St. Matthew 22:34–46
In the name of the Father and of the + Son
and of the Holy Spirit –
Today’s Gospel lets us listen in on a
theological debate – a debate about Scripture and doctrine. It’s a debate
between the Pharisees and Jesus. It’s a debate between those supposed experts
in the Law and the very Gospel Himself – Jesus the Christ. Although the
Pharisees don’t recognize that’s who He is. One of the Pharisees, a Law expert,
asked Jesus a question to test Him: “Teacher,
which is the great commandment in the Law?” He wants Jesus to pick one. Either
one of the Ten, or one of the other hundreds of commands found in the Books of
Moses. Pick a commandment Jesus, and then we’ll have some fun debating Your
answer.
It’s as if Jesus has His Bible
opened to Deuteronomy. And He gives the perfect textbook answer. He doesn’t
play the game – He doesn’t pick one commandment. He summarizes the entire Law: “You shall love the Lord your God with all
your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and
first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as
yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” There
it is. The Law expert asked a Law question and Jesus gave him the perfect Law
answer. Debate over.
But
as perfect as the answer is, it is impossible to fulfill. The Law does not give
life. The Law does not comfort. For supposed experts in the Law, those who think
they can be saved by doing the Law, it can only kill and damn to hell. Debate
really over.
But Jesus has His own question,
and it’s very different from the Pharisee’s question – about as different as
Law and Gospel. “What do you think about
the Christ? Whose son is He?” First, let me explain that term, “Christ.” We
call our Lord: Jesus Christ. Jesus is His name – Christ is His title. Christ is
actually a Greek word that means, “Anointed One.” Greek is the language of the
New Testament. But God’s Old Testament people, the Israelites, didn’t speak
Greek. They spoke Hebrew, and in Hebrew the term for “Anointed One” is Messiah.
So Christ and Messiah mean the same thing. Our Lord is Jesus the Christ, the
Messiah, the Anointed One. And that means He is the promised Savior, the One
chosen by God the Father to save the world from sin. Now, of course, the
Pharisees know the term Christ, so when Jesus asks them, “Whose son is the
Christ or the Messiah?” They answer correctly, “He is the son of David.” But
that’s really only half of the right answer. And so Jesus needs to teach these
experts. The debate might be over. But the Bible study is just getting started.
Jesus quotes from one of the
Psalms of David: “How is it that David, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit,
calls the Christ Lord, saying, ‘The Lord
said to my Lord, sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your
feet’? If then David calls the Christ his Lord, how is he David’s son?” Everybody
tracking with Jesus? The Pharisees, and all Jews, and all Christians for that
matter, know that the Christ is the son of David – He is a human descendant of
King David. But in Psalm 110, David calls his descendant “Lord.” And this Lord,
this son of David is even going to sit at God’s right hand. David is worshiping
his descendant! This is incredible stuff. And the Pharisees don’t know how to
respond to this.
All you Christians already know
what this means. Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed and promised
Savior – He is David’s son and David’s Lord. How can this be? We learned it by
heart in the Small Catechism: “I believe that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten
of the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the Virgin Mary, is my
Lord.” Jesus the Christ is one Person with two complete natures. He is fully
and truly God – the eternal Son of the Father. And He is fully and truly man –
a son of David, the child of Mary. David’s God became a man, born from his own
bloodline. Our God is a man – Jesus the Christ.
But our God did not come in the
flesh just to repeat the Law to us. He did not become man just to answer the
Pharisees questions and give us impossible demands that leave us in hell. He
came to be the Christ. The Father anointed and sent His Son to save us from sin
and from the accusations of the Law. The Christ must be true man. The Law was
given for man to fulfill, so the Christ must be a man in order to do what the
Law commands. He must also be a man in order to suffer all the punishments of
the Law that we deserve. The Christ must be true man so that He could die. And
the Christ must be true God. If Christ was only a man then He couldn’t take the
place for all of us. Only God can pay the price for the sins of the whole
world. Only God can take care of hell’s punishments for all eternity. The
Christ must be true God so that He could save us all.
So now, with this right
knowledge of the Christ, let’s go back to Jesus’ answer about the Law. He sums
it all up: Love God and love your neighbor. He shows the unity to God’s Law. It’s
not a list of random rules. It has a unity of purpose: the Law accuses
everyone. It tells everyone: You have fallen short. You have not loved God
perfectly. You have not loved your neighbor perfectly. You have failed. And
we’re left in despair. Debate over. The Collect of the Day is a prayer for the
little Pharisee inside each of us. This prayer admits the truth: “O God, without You we are not able to
please You.” Without God’s mercy we have no hope. No matter how expert we
think we are in loving God or loving neighbor, we are not able to please God. So
the Collect continues: “mercifully grant that Your Holy Spirit may in all
things direct and rule our hearts.” We need God’s intervention. We need His
saving help. We need the answer to Jesus’ question about the Christ. That is,
we need the Christ Himself – the Messiah, the Anointed One, the promised
Savior.
This Christ loves you. And He
actually loves you so much that He will not overlook your sins. He died for
them – so He can’t just let you go on living with them. He paid the price for
your sins with His blood of the New Testament. So He calls you to repent and
trust in Him. The Christ is the only one who kept the two great commandments
perfectly. He loved God His Father with all His heart, soul, and mind. He loved
you His neighbors as Himself. He did what you cannot. He saved you to have you
as His own. With the Christ your Savior, the Law debate is over. He washed you
and made you holy. And He fills you with His true body born of Mary, yet also
the body of your God. The blood of the New Testament is poured for you from a
cup into your mouth to forgive your sins.
All this He is for you. Do not
despair. Do not give up hope. You have suffering now. But it’s not the
suffering of hell. Your sins are forgiven. The Law cannot condemn you because
you are with Christ. And the suffering you have right now will come to an end. The
Christ is David’s son and Lord. And He is your human Savior and your divine brother.
And He is coming again soon.
In the Holy + Name of Jesus –
Immanuel Lutheran Church
October 4, 2015
A few sentences and ideas came from Rev.
David Petersen (Trinity 18, 2014; and Issues Etc. Interview, Trinity 18, 2015)
