Part One - The Sign of Celebration

        It might seem strange, I suppose, that when Jesus chooses to perform His first miraculous sign, He does so at a wedding. He does so by providing wine when wine had run out at a wedding, in a small town called Cana, in a backwater province called Galilee. At the wedding of a couple who apparently did not have a lot of financial means. And yet there we find Him. And there we see the rather strong reactions to that which He did.

        There was of course, the disciples, who were enabled to respond with their faith. And then there was the master of the banquet who responded with surprise. And then, of course, was the bridegroom who really didn’t know what was going on, and responded, more than likely, in confusion.

        But I’d like to suggest to you that there was another group of people there who responded as well. Perhaps with annoyance, and perhaps even anger. The people who had planned on being able to use for their ceremonial washings but now had no more water left to do it.

        Please understand that in Jewish society at that time, it was absolutely essential to have large quantities of water for a large group like that which might attend a wedding. Weddings in those days lasted anywhere from one to six days, depending on the financial resources of the couple getting married. And so there was a lot of coming and going, as you might imagine.

        And then you want to think for a moment too about Galilee itself, because Galilee had a lot of Gentile population. You see if you are a good Jew, and you touch a Gentile, you are unclean and need to be ceremonial cleansed. You need to pour water on your hands. I don’t suppose the Gentiles were really impressed with that, but needless to say, it was necessary for the Jews.

        And for that matter, if you touched something that a Gentile touched, it was necessary, once again, to wash your hands and become ceremonially clean. It happened all the time.

        Not only that, but there were other rules. There were rules about ceremonial cleansing of cups and bowls and tables and chairs. So this ceremonial washing. The Jews were a very clean people, I suspect. Everything got washed. And washed. And washed again.

        And now, suddenly, at this wedding, there are no more bowls with which to do the ceremonial cleansing. Well, what are we going to do now?

        Well, it seems to me that Jesus was not doing anything inadvertently or coincidentally. In fact, it seems that the rules that often were being broken by Jesus and His disciples, were not really all the time rules that were set forth in the Scriptures in the old covenant, but rather they were rules that were made by men. They were called, in fact, in the text itself, "the tradition of the elders".

        Not that they were necessarily bad, in and of themselves, it was just that sometimes the manmade rules got elevated above the law that God had given. And therein lies the problem.

        The miraculous sign of turning water into wine had a two-fold purpose. First of all, there would be no more ceremonial cleansing, at least not at that wedding. And again, Jesus does not do things coincidentally. He is saying that the tradition of the elders, and the rules men lay upon men, and elevate above that which they should be, that is, superior to God’s will and revelation, are over. They’re done.

        Time and again, our Lord would point out, in no uncertain terms, that such a thing ought not to be. It bred self-righteousness. It bred, if not self-righteousness, then despair at the inability to keep all the rules that not only God had made, but layer upon layer of manmade laws that had been added since then.

        On the one hand, ceremonial things were over. And on the other hand, the celebration would continue.

        Jesus had come, after so, so that people had a reason to celebrate, rather than be in despair. He came precisely to lift us out of the mire of death and hell which we so richly deserve. And give us instead something to celebrate indeed.

        He can’t win for losing with this crowd.

        And so He came. Not to put us into the pit of despair. But to lift us into the joy of His celebration. Of course, it was a celebration at the wedding at Cana. The Bridegroom of the Church had arrived! The long-promised Messiah, the One who would come and lift us up from above the law, and fulfill the law for us, and live for us, and die for us. The Bridegroom of the Church had come! Of course His first miraculous work would be at a wedding!

        How else could it be?

        You know, Garrison Keiller, if you’re familiar with A Prairie Home Companion, often kids his fellow Lutherans. He says, Lutherans look like people who celebrate Lent all year long. Maybe he has a point. I think it’s overstated, but maybe not.

        That’s not why Jesus came! That we might walk around with dour faces and sorrow. There is time enough for that. And there is appropriate time for that, and Lent is certainly one of those times. Remember the heavy load of sin that our Lord had to bear, and that that sin was ours and that’s why He was there. But on the other hand, He comes to give us a reason to celebrate.

        On most every Sunday morning we almost always celebrate the Lord’s Supper, Holy Communion. I suppose if a stranger were to walk into the back, it wouldn’t look like a celebration, would it?

        Certainly when we come forward, it is not a time for celebration. When we come forward, we come in a spirit of repentance. But then when we consider what we leave with, when we get up from the kneelers and return to our chairs, what has happened? God has forgiven our sins! He has offered the very purchase price for the remission of those sins. They are gone! They are forgiven.

        We receive the grace to serve Him with a God-pleasing life. We receive the strength to continue in our faith toward Him, and in the knowledge of Him as our Savior. We may not be skipping and clapping on our way back to the pews, but we know that we are at peace with God and with each other. And that’s reason for celebration.

        What is more, when Christ comes to make His divine sacrifice, which we focus so steadfastly on during Lent, we find that in Christ we have a reason to celebrate our escape from sin and death in which we were so hopelessly mired. Here at the cross we find our death sentence commuted and our sins wiped clean. Here at the cross we are free from the terrible regulations of the law which we could not keep, and the manmade regulations that legalists like to pile on top of them.

        He wipes the slate clean and says, "It is my Son who has kept the law, even if you could not".

        And so we celebrate. We celebrate what Christ has done, and of course it is with wine. We remember that it was during the third cup of Passover, the cup of redemption,  and it was in the drinking of that cup and the sharing of that cup that Christ instituted the new covenant of the Lord’s Supper, a covenant in blood.

        And we remember of course that it was wine vinegar that was lifted up to Him on a stick when He was on the cross and said, "I thirst".

        And someone with a modicum of kindness offered it to Him, and He drank. And His words followed. "It is finished".

        And at the conclusion of those words, I am absolutely certain that a celebration broke out... in hell. And I’m certain that Satan and his fallen angels were whooping and shouting in triumph and victory. But their victory would be short-lived. For as we confess in the apostle’s creed, He descended into hell. And their He proclaimed the doom of their shouts and jeers. And He commended them to the fate to which they deserved. He announced His victory... took His victory lap, and said, "The party is over".

        And at that there began another celebration. One in heaven, where the shouts of the angelic hosts which rang out were shouts of joy and thanksgiving to the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. That song has never ended, nor will it!

        And there will come a day when that shouting and that celebration of the heavenly host will be joined with our own in Christ on the day of His return. He’ll say come join the party, and we’ll be with Him forever.

        Of course it began at a wedding. For we know beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the Lamb of God presides at the eternal banquet of heaven where the scriptures tell us we shall have the finest of, you guessed it, wines. And the best of meats. And all the blessings that come with being in the presence of the Almighty God. And what is more we don’t have to wait to celebrate. For all that we will have is our present possession. It is ours by the grace of God through jesus Christ. Through His death and through His resurrection.

        So forgive me. Hallelujah!

Part Two - The Sign Spoken Against

        Something needs to be said about this sign. For indeed it has been fulfilled in great detail, and repeatedly. Here come Jesus’s parents in accord with the law, that at forty days after birth the child should be presented as first born sons were done, to the temple. At eight days, He was of course circumcised, and then to the temple for presentation. And there and old and pious man, a man of God, having been told by the Spirit of God that he would not die until he had seen the Lord’s Christ, the Messiah, came.

        And we are told that Mom and Dad, Joseph and Mary, marveled at the things that were said about their infant son. And then, comes the sign. A sign spoken against. Ominous news of warning. Completely fulfilled.

        Indeed, there were words of warning and words of speaking against. We remember that early on in Jesus’s ministry, He returned to Nazareth, His home town, and there proclaimed great gospel news. The news that the Messiah was there before then, that those things which the scriptures had prophesied about Him were being fulfilled before their very eyes. For which He was immediately ushered to the edge of a cliff and nearly murdered had they had their way.

        And there was the paralyzed man who was brought to Jesus. But instead of healing him at first, He rather forgives the man’s sins. And there are those there who proclaimed that "blasphemy". And then He heals him anyway.

        And then, that very same day, a man with a shriveled hand comes forward. And they have a discussion before anything happens, about whether it is right to heal on the sabbath, and of course, at the mere thought of it, Jesus is spoken against and condemned. Whereupon He heals the man with the shriveled hand.

        And then even Jesus’s mother and brothers get into the act. And we find that He is engaging so many people in so long a period, that they voice their concern that maybe Jesus is out of His mind. And so even His own family, flesh and blood mother and brothers, are ones who speak against Him.

        And again, and again, and again comes the speaking that this man associates with sinners, tax collectors, and prostitutes. Things haven’t changed all that much.

        Today on university campuses, the name of Jesus is ridiculed. Indeed, anyone who comes thinking that Jesus is risen from the dead is thought to be a fool. And is mercilessly treated.

        And even in church. In many mainstream churches the gospel has stripped of its power. Instead of simple messages of kindness and being nice to one another, have taken the place of salvation by grace through faith in Christ Jesus and in no one else

        And what is more, we find even mainstream seminaries jumping on the bandwagon. And we find that Jesus is thought to be perhaps, just a man after all, not the Son of God. Not the One who rose from the dead. After all, such things, we presume, are preposterous.

        And then what about us? Is the precious name of Jesus, and His exalted title of Christ, which means Messiah, simply a way of expressing an expletive? Then indeed have we spoken against Christ.

        When we engage in conversation with our non-Christian friends, and we sort of want to soft-sell things so as not to create any conflict, instead of pointing out that Christ is indeed the only way to be in fellowship with the Father. Have we not spoken against our Lord Jesus Christ?

        And when we have opportunity among our family and friends to discuss things of the faith, and we change the subject and move on from there, after all we have been bitten before having done that, are we not speaking against Christ?

        It is not merely the atheist. It is not merely the irreligious. It is not merely the enemies of the church. Sometimes, we are the ones who speak against Christ. By our thoughts, by our words, by our actions, and by our inactions, for which we are guilty.

        But this sign who was spoken against does something quite astounding. Despite all the words and the injuries that are thrown and hurled at Him, what do we find Him doing? He is speaking for us. On the cross we hear Him say, "Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."

        Get the picture here. Here is Christ, holding before the Father the wounds of His honor, and He says to the Father, "Father see I have paid the price for their hurtful words. Father, behold every last sin of theirs, I have born in my body." Behold we hear Him say, "Father I have kept the law for these lawless ones, and I have given them the cloak of my righteousness for their own. Father I have given them all that need be given. They are your children as I am your Son."

        The one spoken against is the one who speaks for us. In Jesus’s name, Amen.

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Part Three - The Eyes of the Lamb

        Tonight in your mind’s eye I would invite you to look into the eyes of the passover lamb described in the Old Testament reading. What do you see? I suspect that you will see what I mean. What I mean is that you will see in the faces of those lambs those who will soon shed their blood for the protection of their owners. You will see those will be roasted, but they will have no understanding of it, nor has anyone consulted them about it. You will look into their eyes and you would see just what you would see in any animal’s eyes...just the face of an animal. Without any idea, with any sense of mortality. Without any notion that they are about to do for their owners a very important thing.

        But the most important thing they are about to do is something far greater than the Passover they are about to participate in. For they are about to foretell that which is coming. Something that was foretold. Something that is to be an even greater fulfillment than the great miraculous work of God’s Passover and deliverance from the land of Egypt. They are about to portray the very one who is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.

        And now in your mind’s eye, I would invite you to look into the very eyes of that Lamb of God as He prepares to celebrate with His apostles that very first Lord’s Supper, that very first Holy Communion, that very first Eucharist. And you will see there something quite different.

        There you will see the eyes in the face of the Lamb who knows full well what is ahead of Him. He does have a sense of mortality, in a way. He knows that ahead of Him lies a cross and a tomb. He knows that ahead of Him lies a trial, and an arrest, and a beating, and a scourging, and a crucifixion.

        This Lamb of God knows, and can sense, in that which is about to occur. As the meal is brought in, I wonder if His eyes are taken off that roasted lamb during the course of the meal. For roasted it was, and roasted so too should be this Lamb of God. Over the spit of a cross over the very fires of hell, for the very sins for which we deserve to feel its flames.

        He will shed His blood. And He will shed His blood for the protection of His people, to provide a safe haven so that the wrath of God, the angel of death, if you will, will indeed pass over us on the final judgment day, and we will be found acquitted because of Him.

        Yes indeed, the eyes of the Lamb of God are fully aware of what is about to transpire. His blood would be the one thing that marks the body of every single one of us. Just as it was on the doorposts and lintels of the children of Israel so too does the blood of the Lamb mark us. And indeed does it prevent the wrath of God from visiting us. For on Calvary’s cross we find the Lamb of God shedding His blood and leaving a stain there. A stain that is absolutely irremovable. It is a stain that will not be overlooked by the Father, for it is the very offering that the Father intended His Son to make.

        It is that blood that, as we gather at the altar, which we share together, that is that body, the Lamb of God’s body and blood which we receive within ourselves in, with, and under the wine of this new covenant that He makes with us. And in the establishment of that new covenant, by doing this, He is announcing that that old covenant has been fulfilled. That there is no longer a need for it. For here is the end of the system of sacrifice. Here is the end of endless offerings meant to assuage God’s anger. Here is where God’s anger, you see, is fully and completely expended. The Father will hold nothing back. All the wrath which our sins deserved, all the wrath of sins past and sins future and sins present, are pushed together and hurled at the beauty of His own Son, so that the justice of God could be finally and fully satisfied.

        It is a wondrous thing, to look into the eyes of the Lamb of God. Roasted and turned, over the fires of hell. The blood shed, breath gone, and to know, every last bit of it, was for us.

        And so my dear friends, come forward this evening and receive the amazing grace of God. Come forward this evening and step into that upper room with Christ and His disciples and receive the blood of the new covenant. And taste the Lamb of God, and know that He is in you, and you are in Him. Come forward, and in unity of that faith, we know that we are one, just as He is one with the Father.

Part Four - It Is Finished

        People of God, Good Friday is a strange evening indeed. It cannot all be a celebration on that first time when we come to the cross and see Him hanging there. And yet, there is a sense of joy at what God is accomplishing through this incredible tragedy.

        Good Friday is the culmination of it all. It is exactly what Christ had come to do, it was exactly what the Father willed. It was precisely the fulfillment of the Divine will that this innocent one was the one who should be crushed. And that by His stripes, we would be healed. In essence, I suppose, you could say that Good Friday is payback. It is payback in the sense that it is payback for our disobedience.

        It is what happened a long time ago at the dawn of human history, where suddenly the necessity of coming to this room, this evening, this sanctuary, was absolutely made necessary by the disobedience of mankind.

        And tonight, the Father finally receives what He has wanted all along. The holy one, who is God almighty, has desired nothing save the obedience of His children. And tonight, on that Good Friday we see that obedience being carried out. And the Father finally receives what He longs for. The perfection of the sinlessness of His Son.

        The Father also provides what He also longs to give fallen humanity, to you and to me, and that is justice. Believe me, you don’t want justice from God. You do not want it because what we deserve is nothing but death and hell. Now and forever. That’s what we deserve.

        And so it is His Son who comes to Golgotha’s cross. It is His Son who is raised high, and who is nailed there, it is His Son upon whom the crown of thorns is pressed, it is His Son who suffers the hell we deserve so that the justice of the Father, and His demands of holiness, would finally and at last in humanity be met. And as a result we are acquitted. Declared not guilty. And permitted to be children of the living God.

        You see, it was finally man’s disobedience that was the cause of the cross. Don’t just blame the Roman soldiers. Don’t just point the finger at Caiaphas the High Priest. Don’t just point the finger only at Pontius Pilate. We must point the finger right back at ourselves. For were it not for our sins, the cross would not at all have been necessary.

        Remember that when Adam falls, all mankind falls with him. All that humanity would ever be was contained in Adam, and when he fell, the corporate man fell with him. And we live out the reality of that fallen estate every single day. We know it of ourselves, and we know it in the world in which we live. For we live in a world of drive-by shootings and suicide bombers. We live in a world where people fly airplanes into tall towers and people die by the thousands.

        We live in a world in which, day by day, every single day, we understand when we look in the mirror the potential within us for being just like those who perpetrate such crimes. For that is the nature of sin itself. That within us lies the potential to be an Adolf Hitler, a Jeffrey Dahmler, an Osama Bin-Ladin, or any one of a thousand other names we could bring. This is the nature of sin and disobedience.

        Down through history, of course, we’ve attempted to find ways, we humans have, of trying to satisfy God. We’ve tried again and again to try a sort of do-it-yourself home-improvement/self-improvement projects, to make ourselves at least 51 percent good so that God would, so to speak, sort of even the ledger books and let us into the Pearly Gates.

        If we look at the religion of Islam we find that all that is required is completion of the Five Pillars of the faith. And then we find that those who follow that faith cannot even comply with that short list of to do’s.

        Or we look to the Eastern religions and we find an eight-fold path to inner enlightenment that, if it is done right, and if you do it well enough, well, the next time around it won’t be quite so bad.

        And then if we look at the religion of the Hindu’s, and we see the system of karma built in, and we see how one must accumulate for himself good karma, or bad karma, depending upon how well we behave. And then again, when recycling time comes around, God somehow decides that you will come back as a cockroach or a bull.

        And then for our atheist friends. Here is a faith that is admirable. Admirable because it is so far-fetched it takes more faith than what we believe in. Here we have people who will say absolutely nothing but that we must leave this place a little better than we found it, and of course, it isn’t. And when you die, the only payoff is a hole in the ground, and that’s it. Such faith is amazing. Such faith flies in the face as we stand in the creation and look around us and see the design of God, that all that He has made, interbalanced and interconnected, can therefore by faith be denied completely.

        How bad is it? It’s a good night, I think to find out. The ten commandments are a summary of God’s law. Technically, God’s law is the entire Old Testament, the Prophets and the Books of Moses. Let’s start at the top.

        God’s answer to the unrelenting demands of His inflexible and holy law, is absolutely, astoundingly amazing.

        "Please, God", we would plead, "We can’t do what you command." And so God sends His Son, His only begotten Son. Begotten from eternity before all worlds were made, into this world and becomes flesh. God with a human face on, if you can imagine. Inconceivable. Implausible. Impossible, we might say.

        And so the Son of God, who has no sin, is obedient. He fulfills every last part of the law for us. He goes to the cross and there pays the penalty for our disobedience. Through His obedience even to death on a cross. And so He is the one who receives the crown of thorns. It is His flesh into which the nails are pounded. It is His lungs which suffer the excruciating pain of the suffocation of crucifixion. It is the Son of God, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, who feels the heat of hellfire for us. Because we could not endure it.

        And so with tears in our eyes, both from our sadness and from our joy, we come to this Good Friday evening and we remember it is our guilt that is taken away, it is our punishment which is given to another. And such love as what we see on the cross the world has never seen, nor did it see it when it was happening, and it will never see love like that again.

        The fullest expression of God’s love is His Son, hanging on a cross. He couldn’t make it any clearer than that.

        Yes, this is a bittersweet night. It is a night of extreme irony and paradox. But beyond all else, it is a night on which we know the lengths to which God would go to love us. And to redeem us. To purchase us back from sin and death and hell. It is a night to smile, if you will, through our tears, for the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, and who has purchased us from sin, from death, and from the grave. In Jesus’s name, Amen.