Easter 5 C

“In a Little While – Joy”

St. John 16:12-22

28 April 2013 – Redeemer

John1612 Easter 5 C 2013 In a Little While

(Idea from Luther Sermon for the Third Sunday of Easter)

“In a little while” is the Gospel of the Lord for you today. Seven times in this little text St. John records those words – first from the mouth of Jesus and then repeated in the mouth of the disciples. Jesus is preparing His disciples for his death. What did the disciples think for those three days Christ Jesus lay in death’s strong bands? The cross stood empty, a reminder that their Lord’s life had been taken, and the tomb was full having swallowed up their Savior. But it was only for a little while. This Easter season we celebrate that He was only gone three days – a little while. Jesus told them it would be only a little while. He regularly said “the third day the Son of man will rise from the dead.”

That is your comfort today, the same comfort given the disciples – the comfort of Christ’s Word to you. This suffering under sin and death is only for “a little while.”

Jesus spoke these Words to the disciples the night He was betrayed. The next day He would go away in death. Saint John tells us that the disciples did not understand Jesus’ words. Indeed it probably wasn’t until the resurrection that their eyes were opened and they understood.

To the 12, when Jesus died, it appeared as if He had failed. The world was out to get them. They were as good as dead. Three years of their lives were gone. They had left businesses, walked out on their families. Their stock in Jesus Christ was worthless. It was all for nothing, or so it seemed. All they had was the Lord’s promise – a little while, and that they didn’t understand.

So it is with us. Why can’t you shake that pesky sin that tracks you like a bloodhound? Why do you hurt the most the ones you love the most? What is God thinking when He sends tragedy into your life, when a child dies too soon or a parent seems to live too long? Where is Jesus when I need Him? Why isn’t He doing something? How come the world’s sermons of selfishness and sex pack people into the pews of perversion while the Word of God doesn’t pack the pews of His house? Why does it seem the Word of God is like John the Baptist – a voice of one calling this wilderness? How come my children listen to everyone else as an authority and discount my word and the faith in which they were raised? Why is evil popular and good mocked? Why do the wicked rejoice and the righteous suffer?

I don’t know. I don’t have an answer for you. You and I have only the words of Jesus – a little while. That first “little while” of which Jesus spoke refers to the cross, His cross, His death for us. Jesus was gone for “a little while” and then returned and only then did the 12 grasp the cross and rejoice with great joy. You and I live in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Holy Christian Church is an Easter Church – Christ is risen. We now know that the cross is where Jesus was offered for the sin of the world. He was the burnt sacrifice consumed by His Father’s wrath. He was given over to death to pay for our sins. One of the objects you see returning to Lutheran Churches is a Crucifix – you’ve had one here for a long time, but for a while crucifixes were not very common in Lutheran churches. A crucifix is a cross with the body of Christ on it. That’s a full cross up there because a full cross, God on the cross, Christ crucified means your sins are forgiven, and if your sins are forgiven (and they are) then you will live eternally and rise bodily on the last day or we might say, “in a ‘little while” we will rise. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.

In a little while – joy. I’m sure the days between the cross and the tomb did not seem like a little while to the disciples, but when they saw the risen Lord it was a little while. In a little while – joy. Eleven of these men to whom Jesus was preaching would become His sent men, His apostles. His promise to them – they would suffer. The world would oppose them. The media would be against them. The authorities would kill them, but in a little while – joy.

Three days and they would find the tomb empty. A full cross and an empty tomb. That is our confession and hope. Sin is forgiven. Death is dead. Jesus lives. And all this is for you. And that pattern repeats itself in the life of every baptized child of God. Life is given to us by Christ and our lives are conformed to Christ’s death and resurrection. Suffering for a little while, death for a little while, then the joy of the resurrection and seeing Jesus face to face.

What will your life be like as a Christian? It will be like Christ’s. You will share with Christ in suffering and in a little while you will have joy. Jesus likens it to childbirth. I don’t think any woman would consider three days of labor “a little while.” But her suffering gives way to new life, she no longer remembers the anguish, for the joy that a child has been born into the world.” The literal translation of that passage is “for the joy that a son has been born into the world.” I believe Jesus is referring to Himself. That boy born into the world is Christ, born to the Virgin Mary, but also born anew in the resurrection, the first fruits of those who rise from the dead. And when Christ’s life is born in your heart by faith you too are born anew.

What will your life be like as a Christian? It will be like Christ’s. So often the work of the Father in His Son was hidden – hidden in a baby in a manger and in a criminal on the cross. His work is still hidden in your life – hidden under the plain water of baptism and in the words of a pastor’s sermon. Hidden in your calling as you pray silently for your suffering neighbor or fix supper for your family or stop like the good Samaritan to help someone beaten and battered on the road of life. And God is also hidden in the suffering you endure in this life. Like the disciples that is incomprehensible to us. How can He be at work in this midst of this? In the midst of such trouble we cling to His word….

…. “In a little while – joy, the joy of life, the joy of the resurrection, the joy of being free from sorrow, fear, pain, sin, death, the devil. In a little while we will see Jesus face to face, living, risen, and all will be forgotten save the joy of Jesus. That is what Jesus brings us this morning in His Word and in His Supper. You have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. Take heart then dear brothers and sisters, it will only be a little while in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Pr. Bruce Timm

27 April 2013 anno Domini