Sermon for Quinquagesima, AD 2026

         Together, we are united in Christ, His work, which is the great act of love that saves us and binds us together.

• Christ’s great act of love

Jesus Christ, the God-man, walks to Jerusalem to commit the ultimate act of love. Love is making yourself less in order to bless others. It is doing to your neighbor as you would be done by. Jesus does even more than this, by making himself the least, the lowest, in order to save sinners. What Jesus tells to the twelve here as He takes them aside is not the first time He would describe His passion. Here he goes into the detail about the suffering that He must face for the sins of men.
Jesus says He will be delivered into the hands of the Gentiles. The Jews, being under Roman rule, were generally able to arbitrate their own disputes. The Romans did not particularly care about how they worked day to day goings on in their own religion and their own people. But the Jews were not allowed to put people to death. Jesus must be delivered over to the Romans so a Roman magistrate can sentence Him to death. We confess this every week as we say, “He suffered under Pontius Pilate.” By this, Jesus Christ submits to judgment, not only of one nation, but of the government of the whole world. Here all willingly condemn Christ, whether out of jealousy, foolishness, or cowardice.
Jesus does not only submit Himself to judgment, but He would be mocked, insulted, and spit upon. They can’t only condemn Christ, but must make Him feel as low as possible. The soldiers array Jesus in a purple robe and crown of thorns, mocking His kingship. They spit on him and strike him over and over. Jesus willingly takes the shame. He takes the shame because He is taking on our shame. We should be ashamed of our sin, of turning from God, of denying the king of glory and treating Him like nothing. God should place on us nothing but everlasting shame. But in love He takes that shame on Himself in our place.
Then Jesus is scourged. He is struck with whips which make ruts in His back. No one can say it better than the prophet Isaiah: “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed.” For we sheep who have gone astray, all our sins were put upon Him. By His suffering, we receive instead life, healing and salvation. We are cleansed by the blood sacrificed for us that pours from His wounds.
No greater wounds, than those given on the cross. There He takes the ultimate suffering, not only of the crucifixion, as the two thieves do, but of the wrath of God poured out upon Him. It pleased God to make Christ’s soul and offering for sin, and it pleased Christ to follow His Father’s will and be the sacrifice. Christ dies, in accordance with His Father’s will, as God shows His perfect love for us in His death.
You know all these things, but at the time, the disciples did not understand these things. Their eyes were not open. They were hidden. If our eyes are not open to the love of Christ in His suffering and death, then nothing else in Christianity will make sense. Easter will have no point. We look into the valley of Lent, on our way to Easter. We should not let it be a time to ignore Christ and His Word, only to celebrate on the other end. Nor should it be a drudgery of our own work with no view of what Christ has done. Lent is a time for us to lessen love for ourselves, and increase love for neighbor, as we remember Christ’s love for us.

• Christ’s particular love

It would be enough if Christ’s death on the cross was all He did for us. But daily He shows His particular love with so much more. As Jesus is on His way to Jerusaelm with His disciples, and passing by Jericho, there is a blind beggar on the road. Now the Jews were not supposed to have beggars among them, but take care of their poor, widows, and orphans. But here he is. He has been shown very little love in his life. Jesus will show this man His particular love.
We are all like this blind beggar in a way. We are not in Jerusalem yet, in the place where Jesus is going. We sit by the roadside, in Jericho. And all we can do is call out for help. That is the nature of repentance. Nothing to offer Christ. We see where we are, that we in our sin cannot do anything for ourselves. So we call out to Jesus, the Son of David, the Son of the King, to help us.
You know what Jesus does? It specifically says He stands still. With all Jesus has to do, with everyone thronging around, with the importance of His mission in His mind, He stops. He has the beggar brought to Him and offers help. Though all the world told the beggar to be quiet, He didn’t give us. Christ hears your prayers. He hears your call for help. He will stop and help. This is His particular love for you.
See how Jesus fulfills St. Paul’s description of love in 1 Corinthians chapter 13:
Jesus is longsuffering and kind. He does not mind the blind beggar calling out over and over. We might mind our own children, whom we love, asking the same things over and over. Jesus doesn’t. He will hear a cry for help again and again, and in love come kindly to assist. He never ever gets tired or annoyed with us praying “Lord, have mercy on me.”
Jesus does not think himself too important for our needs. See here, He is the Son of God, He is on His Father’s mission, He is going to the cross, to do the most important thing in human history and yet He is not too busy or too important to stop for a blind beggar. Do not think that you are too small or insignificant for Jesus’ love.
Jesus is not rude or self-seeking either. He is not secretly in the back of His mind thinking about how annoying you are. Love does not behave rudely or think evil like that. He does not think how helping you will benefit Him. Jesus is open and honest in His love. What you see is what you get. If He was willing to suffer on the cross for you then certainly He is genuine about hearing and helping you with your needs.
Jesus rejoices that people may see Him and believe. It is His greatest joy that a sinner be saved. His love is that in seeking the best for you, He also seeks what He and His Father desire most. They desire to be at peace with sinners. That is why Christ died to atone for us, so we could be one, in union with God and one another. This desire, which comes from God’s love for you, will never fail.

• Love is the fruit of our faith

We know that Christ has this unfailing love for us. He has suffered died and risen to make peace with God. We can call on Him for help, because He has shown and continues to show His love. Calling out, trusting in the love of God, is faith. Faith has the greatest value in this life. Faith trusts that God loves us and has a good disposition toward us because of Christ. Faith trusts that God will hear our prayers, come to our aid, and forgive our sins. Because the love of God has been revealed to us, we can have faith.
That faith now is not perfect. In this world we are still affected by the Old Adam. We still have to deal with sin pulling us to not trust in God. We see Christ through the testimony of the scriptures and we trust in His Word. We have good reason to trust, but everything is not yet complete. Paul speaks about this in two images. A child can have right understanding of things, but he understands as a child. When we grow older, our understanding changes, becomes more complete, we leave childish things behind. When we see things in a mirror, as we see Christ in the Word, we see dimly. It is a true image, but not as bright as when we see face to face.
Faith looks forward to being completed in sight. For now, we trust in God, and from that trust in His love, flows our love. When the blind man is healed, his eyes are opened to who Christ is. His response is to praise God and to follow Christ to Jerusalem. He will proceed with the disciples on this same path.
What does it mean for us to follow Christ to Jerusalem. Our eyes have been opened to see who he is. We are no longer blind beggars, but sons and disciples. In faith, we pursue the way of love where Christ is going. As St Paul says, it’s not about tongues of men and angels, prophecy, or knowledge, at least those things are not of any worth without the love of Christ.
As we follow Christ to the heavenly Jerusalem, we see with our eyes opened. No longer do we see as the world sees, but with the eyes of faith. So we can be kind and long suffering to other people. We don’t have to be annoyed with our kids, or others who call on us again and again because Christ never is for us. Like Christ, we don’t need to seek the best for ourselves. We can realize that we aren’t really that important. If Christ with His universe-changing mission was willing to stop for one blind beggar, certainly nothing we do is that important that we can’t take a little time for someone else. Call a friend, play with our kids a few minutes, bring some soup to someone who is sick.
Not just this, because even a pagan could do these things, but rejoice in the truth. Like the blind man, the first thing he does is praise God. We too show love by rejoicing in the things that are truly good, that God loves, and hating the things that God hates. We show love not by covering up truth to protect feelings, but by, in wisdom, letting the truth of God’s Word shine through what we say. And then when get push back, we bear it, believe and hope the best, endure whatever mocking out of the sake of love.
At the end, at the heavenly Jerusalem, love will pervade all things. There will be no impatience or annoyance, pride or boasting in self. There will be no rudeness, self-seeking, or rejoicing in evil happening to others. Only the love and truth of Christ will shine forth. We will no longer know as a child, or see in a mirror, but we will see and know God face to face. That face will shine forth with love, which will be perfectly reflected in us.
Now, as we follow Jesus to the heavenly Jerusalem, we practice that love, in faith, even in great weakness. But it is a practice for who we really are and who we really will be, when the Lord’s Supper here is complete and we come to the feast of the Lamb in His kingdom, who reigns forever, Jesus Christ, the Son of David. Amen.