To God Alone Be The Glory
On rare occasions we hear some of the
saddest news that can be reported: a
mother has drowned her children or
harmed them in some other way. Gives
you a sick feeling in your gut, doesn’t it?
Now, a father killing his own child?
Equally tragic, but we make room in our
minds for that kind of thing because men
seem more capable of violent crimes.
But when a mother shuts off her love like
a faucet, that shakes us to our
foundations. Why? because we secretly
ask ourselves, “What if my mother didn’t
love me?” A mother’s love lays the first
blocks of a person’s sense of identity.
You know who you are when your mom
loves you, hugs you, soothes your hurts,
kisses you on the forehead or cheek.
“That’s my mommy. I’m her child.” Of
course, if both your mom and your dad
love you, your sense of identity will be
so strong that you will probably grow up
to be like them—kind, helpful, loving.
How much more true this is when it
comes to our sense of identity as
Christians! If we know that our heavenly
Father loves us, then we learn to identify
ourselves with him. If your heavenly
Father loves you—if his Son, our Lord
Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit love
you—your sense of Christian identity
will be so strong that you will probably
grow up to be like them: kind, helpful,
loving, faithful, patient, merciful, gentle,
joyful, self-controlled, peacemakers.
23 June 2013
Pentecost 5 - C
Zechariah 13:7-9
But how do you know God loves you?
When was the last time he took you in
his arms, hugged you, and kissed you on
the forehead or cheek? Hasn’t happened
yet. We may get to hug Jesus in heaven,
but that’s in the future. So how do you
know God loves you now?
Because the Bible tells us so. It’s God’s
Word. You’re probably thinking of John
3:16 right now. You may say it with me
if you like: “God so loved the world that
he gave his one and only Son, that
whoever believes in him shall not perish
but have eternal life.” God loves us. He
says so.
But from the world’s point of view, the
Lord has a funny way of showing his
love. The world has heard that the
heavenly Father had his own Son killed.
We know it wasn’t murder. And it
wasn’t for hate. But it was premeditated. The prophet Zechariah, who
wrote down the Words of God that we
are focusing on this morning, lived about
500 years before God’s Son Jesus was
killed. Listen to what God the Father
says through Zechariah: 7“Awake, O
sword, against My Shepherd, against the
Man who is close to me!” declares the
LORD Almighty. We know this is the
Father talking about his Son because on
Maundy Thursday, Jesus quoted the next
verse of Zechariah while he was eating
the Last Supper with his disciples. “You
will all fall away,” Jesus told them, “for
S-1285.648
Pastor N Cordes
www.StMatthews.ws
Page 1
it is written: ‘I will strike the shepherd
and the sheep will be scattered’ (Mark
14:27).” And that’s just what happened.
When the soldiers came and arrested
Jesus, the disciples ran for their lives in
every direction, like atoms colliding in a
particle accelerator.
Now, if you were good unbelievers
(good unbeliever? that’s an oxymoron!),
you would be chafing under the thought
that the Lord had his own Son killed.
You would find it offensive to identify
yourself with such a God. But the Lord
says, “Awake, O sword, against My
Shepherd, against the Man who is close
to me!” declares the LORD Almighty.
Some unbelievers have asserted, “This
can’t be talking about Jesus because
Jesus died on a cross, not by a sword.”
But the sword is an instrument of death,
and the point here is that the heavenly
Father intended for his Son to be killed.
“But why? Didn’t the Father love his
Son?” Yes, he did! He calls Jesus “My
Shepherd, the Man who is close to me.”
The Father loved Jesus. “So then why
have him killed?” Because that was the
only way to make us his possession.
“The only way? Why? What’s wrong
with us that we weren’t already God’s
possession?”
We know the answer. It’s sin. That’s
the problem with us. We keep doing the
opposite of what God wants. He says,
“Use my name for prayer and praise.
Use it to bless others. Use my name to
23 June 2013
Pentecost 5 - C
Zechariah 13:7-9
tell others all the good things I’ve done
for them.” But what have we done? We
are sometimes (or more often) slow to
pray. We worry for a while before it
dawns on us, “Oh yeah, the Lord is in
control, and he loves me. I’m going to
ask him for help and commit this
problem to him. He can fix it.”
But it’s not just that we’re slow to pray.
Sometimes (or more often) we’re slow to
praise the Lord. Instead of having the
good Saturday attitude, “Hey,
tomorrow’s church! I’m going to lay out
my clothes, set my alarm, go to bed early
and get a good night’s sleep,” what do
we often do? Run around on Saturday
like there’s no tomorrow, tire ourselves
out, stay up late, and if we manage to get
to church on time (or even fifteen
minutes early so we can see if everything
is ready for worship, and greet others as
they arrive, and sit quietly for a couple of
minutes to get our hearts ready for
worship), we’re now so tired that we can
hardly pay attention during worship.
Instead of getting excited to hear that our
sins are forgiven because of Jesus’
atoning sacrifice, our minds sometimes
wander elsewhere during the
absolution—best part of the service.
But it’s not just that we’re slow to pray
and praise and give thanks, we’re
sometimes slow to bless those who curse
us. In fact we’ve been known to say
“God damn you” instead of “God bless
you.” And sometimes we’re slow to
S-1285.648
Pastor N Cordes
www.StMatthews.ws
Page 2
speak up about what Jesus did on the
cross to save our friends and relatives
and enemies. “Never mind what God
thinks: I can’t have my friends and
relatives thinking bad of me because I
actually live my Christianity.”
Oh friends, we’ve looked at only a few
examples of how we break the 2nd
Commandment, and already there’s
enough evidence to demonstrate that we
are sinners. There’s only one way to pay
for sin. That person who sins must die
(see Ezekiel 18:4), must be separated
from God eternally. That person is I.
And you.
That’s where God’s plan to love us
comes in. 7“Awake, O sword, against
My Shepherd, against the Man who is
close to me!” declares the LORD
Almighty. I’ll punish Jesus for sin
instead of those sinners who sinned.
Then I can look at them and not see any
sins.”
You’d think that after carrying out such a
painfully loving plan, the Lord would
bring us into his presence right away.
But look at what comes next! He says,
“I will turn My hand against the little
ones. 8In the whole land,” declares the
LORD, “two-thirds will be struck down
and perish.” This is the most difficult
part of the text. It seems to be worded
vaguely on purpose as if it is describing
several kinds of things that would
happen in the future. The easiest thing to
23 June 2013
Pentecost 5 - C
Zechariah 13:7-9
imagine is that 2/3 of God’s people will
be killed by persecution. But this verse
could just as easily be pointing to all the
defections of Jesus’ followers from
churches in the last hundred years. Or it
could refer to the defection of churches
from the pure teachings of the Bible.
Many churches these days no longer
consider the Bible the source of
preaching. Whole churches are perishing
spiritually as they preach about earthly
happiness and success rather than
humble repentance before God and full
free forgiveness through Jesus.
This verse could also be foretelling the
huge loss of disciples that Jesus would
experience. For a whole year huge
crowds followed Jesus around. We call
it his “year of popularity.” But all that
came to an end after Jesus miraculously
fed the 5,000 and then explained that he
is the bread of life, that the bread that
came down from heaven is his flesh
which he would give for the life of the
world. Many followers weren’t ready to
accept a Messiah who would give his
flesh over to death for them. Many of his
disciples said, “This is a hard teaching.
Who can accept it?” From this time
many of his disciples turned back and no
longer followed him (John 6:60,66).
As the prophet Zechariah saw things, it
looked pretty bad for the followers of
Jesus: “two-thirds will be struck down
and perish; yet one-third will be left in
it.” But this loss wasn’t enough. The
S-1285.648
Pastor N Cordes
www.StMatthews.ws
Page 3
Lord had big plans for this one third, this
remnant of believers. No, he didn’t plan
nice big hugs and kisses as if to say he
loved them. He planned other love.
God’s kind of love. Through the prophet
the Lord says, 9This third I will bring
into the fire; I will refine them like silver
and test them like gold. The only way to
purify gold and silver is to heat it up very
hot and burn off all the impurities.
You’re God’s silver. You’re God’s gold.
He plans to love you so much that he’ll
stick you in the fire—probably not a real
fire, but he’s going to make it awfully
hot for us.
How? Not just through the sickness and
regular hardships that everyone
experiences. I’m thinking of the kind of
fire that comes from identifying
ourselves with the Lord. You, no doubt,
have friends or relatives like I do who
want you to leave this church and join
theirs. Or they want you to stay home
with them on the Sundays when they are
in town. Or you have a boss who thinks
nothing of scheduling you to work on
Sunday mornings. Or you have a
boyfriend or girlfriend who wants you
not to wait until you’re married to make
use of God’s gifts. Or you have friends
who want you to consume excessive
quantities of adult beverage now that
you’ve surpassed 21. Just think how hot
things will get for you if you have the
gall to do what is right in God’s sight!
Just think how pure the Lord will make
you by all the heat generated as you love
23 June 2013
Pentecost 5 - C
Zechariah 13:7-9
God above all things and above all
people, dear precious and pure gold and
silver of God! Or will you fail the test
and be found to be something other than
God’s gold and silver. Will you be
burned off or burned pure?
It’s a pressure cooker just thinking about
doing the right thing. But the Lord’s
assumption is that you and I and the rest
of the believers will be part of the onethird who gets put into the fires and has
our sinful tendencies burned off. Of us
the Lord says: They will call on My name
and I will answer them; I will say, ‘They
are My people,’ and they will say, ‘The
LORD is our God.’” And why wouldn’t
we claim the Lord as our God? Why
wouldn’t we identify ourselves with
him? He loves us in ways that are better
than hugs. And every time we read the
Bible for ourselves at home, every time
we come to God’s house and hear his
Word proclaimed and sung, every time
we remember that because the Father
struck down his Son, we will not be
struck down, then we know he is
working to increase our sense of
Christian identity so that when we think
of who we are, the answer comes out
something like, “That’s my Daddy. I’m
his child.” He is THE LORD: I AM HIS
AND HE IS MINE.
S-1285.648
Pastor N Cordes
www.StMatthews.ws
Page 4