He has put His name on His people, He is to be their God and they His people. The way the people act reflects God’s reputation. And they weren’t acting very well. They were giving God a bad rap. They were called to be a light to the Gentiles and the glory of the people Israel. But they were profaning that Name among the nations to which they came. They were ignoring it, or worse, slandering the Name and the reputation of God through their idolatry. God’s people don’t deserve forgiveness, they don’t deserve pardon, they don’t deserve His name or His good reputation. But He gives it to them anyway, as undeserving as they are, and in doing so He vindicates His holy name. This grace is a work of God, it is something that is done to a person.
That brings me to the second phrase, which is divine monergism. What this means is that it is God alone who accomplishes the full salvation of His people. Grace alone is God’s act alone. Again, the Lord acts for His Name’s sake, not for yours. But He does act for you. Upon the cross, He who knew no sin became sin that you might become the righteousness of God (2 Cor 5:21). Upon the cross, Jesus made atonement for the whole world according to His grace, and it was His work done for you. There is nothing else to be added, nothing else you can do. By faith, you simply receive the benefits of Christ’s work.
Third, Baptismal regeneration. This is the rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit worked through the means of grace, particularly Baptism. In Ezekiel 36:25 God says, “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleanliness.” God pays a lot of attention in the Bible to the issue of cleanliness. God is holy, and He shares His holiness with His people. But when that is abused or misused or rejected, cleanliness is lost. The main problem people are faced with is dirtiness. Remember back to how God created Adam. He took dust from the ground and formed a man and breathed the breath of life into Him and He lived. Made from dirt, but Adam wasn’t dirty. That is, not until he and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit. Then it back to the dirt, ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Dirty because of sin. Unclean because of stains in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and what we have left undone. It is impossible for people to cleanse themselves spiritually, even by cooperation with God. He alone can cleanse sinners so that they are clean. There is only one stain remover strong enough to get you clean, and that is blood. Sin stains, blood washes. Or in other words, the blood of God washes the stain of your sin.
St. Paul writes something similar to Titus in chapter 3, “God saved us (divine monergism), not because of the works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy (sola gratia), by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”
If people are to be faithful bearers of God’s promise they must be clean. This is no ordinary washing. God promises to sprinkle clean water on you. At the baptismal font, this takes place. Christian baptism is more than a ceremony representing what God did for us in Christ and being baptized is more than obeying God’s command. In Baptism, God has placed His name on you – the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. He gives you His reputation. His reputation is not staked on your actions, but on His. It is by grace alone and it is His act alone. God adds His Word to water to effect a radical change, He regenerates, and gives a new heart and a new spirit.
Most of the time in the Old Testament, in Hebrew thought, the heart has to do with rational mind, but also emotion and will. A heart of stone implies coldness, and unresponsiveness to God, not just of the mind but of the will. It is hard, and hardened, against God. A heart of stone is incompatible with God’s created intent for humanity and with God’s redemptive purposes. The sinful nature cannot be tamed, it cannot be trained, it cannot be taught; it must be surgically removed. This new heart will be one of flesh. It will be impressionable and malleable, yielding to God’s will and to His Spirit who works through His Word.
A new heart will be given to after the removal of the old, while the new “spirit” will be given/placed within. Again, in the Old Testament, the “spirit” refers basically to that which animates, which enlivens, a person. This new spirit is connected to the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit who effects the believer’s regeneration and sanctified life of faith. Then, and only then, it is possible to do God’s will and live accordingly. This brings some deeper meaning to the Gospel reading and Jesus’ promise of sending the Holy Spirit to His disciples. The Pentecost of each believer happens in the waters of Baptism, sins washed, the Spirit given, the new heart implanted, the regenerated person made alive in Christ.
Fourth, simul justus et peccator, which means at the same time a saint and a sinner. Through faith in Christ, and by means of God’s word and sacraments, already now we are cleansed by the blood of Christ and declared to be saints. Yet as long as we live in this fallen world, our sinful nature wars against our regenerated nature as new creations in Christ. The life of the Christian is marked by repentance over our sin and being declared forgiven for Christ’s sake, for His name’s sake. This repentance is nor some general feeling of being less than perfect, but it is a particular self-examination, a confession of sinful things done and left undone, combined with the faith that Jesus delivers His forgiveness earned upon the cross individually to the person. This forgiveness and life of Christ bestowed to believer over and over again through the Word and Sacraments is what sustains us in this life unto our eternal destination.
Which brings me to the last point, that of our eschatological hope. Eschatology is the study and theology of the end times. This is the hope that we have, the certainty that we have, that as Christ is raised from the dead and ascended to the Father to sit as His right hand, so too shall we be elevated to God’s very presence because of Christ. As we live as saint and sinner in this life, our eternal security and destination rests on Christ’s resurrection from the dead. The context here in Ezekiel bears this out as it is phrased in the future tense. On the Last Day when Christ returns with all His glory, God will finally and completely cleanse His people by the removal of their sinful nature so that they shall never again sin or be unclean, that we shall dwell in the Lord’s presence in His land, in His renewed creation, the new heavens and the new earth.
God saves us by grace alone, which is His work alone, and He cleanses us from our sin by the blood of Christ, sprinkled it on us in the regenerating power of Holy Baptism wherein the Holy Spirit is bestowed and a new heart given, that we may live as one of God’s saints struggling against our sinful nature with the sure and certain hope of our eternal life with Him on the day of resurrection wherein we will be His people and He will be our God forever. Alleluia, Christ is risen. He is risen indeed. Alleluia. Amen.